april news for rae and sunwrae...

phew! it's april already?! the story of my life at the moment.. it's going too fast! where did the time go? a month since my last post?! ok i'm over my outburst. i have had some adventures though..

march was crazy busy with projects.. first and foremost was the dance and music collaboration with choreographer chris scott and 8 dancers from the london contemporary dance school, along with jenni wright, a fabulous french horn player from the guildhall school of music & drama. i wrote the music and played piano & vibraphone.. my london debut performances!! it truly was a great project to be involved in. chris and i were on the same page from day 1 (that's pretty rare i think!) and so hopefully we'll create something more in the coming year or two.. maybe to tour?! that's be good too! we were the finale act ( i like to think that's a compliment! ) and i think the audience liked it too.. wish i could post it here, but i haven't got the dvd (hoping to soon tho). here's a pic tho from my practice sessions...

next up.. my orchestral work was premiered on march 18.. apparently it was great but i haven't heard the recording yet!! hopefully they'll send me a photo too.. i'll be back with more when i know..

then... i had two weeks break (from my masters classes), which consisted of writing essays, project proposals and funding applications (fun stuff eh?).. but also an easter trip to st ives, cornwall.. the beach! now it wasn't exactly beach weather, but it didn't stop the pomms from gearing up in wetsuits and surfing what looked like not even a foot of surf. i laughed out loud sipping coffee from the warm of the beach cafe out of the rain, but gave them points for the effort.

next stop.. denmark! the home of lego!! legoland was awesome.. it's an amusement park with rides for kids and adults!! and so many amazing lego sculptures..
here's a very short but hilarious video from our trip there...

and some pics... couldn't resist this one..

there's even an underwater world with real sharks, fish and all sorts!

crazy that they're all made from tiny lego block huh!

mmm. so not much else on the cards, oh but ah! that's right.. i've taken up a new hobby.. bouldering! couldn't resist taking a picture of my shoes with the view from my flat in the background too..  ha! not that i'm climbing buildings, just walls and boulders so far. it's indoor too here, but maybe the wild outdoors will call when i'm somewhere with good rocks ;-)

mmm. so next musical venture is a short gig for sunday in the apartment.. then onto a project with an illustrator, idris hussain, to make an animation film... stay tuned for updates!!!

til next time, r

2 premieres, 2 cities and lots of music!

well it's been a busy couple of weeks here in london. i thought it was about time to get out there and see lots more music than i have been..

southbank on march 2nd: oren marshall and koby israelite duo.. wowwee. what a pair. certainly one of the most dynamic duos i've seen for a while. oren's a tuba player extraordinaire and koby a multi-instrumentalist with quirky and amazing skills. well worth a look at both of these artists..

southbank delivers again on march 3rd: heiner goebbel's 'surrogate cities', performed by trinity laban orchestra. what a feat.. a huge orchestra, with the largest percussion section i've seen.

kettner's champagne house in soho (yes, daarling) on march 3rd: sunday in the apartment which is an all australian showcase of music/writing/art in london. rather heavy in the musical theatre department rather than a broader range of styles, but i've only been to one and it was very enjoyable and comic! there's a chance i'll be playing at the next one so i'll keep you posted there..

so that was a busy weekend, but oh so enthrawling.. VERY contrasting musical performances too...

and just yesterday:

king's place, sunday 11th: 'not so silent movies'.. live soundtracks to rare and classic silent movies. very funny and entertaining for sure. the band consisted of bass, drums, horn/trumpet, pedal steel, harp, violin and cello and what a lineup of musos... i've booked tickets to see them again when my sister arrives in town (not long now).

wigmore hall on sunday 11th: the brodsky quartet.. of course those who have seen them play can agree, one of the most engaging live string quartets. i was wide eyed the whole performance.. wonderful works by respighi and puccini, as well as wolf, ravel, debussy, schubert.. very inspiring to see and hear. makes me want to write a whole series of quartet work! i'll get there eventually when i'm not so frantic...


the other exciting news this week is that my orchestral piece Tails of the Trebuchet is being premiered in ballarat by the ballarat symphony orchestra on sunday, march 18 at the wendouree performing arts centre. i would love to be there however time and money prove otherwise at the moment. if you're available to go, please be my proxy!!

and in london.. march 29 & 30 i'll be performing (and premiering) a dance & music collaboration live. together with choregrapher chris scott from the london contemporary dance school we've created a work for piano, vibraphone & horn performing live for 8 contemporary dancers... it'll be at 'the place' in king's cross/ euston. more details to come...

