Here you will find my blog posts. I'll try and keep it up to date, and will write about trips, performances and, no doubt, many other bits and bobs along the way!
It was around 7 hours on a coach from Edmonton to Saskatoon – I figured going by land was a nice way to see some of Canada. It turned out that it was a good way to see a very cold, white, flat desert!
But it past quickly (thanks to listening to Pink Floyd almost all of the way), and on arrival I was met by a Will Martin – a friend from Manchester, in fact we both lived in Chorlton a few years ago (it feels quite a long time ago now!) who now lives out there with his wife Karen.
My bulk of work in Saskatoon was towards the end of the week, so i was glad of a lie in on the Monday morning – Edmonton was great fun, but it is fair to say that we closed the bar every night, which meant I was a little short of sleep! We headed to Will’s workplace - St Johns Music where we met his work collegue, a great guy called Kris, before heading to a pub for lunch. It was here that they warned me about the bears…if you see a grizzly, you are supposed to curl up in a ball and play dead…if the bear is a the black variety, you have to make yourself big and try and scare it away. A floor in the plan seems to be telling the difference between the two – I wasn’t planning on hanging around to ask the bear, should I come across one!
I spent the evening at a school band on the outskirts of Saskatoon (it is quite a way away from the centre – I am told that the province of Saskatchewan is 17 times the size of England, but has only 1 million residents- 250,000 of them are in Saskatoon, and the province has more lakes than people!) We did a group composition class – the band separated out in to groups and they all produced miniature works to perform to each other. Sometimes, composition is just a confidence game – without it, it is very difficult to write at all (at least, that is the way it seems to be for me). With it, all of a sudden a blank sheet of paper has many exciting possibilities, and getting young people to see that and recognise that a blank sheet is an opportunity, not an impossible task, is a lot of fun – if hard work.
A day off on Tuesday meant I could get on with some composing, although I did manage to find time to watch England v Sweden. We headed to a local bar that evening to meet Kris, and the Director of Bands at the University of Saskatchewan, Darrin Oehlerking. By this stage, I had grown fond of a beer called Trad (Traditional Ale). There is a great micro-brewery movement in North America (my favourite of which is Goose Island from Chicago - Honker’s Ale being my tipple of choice!), and it is developing in to a fine tradition.
As mentioned in the first part of my Canada blog, composing is just about the best job I can imagine. It always amazes me that people take the time to learn your music – I mean, when you are just someone from Nuneaton who went to a normal school, came from a very modest background, the idea that someone will practise your music seems surreal. So on Thursday evening, when I was invited by Will and Roy Sydiaha to go and conductBridge City Brass (the brass band they both conduct) through some of my pieces, it was a real honour.
I conducted Fanfare for a Festival, Match Day, Sentinel and – what was most special to me - The Pohutukawa Stands. It is a work that was commissioned by Woolston Brass Band from Christchurch, NZ, to be written in memory of those who lost their lives in the terrible earthquake earlier in the year. I’d not heard the piece live in person before, so this was a real treat for me. The band were of a really good standard – they had lots of patience, enthusiasm, and were great sight readers.
The final two days were spent judging and giving clinics at UNIFEST. Thursday was spent around local Saskatoon schools, hearing their short performances (which by the way, were all to a really high standard) before giving some feedback, and delivering a clinic for each band, working with them to find areas as to where to better their performances. It turned out that I had a power – unbeknown to me – which was my accent. A music teacher/band teacher can tell them 100 times to watch the conductor, but they don’t. A guy who they have known for 5 minutes and is from England, they listen immediately!
The same was true on Friday, where I was based at the central UNIFEST venue, doing the same job, but this time to bands who had travelled from further afield in the state – up to 4 hours away, maybe more! This was again fun, although I was also slightly in awe of how a country can deal with a blizzard, leaving 10cm of snow, and hardly blink! One band in particular were as near to perfect as a grade 2 band could be – it was a tough 40 minutes to fill in the clinic!
I don't think it was my birthday, and I don't think I am a moose.
