Joe Bates
  • News
  • Music
    • Full List
    • Large Ensemble >
      • Muted The Night
      • London's Other Bones
    • Small Ensemble >
      • Straight Line Through A Landscape
      • Two Animals
      • Nocturne
      • Lain Lines
      • Us Alone
      • A Noise So Loud
    • Solo >
      • Suite for Guitar
      • Sparrow
      • Street Through A Window
      • Two Animals
      • Flim Flam
      • Slow Hills
    • Vocal >
      • The Hazelnut
      • Some Parts of Us
      • Now Is A Long Time
      • Cataracts
      • Ceasing
      • Hildegard
  • Recordings
  • About
  • Teaching
  • Filthy Lucre
  • Upcoming Dates

Music

To get an overview of my music, you could start with my solo works: my EP, Flim Flam, or my piece for double bass, Sparrow. From there, you could check out my work for choir, Ceasing, or my works for small ensemble, A Noise So Loud or Us Alone. 

Much of my work is challenging to perform, but some is easier. This music might be suitable for amateurs, students or for settings with limited rehearsal time. You can find this work grouped together at the bottom of the page.

Large Ensemble


Muted The Night (2019)

"Music is feeling, then, not sound; 
And thus it is that what I feel, 
Here in this room, desiring you, 

Thinking of your blue-shadowed silk, 
Is music." (Wallace Stevens, Peter Quince at the Clavier)
3'30". For orchestra.
Full details
Score


London's Other Bones (2016)

A piece about London, where every building is raised from the guts of its predecessor.
17'. For orchestra.
Full details
Score

Small Ensemble


Straight Line Through A Landscape (2022)
A ceremony for siphoned demijohns.
18'. For flute, violin, cello, percussion.
​Full details.
Score

Two Animals (2021)

A meditation for ensemble, based on the piece of the same name for solo accordion.
5'. For any combination of 6 or more instruments.
​Full details.
Score

Nocturne (2021)

A piece of night music with warped electronic echoes.
6'. For piano, double bass, percussion and live electronics.
​Full details
Score

Lain Lines (2020)

A piece for accelerating string quartet.
4'. For string quartet.
​Full details
Score

Us Alone (2018)

A piece about failure, written for Zoe Martlew. A partner piece for Horatiu Radulescu's Intimate Rituals.
18'. For cello and 2 Sound Icons; or cello and electronics.
Full details

Score
Recording


A Noise So Loud (2017)

A piano quartet that gets happier as it goes along. 
16', with an excerptible movement. For Piano Quartet.
Full details
Score
​Recording

Vocal


The Hazelnut (2020)

A song about seeing all of creation in a ball the size of a hazelnut. Text by Julian of Norwich.
5'. For choir.
​Full details

Now Is A Long Time (2020)

A song about time in isolation.
6'. For choir.
​Full details
Score

Some Parts of Us (2020)

A song about losing friends.
5'. For choir.
​Full details
​

Cataracts (2020)

A song about blindness and waterfalls.
4'. For soprano and piano.
Full details
Score

Ceasing (2019)

A song about death.
16'. For choir and live electronics.
Full details
Score
Recording
Video

Hildegard (2018)

A setting of Hildegard of Bingen's imaginary language for a film by Paul Vernon.
10'30". For synths, soprano and film, or soprano and electronics.
Full details
Score
​Film

Solo


Sparrow (2020)

A virtuosic tune for double bass.
9'. For solo double, scordatura.
Full details.
Score
​
Recording

Street Through A Window (2020)

A suite of dusty pieces for muted, detuned harp.
12', with four excerptible movements. For solo harp.
Full details.
Score

Two Animals (2020)

A meditation for singing accordionist. 
5'. 
Full details

Flim Flam EP (2018)

A suite for synthesisers about desire at a remove.
28'. For solo electronics.
​Full details
Score
Recording

Early Summers EP (2017)

A series of songs, for me to perform, that I never perform.
27'. For a singer playing keyboard and electronics.
Full details

Slow Hills (2013)

A piano piece about wanting to run away to a cottage in the rain. ​
5'. ​For piano.
​Full details
Score
​Recording

The Internal Glow Of Electric Hearts (2010)

"Awake all night my friends and I,
Hunkered under mosque lamps domed with fine-traced brass:
These charged our spirits to shine like them:
The internal of electric hearts." Marinetti, trans. Oran Maguire

5'. For electronics.
​Full details

Suitable for amateurs


Two Animals (2021)

A meditation for ensemble, based on the piece of the same name for solo accordion.
5'. For any combination of 6 or more instruments.
​Full details.
Score

Slow Hills (2013)

A piano piece about wanting to run away to a cottage in the rain. ​
5'. ​For piano.
​Full details
Score
​Recording

Street Through A Window (2020)

A suite of dusty pieces for muted, detuned harp. The third movement of this piece is easier than the others.
12', with four excerptible movements. For solo harp.
Full details.
Score

Some Parts of Us (2020)

A song about losing friends.
5'. For choir.
​Full details

Cataracts (2020)

A song about blindness and waterfalls.
4'. For soprano and piano.
Full details
Score

The Hazelnut (2020)

A song about seeing all of creation in a ball the size of a hazelnut. Text by Julian of Norwich.
5'. For choir.
​Full details
All photographs by Ilme Vysniauskaite
  • News
  • Music
    • Full List
    • Large Ensemble >
      • Muted The Night
      • London's Other Bones
    • Small Ensemble >
      • Straight Line Through A Landscape
      • Two Animals
      • Nocturne
      • Lain Lines
      • Us Alone
      • A Noise So Loud
    • Solo >
      • Suite for Guitar
      • Sparrow
      • Street Through A Window
      • Two Animals
      • Flim Flam
      • Slow Hills
    • Vocal >
      • The Hazelnut
      • Some Parts of Us
      • Now Is A Long Time
      • Cataracts
      • Ceasing
      • Hildegard
  • Recordings
  • About
  • Teaching
  • Filthy Lucre
  • Upcoming Dates