Category: composing

Vinyl Community Collaborative Composing Project

Bobbie15 Comments

Vinyl Community Collaborative Composing Project

Hey there lovelies! Here’s the page for us to share findings.

Context:

Task 1: Please introduce yourself and what you’d be interested in contributing to the project to the gang.

Task 2: Please share your top 5 tracks which must include orchestral arrangers (soul/jazz/RnB/pop of 60/70s). What do you love about the sound? What do you think are the signature elements of the music you’ve selected that we should take note of for our collaborative piece?

Deadline: 28th September.

Best wishes,

Bobbie

Alfonso, I’m listening to music by Thom Bell on your recommendation, he has an interesting story too! I wonder what he does now? Would love to see these scores, how do I access them, record labels?

Lord ha mercy this as well:
Didn’t I (Blow Your Mind This Time)” – The Delfonics – starts with french horn and glockenspiel! That brass!!

Read this interview about his collaboration with Johnny Mathis on the track ‘Coming Home” and this stood out:

“Musically, Bell fashioned an arrangement that further amplified the visual cues in Creed’s narrative. “I intended to meet the obligations of the lyrics of what he’s saying,” he explains. “It’s got to match. If the arrangement does not fit, I’m not ashamed to throw it in the trash. Just because I wrote it doesn’t mean it has to be in there.” Each musical component on “I’m Coming Home” painted a vivid scene: the interplay between the bass and drums summoned a train’s chugging rhythm on the tracks while the strings evoked rolling landscapes glimpsed from a passenger’s window. The soft horns simulated a distant train whistle heralding Mathis’ arrival.”

Study Scores

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Love that it’s easy to follow scores and listen to audio on youtube. It has been an amazing educational resource for my post-grad studies.

Here’s some of today’s listening:

Wojtek Blecharz — Small Talks

Claude Vivier – Zipangu

I like the use of texture and how there is also strong melodic content. I don’t get bars 39-39, they don’t sit right for me, but I find the piece interesting nontheless.

the politics of friendship

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many hands make light work is a piece about sharing the load.

props to all musicians involved; loz, anton and james.
thanks to cheryl at grand union and the grubby mitts for asking me to be the support act.

for its first incarnation we did well in such a short space of time and yay we didn’t burn down minerva works!

thanks to photographer david rowan for some top photos!

 

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Tapeworm

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There was an opportunity to compose a one page score for top ensemble Noszferatu as part of Frontiers Festival. I was mad busy working/writing essays/finishing other pieces and had resigned myself to not being able to do so. However, when I spotted my name down on the list, I thought I’d rise to the challenge anyway.

I wanted to further explore my interest in parasitic relationships.
The relationship between a flatworm parasite and snails was intriguing, the fact it became almost like a zombie  was curious. I wanted to find a way to explore the imbalance. One idea starts with a lot and is stripped bear, the other multiplies and grows at the expense of the former. Non-mutual symbiotic relationships.

As a title I thought ‘Flatworm’ sounded a bit dry, so opted to entitle the piece ‘Tapeworm’, another parasite, sounds cooler, and it connected to a piano piece ‘Tick’ I had written earlier – which explored the same idea in a slightly different way.

You can have a listen here
Many thanks to top musicians Finn Peters, Joel Bell, Ivo de Greef and Percy Pursglove!

Adrift

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Image by Ruby’s Treasures.

A piece I have written for string quartet and soprano is being performed at 9.15pm at Warwick Arts Centre, after their Nocturne performance.

The piece is called ‘Adrift’ and the words are written by Warwick Uni student/poet Miss Ella.
Here’s a wee snippet, I am still buzzing from how beautifully the Coull Quartet and Sophie Pullen performed in today’s rehearsal!

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