London Contemporary Dance School and a new piano!

so! i'm back. it's been quite crazy at guildhall. this month we're running a project called 'dialogue' for the 'Barbican Weekender'. the theme is Urban Stories. it's a big project working with storytellers, community groups, family groups, choirs, primary and secondary schools in nearby bethnall green, and current & post students of the guildhall. my part is running workshops with the schools and supporting the secondary band & choir, creating small performances that all piece together one after the other, creating a larger roving sort of concert, throughout the barbican. that's my understanding of it anyway.. the rest i improvise (but don't tell them i said that).

at the same time (and the most exciting thing for me), is starting a project with the London Contemporary Dance School...

it was a last minute invite from the composition department at guildhall, to compose a work for a dance project, in collaboration with a choreographer, Chris Scott. he's finishing his course at LCDS. so, the project is to create a work together from scratch. it's a pretty new concept for me (but oh so exciting), coz until now, any specific dance projects i've been involved with have usually been entirely improvised, or the work is choreographed to one of my existing compositions. this time however, as we're both creating from scratch, we're influenced as much as each other right throughout the process.

there'll be more news to come as the work unfolds, but here's a sneak peak at what came out of the first rehearsal. i mostly improvised or played some existing compositions on the piano, to get chris and the dancers familiar with my style. on this below clip, i left out the music (sorry!) so i wouldn't be influenced by it when watching it at a later date. i'm sure they'd say it's a bit rough, but it was waay exciting for me...

and the next thing... MY NEW PIANO!!!
today i experienced a most amazing and generous thing. someone donated a piano to me (edit: actually this didn't turn out in the end, but it made for a good story at the time!!!!). i've been needing to buy one for my flat (it's been driving me crazy to not have one at home believe me!) and i have been looking frantically for one that is suitable, affordable and course playable. i've had a number of trips to the countryside to play and bid on pianos. the train journeys have been great, but not so successful until today, yay! i initially put a hold on a very small second-hand yamaha upright from a shop, however had to call back, apologise and say no when i received a call following up my 'email of interest' from last week. a lovely lady and gentleman from orpington (countryside outside london), questioned me about my studies, wanting to know more and more. to cut a long story short, today i have walked away with an antique 'Dörner' upright piano, from stuttgart in germany. could be from the early 1900's.. it's quite old, but such a lovely open tone. the moving and shaking of course is yet to be done (my only costs are to move and tune it), but soon (hopefully next week?!), i'll have the piano in my flat. i'm hoping my neighbours won't mind.. i haven't even checked it with the official building peoples, but my flatmate likes the idea, so that's good enough for me until i get told off!


the best part about the story is that during our conversation over a lovely cup of english tea, i found out that the lady is the sister of a certain Isobel Rolston, who was the director at the banff centre in canada, whilst i was there in 2006 for my winter residency. what are the chances?! i gave them a gift of my cd 'never stops to wait'. it certainly doesn't balance the scales, but one day i'll thank them properly by inviting them to an amazing concert. it truly is a fabulous and generous gift.. and i am very grateful that it came at this time.. i can afford to eat for another couple of months now! yay!

ok (edit 29/02/2012): so the free one didn't work out.. they reneged! how's that?! offering then reneging. sheesh!! to cut a long story short: i called the piano shop back and mine was still there.. so it's being delivered today.. yay! just goes to show that it's waaay better just to pay someone to do the job, then you know it'll be done.

well, better run. work and sleep to be had.
back soon! :)

Happy new year...

happy new year to you all out there.. hope 2012 brings you all you may need and more..

so. once again, time has flown and it's already mid-january, mid winter (i think -1 degrees this morning here in london?!) and i'm almost mid way through the first year at guildhall. phew! since i last wrote i've been on a grand musical venture...

the gambia, west africa.

for two weeks during december, as part of a cross-arts and trans-cultural elective at guildhall, 8 of us (and rather an international bunch.. aussie of course, dutch, mexican, american and english) travelled to the gambia, west africa to learn about four very different west african musical traditions. we spent our time drumming rhythms, singing and dancing through the days, absorbing the cultures and music of Susu, Mandinka, Wollof and Fula. every few days there were different visiting artists who would teach us various things about their respective tradition and style. 