A fun evening followed at a cowboy bar – I didn’t see any cowboys, I just mean that the bar was cowboy themed (all the cowboys seemed to be in Edmonton for the rodeo – now that was an experience!) – where I was given the bar’s traditional birthday treat: a bowl of ice cream, complete with sparklers, whilst having a mosses head and antlers put on. Strangely, it wasn’t my birthday…
It was a great night, which made the 7 hour return trip to Edmonton the next day a little tough – this time, Dire Straits got me through! A pretty rubbish Lufthansa flight home (where the console highlight was an episode of Midsummer Murders) followed, and before I knew it, was back in the UK.
Canada is an amazing country – I really hope I get the chance to go back there (and really hope I avoid the bears again…). I have been fortunate enough to go to many different and varied places around the world, but I have no doubt that Canada was the most friendly – and I received the most incredible performance of Apophenia there, and they even have the Queen on their coins! What more could you want from a country?
I’m not too sure that there is a better job than being a composer; sure, it has its challenges (these are more often than not fun, anyway) but they are far outweighed by the positives – of which, I find anyway, there are many.
I have just returned from spending the best part of 2 weeks in Canada in two cities (Edmonton and Saskatoon) that, chances are, if it were not for being a composer I wouldn’t have visited.
But I would have missed out.
The journey out there was a nightmare – I will not be flying Lufthansa again. The famous German precision was replaced by delays and bad customer service. But I made it (after 23 hours!) and was greeted by a pint of Canadian beer (thankfully not a Labatts in sight!), a club sandwich and a trumpeter – not bad by all accounts! – called Jens Lindemann!
(Seriously – if you haven’t heard him play, you haven’t lived! Buy his latest CD…it may also have a recording of my concerto on it…)
Jens - I think he plays a Yamaha if anyone was wondering...
My main reason for the visit was to hear Jens perform my trumpet concerto, Apophenia, with the Edmonton Symphony Orchestra. Jens has already recorded it with brass band(with Fodens Band – what a recording!), but these were the premiere performances with symphony orchestra…more of that in a moment.
Shortly after the sandwich and beer (okay, two beers) we both headed off to a rehearsal of the combined forces of a couple of Edmonton’s brass bands. Jens was guest soloist in a concert with them and I was fighting jet lag, so staying at the hotel would have been a bad idea (I needed to push through until a decent time to sleep!). This evening was to finish in the Sherlock Holmes (a “British style pub”) – a friendly bar that served some great beer. It was the only night that the evening’s proceedings finished there – so much so that some of the bar staff ended up coming to the concerts!
Thursday saw another first for me – a BBQ in winter! Edmonton was not the warmest place on earth (it was -30c the day I left!), but it didn’t matter – the winter dry atmosphere and the cold clear sky (and a jumper!) made a strange combination for enjoying food and drink outdoors, but it worked perfectly.
Jens drove us to his parent’s house, where I got to meet the lovely Herr and Frau Lindemann (the Chef at said BBQ). Not only was their food beautiful, but they were great company. It was very interesting to hear their stories about Germany of old, and specifically about those Germans who were executed for opposing Hitler. It’s perhaps something that is very easy to forget for the British – it shouldn’t be.
So to the performances…
Bill Eddins - stunningly good conductor, who has the town in his hands. And, as this picture shows, is a World champion of the dry butterfly stroke discipline!
Simply put, Friday was brilliant. Jens blew everyone away with his performance (and it should be said that Brian Thurgood on kit was spectacular in both performances) – the reception was fantastic. The orchestra, who are very good, are conducted by Bill Eddins – who is a total inspiration: to the musicians and, it was clear, to the city. The panel for the post-concert discussion (yes – hundreds of people stay behind on a Friday night, after the concert) included myself, Bill and Jens, and was fun and lively – but the truth is that the sizeable amount of people who had stayed behind hung on every word from their city’s maestro, and it wasn’t too hard to see that Jens was one of their favourite sons too!
If Friday was brilliant, I guess the only word for Saturday is blistering. Bill and the ESO were in sparkling form, but Jens was on a different planet to Friday – it was just about the best live playing I have ever heard from anyone. Forget all the technique stuff (unbelievably impressive as it was) this was pure musicianship on demonstration coupled with an amazing ability to captivate and entertain an audience. The only time I have really seen anything like this was at a concert featuring Nigel Kennedy as soloist – he has the same ability. And this piece is not easy – but that is all part of it; great performers, in music or in sport, deliver their best game when on the biggest stage. When the adrenalin is pumping, when the risky line between failure and and success is wafer thin – that is when this kind of person takes care of business. Jens is that kind of person.
