A lovely premiere!

The Sutherland Shire Choral Society, conducted by Melissa Kenny, premiered Laura's and my "4 Christmas Carols" today at 2:30 pm in St Patrick's Catholic Church, Sutherland. They did a really nice job with some very difficult music. The final one, in particular has some real rhythmic challenges for the singers, as well as setting the bar pretty high when it comes to getting the right balance between soloist and choir. All in all, it was a very satisfying performance, as the choir's diction was very good, and the silvery voice of soloist Judy Rough was delightful to listen to as the "difficult child" of the last carol.

The piece has been performed in bits at other times by the Illawarra Choral Society, although the final carol has never been performed. Thus, this counts as a world premiere of the collection. It was great to sit next to Laura and think, "This is really what we both wanted from these carols." The singers were very gracious and fulsome in their praise of both the words and the music, with some even saying that they'd like to perform more of my music. They may have been just being polite, but it's still nice to hear all the same!

That's the last premiere scheduled for this year. 2010 began with a new work for flute and organ played in the "Organs of the Goldfields" by Jean Penny and Andrew Blackburn in January, and, after several more pieces have been premiered in Taiwan, the USA, Melbourne and Sydney, it finishes with this one close to home. In all, six new works got airings this year - a record for me.

And there's more to come in 2011!

A great premiere!

On Wednesday 27th, my string orchestra piece, I Saw My Lady Weep was premiered in Melbourne by the Southern Cross Philharmonia. Conductor Gerald Gentry is a champion of Australian music and it's amazing to have a conductor who has such breadth on knowledge and musicianship interpreting your piece for a first performance. This is a conductor who worRalph Vaughan Williams, Roberto Gerard, Elizabeth Lutyens, Sir Arthur Bliss, Samuel Barber, John Ireland, Andrzej Panufnik, Percy Grainger  and Paul Hindemith The young players of the orchestra have a superb sound and are technically very good. It's a great pity this is not more than an "occasional" ensemble, as Gerald would be able to build a superb sound and ensemble sense form such great talent.

My piece, which was originally a string quartet written for the Scottish Chamber Orchestra String Quartet at the 1995 Hoy Composers' Course, run by Sir Peter Maxwell Davies, is based on the opening notes from John Dowland's song of the same name found in his Second Booke of Songs or Ayres (1600), which I first sang when I was about 15 or 16 in a concert, in full Elizabethan costume! I had been searching for a way into the work - an emotional entry key if you like - while under the pressure of having to try to compose the piece in less than a week. After three failed attempts to start the piece from a purely technical, sonic point of view, I finally found what I was looking for when, unbidden, a memory of the first time I saw my wife, Laura, cry, same to mind. 

The piece just flowed like tears (another Dowland reference for those of you who are counting) and the piece was completed in a real heat of industry. It's ten minutes long and took only five days using pencil and paper! It was so long that it caused Max to question whether or not I'd written it beforehand or not. However, there were plenty of witnesses to the contrary, so the piece went ahead. Afterwards, the players suggest that it would make a good string orchestra piece and, after 14 years of waiting (I converted it to a piece for String Orchestra in 1996) Gerald and the SCPO proved them right.

What was deeply satisfying to me about this work is that the complex counterpoint and deep emotion work very well together. It is a big wall of sound for a lot of the time, balanced by some very delicate and tiny sounds. Juxtaposition rules supreme, as it did for a lot of my music from the 1990's, and it still seems to hold up, 14 years after the event!

My deepest thanks to the Southern Cross Philhramonia and, most especially, Gerald Gentry for, as he says, championing Australia music!

An update on an exciting project

Last month, though it seems much further back, I was part of the creative team for a new project headed by lighting desigder extraordinaire Toby Knyvett. Briefly, along with two other composers, four dancers and come computers, cameras and interactive software, we created an event called Feedback You can read all about it by clicking the link above, which will take you to the documentation. There will be excerpts up on my website eventually too.

This is a very exciting and worthwhile project that seems to have garnered a lot of interest. The Festival circuit awaits, I think, as well as the installation circuit. We have some bugs to iron out as well as some over-arching structural ideas to develop, but this is one of the most interesting projects I've been involved with for some time. Keep a lookout for it as a Festival near you :)

A week in Tasmania

I think I've finally settled down enough to write about the superb week we have just spent in Hobart. I was Composer-in-Residence at the Tasmanian Conservatorium of Music last week, and Laura had a teaching gig at the Tasmanian Writers' Centre. Margaret brought her homework and, apart from a few hours a day spent doing maths and German, the city lay at her feet!

Hobart left a deep impression on all of us. Apart from its beauty and the happiness all around (people seemed really content to live there!) there was a delightful mix of sophistication and a "small town" feel. It was like stepping into a Cornish fishing village which just happened to have all the amenities of a capital city.

