For Steve (2013)
For solo cello
Duration ca. 5'30"
There are plenty of people who knew Steve Martland better than I, and could tell you better stories than I. My principal encounter with him was in 2001, when my string piece "Infinite Breathing" was chosen by him for a SPNM workshop and concert. So I got to experience the generosity and big-heartedness of the man first-hand. Between the workshop and the concert we went for a meal and we had a fantastic conversation, which I can't really relate here because it largely consisted of things that would be libellous if i wrote them down. Very funny, though. When I bumped into him afterwards at other events, he remembered who I was. This may not sound like much, but believe me that's a rare thing in this business. Steve was a man who cared about people above all.
I can't quite believe he's dead. No-one else can, from the people I've spoken to. It's particularly sad because I gather that after a long period of creative stasis he was feeling re-energised: the commissions were coming in again, he was full of ideas and the hunger to realise them, and things seemed generally to be coming together for him. It's a sad thing to consider what he might yet have had to give in music. It's a greater loss to the world though, no longer to have the man himself in it.
This is a tiny thing I wrote as a memorial. It seems dreadfully inadequate, but I couldn't not make the attempt. I hope it's not sentimental, at least. Steve wasn't a sentimental man, just a passionately caring one.
Duration ca. 5'30"
There are plenty of people who knew Steve Martland better than I, and could tell you better stories than I. My principal encounter with him was in 2001, when my string piece "Infinite Breathing" was chosen by him for a SPNM workshop and concert. So I got to experience the generosity and big-heartedness of the man first-hand. Between the workshop and the concert we went for a meal and we had a fantastic conversation, which I can't really relate here because it largely consisted of things that would be libellous if i wrote them down. Very funny, though. When I bumped into him afterwards at other events, he remembered who I was. This may not sound like much, but believe me that's a rare thing in this business. Steve was a man who cared about people above all.
I can't quite believe he's dead. No-one else can, from the people I've spoken to. It's particularly sad because I gather that after a long period of creative stasis he was feeling re-energised: the commissions were coming in again, he was full of ideas and the hunger to realise them, and things seemed generally to be coming together for him. It's a sad thing to consider what he might yet have had to give in music. It's a greater loss to the world though, no longer to have the man himself in it.
This is a tiny thing I wrote as a memorial. It seems dreadfully inadequate, but I couldn't not make the attempt. I hope it's not sentimental, at least. Steve wasn't a sentimental man, just a passionately caring one.