It received a standing ovation – no doubt all were standing for the incredible performance. But what was nice was the amount of audience members who took the time to come and talk to me about the piece, discuss the performance and wish me well for my travels – Canada was full of lovely people.
I was lucky enough to meet many people in Edmonton, although perhaps my favourite story came from a friend of Jens’. Mike, a car enthusiast and musician, sings in the Swiss male voice choir based in Edmonton – although it’s how the choir describes itself that appealed most to me: “a drinking group with a singing problem”! Brilliant!
I also met a member of the board of the ESO – who told me that the Winspear Centre (the home of the orchestra) was built by the city for the city, even local builders worked overtime for free in order to finish the concert hall. Such investment (personal, as opposed to financial) is probably the reason for this:
The Winspear Centre: Like Rome, not built in a day - but importantly, was built by Edmonton.
The concert hall was pretty much sold out both nights – it holds around 2000 people. It was the same programme, featuring 2 premieres, that is, pieces that the audience hadn’t heard before, and it still sold out. So it was not a “bums on seats” mentality.
Literally hundreds of people turned up for the post concert talk on Friday – after a long day, a substantial concert: and the audience still wanted to hear more. A similar number turned up for the pre-concert talk on Saturday. Maybe the orchestra too have seen that risky fine line, paid it due respect, before saying “thanks, but no thanks”.
I don’t pretend to know what is wrong with music and programming in the UK (although it is clear that there is a problem), but am pretty sure that we can only dream about such an audience for a similar concert, given twice.
Like I say, I’m not sure there are any better jobs than being a composer – and Saturday night’s concert, where I can honestly say I received the best performance of any work of mine, was a perfect demonstration as to why.
Those of you who know me will know that I live and breath Liverpool Football Club. Of course, being a supporter involves cheering on your team, debating tactics with friends, talking about potential transfers et al. But supporting our team is a little different to most, it is about something bigger than the football. We have a responsibility to make our voices heard, to continue the pursuit for justice for 96 fans and their families, and never let those who perished at Hillsborough ever be forgotten.
Please, please, please sign the Government petition to release all hidden documents that were part of the cover up. 22 years on, and parents don’t have justice for the deaths of their children, children for the deaths of their grandparents, friends for the death their friends.
As someone who has some sort of audience, like the script writer, the poet, the artist, I felt I had a responsibility to do my part to make sure that Hillsborough didn’t become abstract, that it was kept very real, and that the fight for justice, and the memory of those who perished was kept at the forefront of the minds of as many as possible. So in 2009, I wrote a piece to commemorate the 20th anniversary of the tragedy titled: Epitaph (for Hillsborough). Below is a performance of the piece, as well as the work’s program note.
Epitaph (for Hillsborough)was written on the 20th anniversary of the Hillsborough stadium disaster, April 15 1989, in memory of the 96 victims. All of the victims were fans of Liverpool Football Club, the club I have supported since I was a young child.
The disaster unfolded in front of the BBC television cameras, and due to the importance of the match (FA Cup semi final), millions, including myself, witnessed it first hand, leaving a lasting impression in the public psyche.
Several features of the piece were determined by the tragedy. The length of the piece, around 7 minutes, represents the minutes of the game that were played that day (The match was abandoned after 6 minutes), and the 60 seconds of the work, where the band gently applaud, is a reference to the first match played after the tragedy, a European Cup semi final between AC Milan and Real Madrid.
After 6 minutes, the referee blew his whistle and all the players stood still where they were, both sets of fans applauded in memory of the perished, and the fans of AC Milan began singing You’ll Never Walk Alone, the anthem of Liverpool Football Club.
The work also features 96 strikes of the tubular bells, in memory of each person who lost their life.
Epitaph is dedicated to the 96 people who died that day, and to their families whose fight for justice is an inspiration to all.