day 1 we were taken to a hotel in bakau, just outside the main city of banjul. quite the introduction really. the atmosphere of the beach and ocean breeze, the sun, the horizon of the deep-blue and man-made sailing boats, certainly made for a fresh slate, leaving the icy cold, stressful and bustling city-scape behind us.

day 2 we were soon shuffled off, piling into a rickety van, luggage precariously bumping around on the top, travelling to out next destination, our home for the next two weeks. 

it was a fabulous and intense couple of weeks, with temperatures in the mid-30s. we lived in huts, making up a small camp just outside a small village called berefet, with a crew of locals that cooked up delicious traditional food. we were right on the river gambia too, where we could swim every day, escaping the heat. there was a few hours of electricity in the evenings only, run by a generator. and if we were lucky and the sun was shining brightly, we'd have running water too! i've never loved a shower so much as when you're covered in red dirt from dancing all day, mud remnants from the river and layers upon layers of citronella mosquito spray to escape the malaria carrying pests.

we worked hard absorbing all we could..  and it felt like a holiday at the same time! here's a bunch of pics from the two weeks: our teachers and few of us as well!

our susu teachers...

 

here's liza teaching the balafon (the african wooden xylophone with gourds) master how to play violin...

and some village shots: washing day under the boabab tree... 

and some entertainment by the local village women and children... soon after these images, the whole village turned up pretty much, around 150 women and children, absolutely going crazy dancing and singing. what a memorable occasion it was!!

mandinka lessons....

i was very inspired by our teacher Jaliba (meaning 'great musician') Momodou Suso, from the mandinka tribe. his vocals are hard to hear in this video (this one is the only one i could upload for some reason.. more coming next time!), but his playing of the kora makes up for it.. what a beautiful instrument. i'll find another video for next time where you can hear his vocals too..

amazing really, the importance of music and musicians in west africa. the stature that musicians have  traditionally in society, the respect for them, as well as the reverent messages behind the music that they create, is incredibly different to the western world. all music is taught aurally from generation to generation, they create and perform music to exchange messages, to resolve conflict, to influence political leaders with messages from the people. many of the songs we learned had a profound and respectful meaning behind them. 

we had a day off after our mandinka jaliba came to berefet.. we went on this boat... which was quite an experience!

to this island, kunta kinteh island, or james island...

which is an historical island.. i think actually a UNESCO world heritage site, that was used for the west african slave trade. it still has the ruins of administration buildings and cells on the island.. as well as some boabab trees (great fruit by the way..!). it was kind of eery, but certainly amazing to hear of its history. apparently it is now 1/6 of its original size due to erosion as well. 

ok, back to the music...

wollof music:

the wollof drumming was fantastic.. i bought a talking drum! yes i'm excited about it.. i'll dig out some more pics and videos this week too, as what i have here is very limited and i can't seem to upload any more videos today... crap internet!!!

then there was the fula musicians.. this is the only photo i found! more coming soon, i promise!! from the fula musicians, i bought a pair of lado lado's (i think they're called!), which are hand percussion shakers, make from sticks and cut out sections from a calabash.

and here's kat (our english gal, on the left), kabba (our local guide, who took a lot of convincing to come and dance), and maiike (one of our dutchys from the course) dancing with the musicians...

apologies for the lack of videos and music clips here.. i'll get the internet and videos sorted and will be back soon!!! thanks for reading.. any comments or questions welcome!

and coming next time also, are perhaps some photos form the guildhall.. who knows.. 

settling in to london...

ok. sorry for the delay. i've had an eventful 6 weeks or so, settling into london, world's end and guildhall. the 1st term of school is coming to an end though, so i can take some time over the next month to assess the first 3 months here and start planning for an eventful 2012.. yay!

the most exciting thing is yet to come.. on december 6th i fly to west africa, the gambia, for just over 2 weeks for a collaboration with local musicians.. i'll be immersed in their music culture & rhythms: drumming, singing and dancing.. i'll be taking plenty of photos and music clips so i'll definitely update this blog with lots of things to look at and hear!