This included the University of Tasmania and its Conservatorium of Music. They were my generous and friendly hosts, providing us with a lovely, rustic cottage built around 1850 (and still going strong except for the night when the clothes dryer fell off the wall) and a steady, but not overwhelming, stream of student composers who are always exciting and challenging.

Apart from the one-to-one lessons (a bit of a novelty for me at the moment) I gave a two-hour seminar on my music, and Laura and I presented a one-hour seminar on the subject of collaboration - particularly ours.

On the Saturday night, the 9th October, pianist Vanessa Sharman capped the week off for me by premiering my "With Open Arms" for solo piano. Her intensity and musicianship were a blessing to a piece that has so much space, silence, reverberation and tension. The moment at the end where she crossed arms was a huge relief of tension both musically and "theatrically" - a dramatic moment she completely understood. In fact, she understood the work superbly all the way through. I could not have asked for a better reading of this work. I feel very blessed.

Sunday was a day to savour as, on Margaret's suggestion, we went to the Choral Eucharist at St David's Cathedral. An added bonus to the superb music was the presence of an old friend and colleague, Jane Edwards, who consummately performed the Mozart "Laudate Dominum". Afterwards, it was a great joy to have lunch with her, her husband Drew and little girl, Grace.

Add to all of this two perfect journeys to and from Wollongong and Hobart and we look back on this time as very special.

My thanks to Maria Grenfell, Don Kay and Kevin Purcell for making it all possible, Peter Lynch for organising the mechanics of it all, Sarah Miller for singing the papers and let me go and Stephen Ingham, who covered my classes while I was away.

And thanks to Laura and Margaret for coming with me :) It made all the difference that we could share this together.

A new website on the intertubes!

Yes, I've finally managed to get my website up! Please drop by at www.houstondunleavy.com and let me know what you think!

A new piece - on youtube!

This has just been uploaded by pianist extraordinaire Helen Lin. It is a recording she made with exciting American trumpeter John Irish of my "Skeletal Dance" for trumpet and piano , written especially for them in December 2009 and premiered by them in July 2010 in Taipei. She has put a nice little slide show together to accompany the sound file - I especially love the skeletons that appear at the 1 minute mark.

Enjoy! I did!!

Skeletal Dance, premiered by John Irish, trumpet, and Helen Lin, piano.

It's a pity every week isn't like this one!

It began with a lovely few days at World Con in Melbourne, being Laura's boy toy/trophy husband/arm candy etc. as she swam the corridors of Science Fiction Writers Inc. Laura had a book launch for the anthology Baggage which can be purchased from here  and is summarised and reviewed, among other places here. Apart form the launch, Laura was a panel moderator, where she kept the pace going, asked interesting questions and kept the loonies in the audience on a short leash. She also had a reading of her own work, but I had to miss that as I had to come back to the Gong to WORK! ARGH!

Actually, that work was pretty cool. I spent all of last Monday, and a fair chunk of the rest of the week, in the Bruce Gordon Theatre at the Illawarra Performing Arts Centre. There, along with two other composers, three dancers and a lighting designer, I was involved in the development of a new project for dancers, sound and motion capture software called "Feedback".  This involves computerised music and sound that is controlled by the movements of the dancers and, in the case of my work, the shadows of the dancer, which could be recorded and manipulated, thus triggering more sound cues. This is really nifty stuff to be involved in, with loads of potential for installations and public art, theatre and festival performances, as well as for film and internet projects. On Wednesday and Thursday evenings, we presented what we had been working on to the public for the first time, and the result was overwhelmingly positive.

All of this was made possible by development funding and in-kind support given by the Merrigong Theatre Company who are doing so much to facilitate good theatre and music theatre in our region, as well as providing local talent with the chance to develop their work to a more national standard.

Apart from this, and as if that weren't enough, I began preparing the The Sydney Male Choir for their 11th City of Sydney Concert the the Sydney Town Hall. I was only supposed to do last Tuesday night's dress rehearsal.  The retiring music director, Alan Thrift, should have conducted the concert today with me playing African drums on a couple of pieces. However, Alan, who has been in very poor health lately, took a turn for the worse and was hospitalized during the week. He was unable to be at the concert today, so I had the duty and honour of conducting the concert with 1200 or so in the audience.

The choir was, simply, stupendous. Their musicianship, a great tribute to the work of Alan Thrift, was on special display, and the fun and exuberance the men showed during the up tempo numbers (including the delirious moment when they front row formed a kick line in perfect unison!) caught the huge audience's imagination and joy rang out its song - all because of the legacy of Alan Thrift.

A great afternoon of music and laughter, with fabulous guest artists like the Bathurst Panorama Choir, Renae Lopez and Peter Kneeshaw. I mentioned drums before too. I couldn't play them on the concert, of course, so Laura bashed away on our African drum instead in primal, African style and made the day!

A special mention of pianist Eleanor Gair - a true and marvellous player, who is going to be a fantastic collaborator in the years ahead!

I'm looking forward to a great year in 2011 with this choir. Stay tuned for further concerts and events and I look forward to seeing you there!