At the start of February I was voted as Chair of BASBWE (British Association of Symphonic Bands and Wind Ensembles), which will be quite a challenge – an enjoyable one, an honour, but a challenge. I am very lucky that the rest of the Executive committee are full of energy, experience, youth, brains and ideas – it means we have a lot to look forward to over the next 2 years (my term) and beyond.
Tomra Brass Band. conducted by Nick Ost, gave the premiere of Fire in the Sky at the Norwegian brass band championships. The work is inspired by a trip to the glorious Montreux, Switzerland, and the musicians who have lived there and graced the amazing Stravinski concert Hall, namely Miles Davis, Freddie Mercury and Stravinsky himself.
You can hear their performance here:
March highlights included….
First performances in China of any of my music
World premiere of Fenix Blue for Alto sax and wind orchestra, given by Tim Watson and Lambeth Wind Orchestra at the BASBWE London Festival
Launch of volume 1 of my wind band music – more on this later
Apex recorded and released by Jim Hayes
BASBWE London Festival (including a performance of Elegie given by Becky Smith and Kew Wind Orchestra)
Okay, well it appears that I have been very slack in keeping this up to date. I made a New Years resolution to be better than I was last year, but it seems as though I have had a massive fail…so am going to catch up, and from April onwards, will be keeping it up to date now I have my new iPhone (which I hate to admit that I like!), and can do it on the move…
So January was a hectic, exciting month. It started with friends and family, and ended with my birthday (which was the same day some ex-Liverpool player handed in a transfer request to LFC, not a good way to start my birthday. I have forgotten the player’s name now – I think he went to some small time London club…).
I had 2 deadlines to meet at the very start of the year, and I managed to meet them, although Christmas Day was spent writing the first of the two pieces, Fire in the Sky; a new work for Tomra Brass Band in Norway, which was commissioned by my good friends Stijn Berbe and Nick Ost. More on that in Febuary.
The second piece – Shine – is a new 12 minute work for tuba. The premiere was given at the RNCM Festival of Brass, where I was one of the featured composers, by Les Neish (who commissioned the piece) and Grimethorpe Band, conducted by Howard Evans.
A trip to Belgium followed for a new piece commissioned by Brass Band Willebroek and Achel Fanfare Band – probably Belgium’s top two amateur (only in terms of finance, not in terms of standard that is for sure) bands, and there are many fantastic brass, fanfare and wind bands. Ad Astra was the name of the piece, and it was a kind of funked up Gershwin number, written whilst I was in America, and named after a very nice beer that was given to me in Kansas City!
The end of the month felt like the end of the world as Fernando Torres displayed properties that Judas would have been proud of and headed south for Chelski, and my years on this earth ticked over from 30 to a rather unimpressive 31. However, it was my favourite weekend of the year – RNCM Festival of Brass, and this year I was honoured to be invited to the festival by the Artistic Director, Paul Hindmarsh, as a featured composer.
4 of my pieces were played: Dave Childs and Cory were in stunning form on Sparta – Dave really is something else, a true performer, but that combined with his skill on the euphonium is something to behold. One of the best performances of a piece I’ve ever had – flair!!!
Leyland and Philip Harper performed Macbeth in the Saturday morning concert, where my old college friends John Doyle and Ben Rapp performed the fiendish solo parts, on cornet and flugel respectively, brilliantly. Leyland are one of my favourite brass bands, and so it is always great when they play a piece of mine, especially when your friends play as well as they did!
I’ve already mentioned the piece for Les Neish – Shine (an anagram of his name) – and he has recorded it with Wingates Band for release on CD later in the year. He’s another great performer – I think we must have had a really talented crop of performers at the RNCM whilst I was there. So many of them are professionals now – many of them amazing soloists. It makes the gig better when you can have a great performance, enjoy a pint with the soloist and catch up on old times all at once!
But perhaps my favourite concert of the weekend was Fodens band. The whole concert was stunning – Jim Gourlay is at his best with music as good as they played that night – but they performed my Epitaph (for Hillsborough), and it was perfect. Not just the playing, but the atmosphere, and everything about it. It’s after weekends such as this I realise just how lucky I am.