recently, as you all know, the memorable day of 11/11/11 was upon us. it's the first time in 17 years (except for 2009 when i was in brazil!) that i have been absent from the buninyong rsl's annual commemorative service in regional victoria, australia, where i play the last post and reveille on the trumpet (ditto for anzac day too). this year, alongside my fellow masters companions, i was involved in a special project with inspiration from http://11elevenproject.com/   we created eleven, one minute compositions with 11 musicians, making a deadline for ourselves of recording each and collating them for upload to the 11eleven project. the first and last tracks were of 1 minute silence.. 6 others being composed in 11 minutes each, and the final 3 of them were made in 33 (11+11+11) minutes. thanks goes to detta, natasha, rené, evi, mirjam, liza, kat, cris, afla and chiel for making this happen... each track has a context and concept for/by all involved, which  proved challenging with the limitations of time for composing and recording. it was a great day, with loads of laughter.

on november 17 i was involved in another project i wrote briefly about last month.. i arranged an orchestral work based on julian nott's wallace & gromit theme (i've still got the tune running through my head!). it was performed at the roundhouse theatre in chalk farm, london, by the young person's concert foundation orchestra, who are pro muso's from around london. the foundation is a charity for kids... the musicians lead workshops and perform for children all around the united kingdom. for this particular concert, each work was arranged by a different composer/arranger and we had the option to conduct it.. of course i jumped upon this opportunity and absolutely loved it! after a crash course in orchestral conducting i managed to do pretty well (i think!). so my head is a-buzz with inspiration to write another orchestral work and conduct it myself... i'll keep you posted on my progress!!

mmm so i'm going to pause there so i can get back to some work.. i'll sort out some recordings this week from another group i've been playing with and upload some before i head off to the gambia.. happy ventures out there to all who read this! rae :)

A New Beginning...

so. i've arrived in london. this first month has flown by and i really wish i'd written before now coz by golly it's been an interesting, busy and crazy time.

after i said goodbye to my 'stuff' in the storage units, i closed the door and walked away with a refreshingly free feeling. it was kinda weird tho, as i've been quite used to having just enough space & things around me to create music and make my life progress.. my piano, vibraphone, my office of business tricks and pieces, books, never ending stand of hats to wear.... now however, i'm limited to a bag of clothes, a lap-top, my mellophone and my conducting baton. literally yes, my baton came with me and i'm looking forward to the first time i use it in a few weeks time, conducting an orchestra who will be performing an arrangement i'm orchestrating of julian nott's wallace & gromit theme. but more about that later...

so my first surprise came at the melbourne airport when i was astonished that the beers were cheaper than the northcote social club. wowweee! how things change and we just accept (the story of my life in the past month!!).

to cut a very long story short... don't try looking for a place to live in london in september. i can't explain it really, but it's a million times worse than what i imagined. the novelty of moving around every couple of days between hotels and friend's places wore off after a week.. believe me there's some really awesomeful hotels here.

i knew it would come to an end tho.... and now i find myself looking at a view like this, from my place in world's end... this is first light on saturday morning.





world's end (great name huh!) is south west london city.. it's a bit of a trek to school, but transport is good (waaay better than melbourne) and with a view like this it really feels like i can escape the city (kind-of) with some perspective anyway. here's another pic of the main city zoomed in a bit, later in the day...



the guildhall school of music has been great. the course is full-on and will definitely keep me crazy busy. it'll be a bit more challenging to practice piano & vibes now (it's not really practical to have either at home, so the only way is to book practice rooms at school~ it can be very competitive).. late nights and early mornings... bring it on! 

i'm met some great people from all over the world. and as part of the masters there's visiting tutors each week who show us their work, create practical projects for us for the week and really make us think. very interesting indeed. when i blog more regularly i can explain things as i go...

the guildhall is based at the barbican, which is the largest multi-arts centre in europe. it's a great place to be visiting everyday, loads of things to see and experience. with so many artists living and working around the area, it's possible to fill each day with pure entertainment! work must be done however, so i'm at the drawing board today, catching up on emails and starting the orchestration of julian nott's wallace & gromit theme.

i have had the chance to see some great music tho... just yesterday i saw a string quartet from the london symphony orchestra (lso st luke's) perform steve reich's different trains, for tape and string quartet. there was an interesting discussion about it afterwards too... there's lots of masterclasses, concerts and talks about various music subjects daily really. tuesday at the barbican is lucinda childs dance company performance, which i'll go along to as well... anyway, the list goes on!!!

anyway, over and out for now.. work to be done! more news soon...
wintery sunshine from london,
rae :)