This is why I teach

I teach because I get the chance to meet with, mentor and learn from talented people who, at least in the case of the program I currently teach into, may not have anywhere else in this country to study. We can say all we like about our pedagogical method, our financial viability, future plans etc., but the proof of what we do comes out, in the end, in the quality and originality of music that these young artists produce.

For want of a better term, we are an experimental music composition program. We use what we have to hand, be it the latest gadget on the computer market (preferably free of shareware!) or a second-hand viola, or a bicycle wheel - anything that makes a sound in fact. The more dramatic and visual it can be the better at times. Our students have created instruments for their works that are as much sculptures as they are musical instruments, and they are encouraged to break down the barriers between what might be considered more pedestrian definitions of "music", "sound", "sculpture", etc. This is hardly a new idea, but it's very surprising how challenging it is to the artistic community even now, and how it really doesn't seem to be something the rest of the community has embraced either - at least on a conscious level.

In the coming weeks, I'll post some pics and video of the concerts the students have recently mounted, which will all be available on youtube. Meanwhile, to whet your appetite, and to illustrate what I'm talking about, here's a video my Faculty made last year of our first year students performing improvised music live and outdoors, some with instruments they had found/bought recently/built.

It contains an interview with me, but you can fast forward through that. I seem not to have slept for the previous two years if this shot is anything to go by.