Back in November, Sir Peter Maxwell Davies was invited to Manchester University by the Music Society to attend a concert by Vaganza as part of the New Music North West festival. Vaganza performed my Moto Perpetuo, and Max gave a Forum afterwards, where he talked about his work with me, fellow composer Professor Philip Grange, and my fellow student Helen Pearce. You can now see a video of the interview – below is a clip of me asking him a question, and you can see the full interview divided into questions here, or as one continuous video here.

The Candle is being performed on Tuesday at the RNCM, as part of Sing Ariel: The Music of Alexander Goehr. It’s a joint concert between Vaganza, the University of Manchester’s new music ensemble, and the RNCM’s New Ensemble. Vaganza’s Olivia Howie (alto), Olivia Jageurs and Naomi Lewis (harps) and Ali Vennart (viola) will perform my work, and Vaganza will also be performing a work by University of Manchester masters student Chris Swithinbank.

Olivia Jageurs gave the premiere of Harfenstück on Thursday at her final undergraduate harp recital. You can hear a recording of the work here:

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The University of Manchester 3rd-year recitals are this week at the Martin Harris Centre for Music and Drama. Olivia Jageurs gives the premiere of Harfenstück this Thursday June 3rd at 17:00 in a programme for harp that also covers Fauré, Bach, Berio and fellow Manchester composer Josh Spear. Then the day after on Friday 4th, Sarah Hill is playing the Two Études for Solo Violin on the 4th June at 16:20 alongside Ravel, Bloch and Bartók.

The subsequent Wednesday, an old forgotten piece, Music in Four Tempi, will finally get its first performance as part of the Manchester University Music Society’s Estival. Estival is a four-day long student-run arts festival held in the Martin Harris Centre. My work will be performed from the balconies at 1pm in the foyer.

A few weeks ago the Raise Your Voice Collective performed Avian Riots at Centro Bar in Manchester (that’s them below, photographed by Simon Bray). They’ve made a recording of the night, managing to edit out some of the upstairs noise they had to contend with…the recording of my piece has been put on its page in the Works & Audio section. You can also stream or download the rest of the concert here.

Violinist Michael Jones and an ensemble of eleven University of Manchester students recorded Acheronta Movebo on Wednesday. You can now see a video of the performance, which I was very pleased with:

Of course, that video will live in the Video section, and the audio has been put in the composition’s page in the Works & Audio section. I’ve also put up recordings of Sarah Hill performing Two Études for Solo Violin, and some extracts from the score I did for Sinbad, a play done at the Camden Roundhouse in Summer 2009. Just click on the names to hear them at their respective pages…

And so onwards to other things – on Thursday I talk about my dissertation at the Martin Harris Centre at an Undergraduate Musicology Forum at 15.30. Then on Friday the Raise Your Voice Collective perform Avian Riots at 20.00 at Centro Bar in Manchester’s Northern Quarter, as part of the Fu­tur­eEverything Fest­ival Show­case. Lastly, on Sunday, we travel to the York Spring Festival to perform The Candle as part of the Conference & Collaboration Weekend. The free concert will see various student compositions from around the country, and is in the Jack Lyons Concert Hall from 15.30.

Phew…now you’re up to date…

I’m giving a talk at the University of Manchester on the 13th May about my recent undergraduate dissertation, titled ‘This Is Our Music: Black Music & White America’. I’ll be briefly outlining aspects of the study, which looks at the evolution of black music – from minstrelsy to free jazz via blues, bebop and rock & roll – against the backdrop of the civil rights movement and dominant white society. It’s a side of my musical interests I rarely get a chance to address publicly, but jazz and blues are great passions of mine, so it has been great to write this dissertation over the last few months.

The talk will be part of an Undergraduate Musicology Forum at the Martin Harris Centre for Music and Drama, and will also feature discussions by fellow students Rob Bentall on the late works of Steve Reich, David Tagg-Oram on orchestral funding, and Imogen Walker on the immigrant musicians of the Beating Wing Orchestra.

A new work of mine, Acheronta Movebo, will be recorded at an informal concert at the University of Manchester on the 5th of May.

It is essentially a mini concerto for violin and ensemble of eleven (that is, a violin concerto that’s mini, not a concerto for mini violin…). It was written for violinist Michael Jones, who he will be accompanied by other students at Manchester.

You can read more about the piece at its page in the Work & Audio section, and I’ll be posting up the audio when it’s done.

The magnificent Raise Your Voice Collective will be giving the premiere of a new piece of mine, Avian Riots, for flute, clarinet and string quartet. The concert is on the 14th May at Centro Bar in Manchester, and is part of the FutureEverything Festival.

Raise Your Voice are a Manchester ensemble who had their first performance in February, bringing contemporary music in amongst the clinking of glasses of Manchester’s Northern Quarter. They had an eclectic programme including new instrumental and electro-acoustic premieres, laptop improvisations and the gesture-based Buchla Lightning device.

The evening will also be featuring new works by other composers connected to Manchester: Martin Suckling, Luke-Matthew Iveson, Chris Swithinbank, Steve Pycroft, José Puello and John Davies.

It’s the third-year recitals at the University of Manchester in June, with two pieces of mine being played. Sarah Hill is playing the Two Études for Solo Violin on the 4th June alongside Ravel and Bartók, while on the 3rd June Olivia Jageurs gives the premiere of Harfenstück in a programme for harp that also covers Fauré, Bach, Berio and fellow Manchester composers Steven Calver and Josh Spear.