Piano Music
Every Last Bar (2020)
Duration ca. 2'
First performance: 29 March 2022, Old Royal Naval College Chapel, Jinah Shim, piano
Every Last Bar consists of every last bar of Beethoven’s piano sonatas with opus numbers. In those cases where the final bar is silent or tied from the penultimate bar the final sounding bar has been included.
Tempi and pedalling are ad lib but should broadly align with established performance practices for the sonatas, tending to the slower end of the spectrum of tempi. Each ending is annotated with the tempo indication for that movement. Pedalling is indicated only where it is explicitly marked in that bar by Beethoven.
Score
Duration ca. 2'
First performance: 29 March 2022, Old Royal Naval College Chapel, Jinah Shim, piano
Every Last Bar consists of every last bar of Beethoven’s piano sonatas with opus numbers. In those cases where the final bar is silent or tied from the penultimate bar the final sounding bar has been included.
Tempi and pedalling are ad lib but should broadly align with established performance practices for the sonatas, tending to the slower end of the spectrum of tempi. Each ending is annotated with the tempo indication for that movement. Pedalling is indicated only where it is explicitly marked in that bar by Beethoven.
Score
The Fade in Time (2019)
Duration indeterminate
First performed at New Lights Festival, London, 19 June 2019
This piece is both a performance and an installation. An ebow is set inside the piano over one string (F4), and the relevant key is held down by a weight (in the first performance a stack of 23 pennies) to allow the string to sound. A melodica is placed on the piano stool and three keys taped down (A3-D4-A4). The melodica is attached to an electric air pump which is then switched onto sound the depressed notes. The setting up of this is the performance. The performer may sit with the piano for a while before leaving the performance space or leave immediately. Once the performer has left the piano and melodica continue to sound and effectively function as an installation. The audience should not be forewarned of any of this but allowed to find their own changed relationship with the situation. The sound should continue as long as the situation allows, or until the batteries in the pump and ebow run out. The setup may also be presented in a gallery environment as an installation.
Programme note from the first performance:
My father was a keen photographer, his lens a hovering presence at all our family gatherings. I would watch as he developed them, images materialising in a chemical bath, each one a memory frozen on paper.
My father’s mind grows dim now, his memories mere traces. His photographs remain, but in time they too will fade.
Fourth Sonata for Piano (2009)
Duration ca. 45'
Score
The piano is in many ways a remarkable machine, but it is also a severely limiting one: its limited number of keys and its compromised tuning system close off vast areas of potential experience to the musician and the listener. No true consonance exists on the piano other than the octave, and so the distinction between consonance and dissonance becomes a nonsense. The deliberately obscure notation of this piece thus acts as a medium for the player to reflect on the gap between what is imagined and what is achieved. The working title of this piece was "Shibboleth": the word that in the Bible stands as a test to distinguish the Tribes of Gilead and Ephraim, the latter of which could not pronounce it.
This piece is dedicated to the memory of Zoe Nagle.
Piano Sonata No.3 (2008)
duration ca. 5'
I. Prelude
II. Interlude
III. Postlude
Score
High Windows (2006)
Score
Duration ca. 45'
Score
The piano is in many ways a remarkable machine, but it is also a severely limiting one: its limited number of keys and its compromised tuning system close off vast areas of potential experience to the musician and the listener. No true consonance exists on the piano other than the octave, and so the distinction between consonance and dissonance becomes a nonsense. The deliberately obscure notation of this piece thus acts as a medium for the player to reflect on the gap between what is imagined and what is achieved. The working title of this piece was "Shibboleth": the word that in the Bible stands as a test to distinguish the Tribes of Gilead and Ephraim, the latter of which could not pronounce it.
This piece is dedicated to the memory of Zoe Nagle.
Piano Sonata No.3 (2008)
duration ca. 5'
I. Prelude
II. Interlude
III. Postlude
Score
High Windows (2006)
Score
Piano Piece 07/07/2005
Score
Score
Piano Sonata No.1 (1999)
duration ca. 15'
Score
Studies for Piano:
Landscape: Night (1991)
Duration ca. 2'
Score
Still Life in Shadow (1993)
Duration ca. 2'
Score
Study in Blue (1998)
Duration ca. 2'
Score
Fractured Melody with Integral Background (1998)
Duration ca. 1'
Score
A Short Fall into Infinity (1998)
Duration ca. 3'
Score
"One measures a circle beginning anywhere" (1998)
Duration ca. 4'
Score
After Escher (1998)
Duration ca. 2'
in memoriam (1999)
Duration ca. 2'
Toccata (1999)
Duration ca. 2'
Score
Tracks and Trains for two pianos (1998)
Duration ca. 6'30"
Score
duration ca. 15'
Score
Studies for Piano:
Landscape: Night (1991)
Duration ca. 2'
Score
Still Life in Shadow (1993)
Duration ca. 2'
Score
Study in Blue (1998)
Duration ca. 2'
Score
Fractured Melody with Integral Background (1998)
Duration ca. 1'
Score
A Short Fall into Infinity (1998)
Duration ca. 3'
Score
"One measures a circle beginning anywhere" (1998)
Duration ca. 4'
Score
After Escher (1998)
Duration ca. 2'
in memoriam (1999)
Duration ca. 2'
Toccata (1999)
Duration ca. 2'
Score
Tracks and Trains for two pianos (1998)
Duration ca. 6'30"
Score