New Pieces: Muted The Night, Two Animals

​I haven’t updated this website with new work for sometime. I’ve been in limbo.

I was in a bad accident in August. I was out of work for two months, but I could compose (I met my deadlines and kept my sanity) and I could practice chess (I bumped my chess.com ELO from c1100 to c1350). 

I was also able to submit applications. Having dealt me a pretty horrible blow, luck decided it would take my side thereafter. I got Arts Council funding for Filthy Lucre’s Hurricane Bells project, a place on the National Youth Choir’s Young Composer Scheme, and a further exciting opportunity that is yet to be made public.

This has left me in an odd place over the winter. Returning to work is hard, catching up on old projects and rushing to meet stubbornly immobile deadlines. Due to my injuries, I haven’t been able to restart performance, meaning that my EP Flim Flam has been on hold since its debut at Artificial Hells in the summer. While writing new works for the London Symphony Orchestra and for Milos Milojevic has been stimulating, it’s been a long time since my last performance. That has left me feeling disconnected from my work.

That’s about to change!

This weekend, Hurricane Bells finally kicked off. I’m so excited to see Peter’s work get an audience in Cambridge, and thrilled by what is shaping up to be some wonderful collaborations in London and Birmingham in April. It was a nice surprise to hear it mentioned on Thought For The Day on Monday morning! There's so much to these bells, do try to make it to Peter's talk on Saturday if you're in the area!

Peter with cowbell and Hurricane Bell.

On March 26th, my piece Muted The Night will be performed in a public workshop by the LSO, conducted by François Xavier-Roth. I am so curious to hear this piece which contains a lot of new techniques and obsessions. I’m proud of what I’ve written, and genuinely don’t know exactly how it will sound! There are free tickets available here: my piece is scheduled for around 3pm.
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Just five days later, on the 31st March, Milos Milojevic will record and film my new piece for accordion, Two Animals. It’s a challenging piece, in which the accordionist sings and breathes alongside his instrument’s mechanical exhalations. You can keep an eye out for that film on Psappha’s YouTube channel.