Curriculum Vitae
I have picked out some highlights from my time making music. I have been making music a long time, sometimes occasionally, but always felt the ‘pull’ of composing without making the opportunity to pursue it full time. I believe that time has come. Delightfully, my life has been punctuated with some wonderful opportunities to design, play, and touch, sound.
Abridged CV
1970s
1973 After school: music college Huddersfield/Manchester
Trained to be professional musician/composer
Instruments: clarinet, sax, voice, piano + composition
1973-77 Jazz/rock outfit – It must have been somebody else – sax + keys (regular gigs, recordings). Jammed with members of Soft Machine
1978 Tuba piece for Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival. Now in its 43 year, I am proud to have contributed to the very first festival.
1979 – 1991 Director: Midlands Jazz Orchestra played many venues inc. opening week Symphony Hall, Birmingham
1979-1999 Principal clarinet Midland Concert Orchestra
1979 ‘Mechanimism’ – for vocal ensemble – extended vocal techniques in 8 vocal parts.
1980s
1980 Quintet and Trio for Winds – Performed in London concert halls by members of professional wind ensemble
1981 – ‘The Spider and the Fly’ for Soprano and String 4tet
1982 – 2001 Sax wind synth flute session work – bhangra, jazz, classical
1983-88 Conductor – W’ton Youth Concert Orchestra
1984 – Directed and curated Arts Festival which drew on art groups (sound, dance, visual, word) from all over the world supported by arts council, Real World records (WOMAD) including, Loose Tubes (jazz), Grand Union Orchestra (performed with that ensemble inc. sax player Courtney Pine), Prahalad Natak (Orissa, India) and The Musicians of the Nile plus many others.
1985 – composed ‘Autana’ for orchestra and gesture controlled electronics (sound spatialisation through quad sound system using joysticks)
1986 performer with experimental jazz ensemble ‘Living Word’ – synthesisers
1987 Composed music for stage adaptation of Ian Serraillier’s Silver Sword performed in UK theatres
1989 Premiere (clarinet) – Alun Hoddinot Clarinet Concerto, Adrian Boult Hall, Birmingham Conservatoire
1990s
1990-92 Sound Experience – Collaboration with Uni of York John Paynter, Trevor Wishart, Tony Myatt compositions Grid and It’s Full of Stars for orchestra, live electronics. Companion activities/projects for children integrated into performance of It’s Full of Stars. Published as part of Sounding It Out Project
1991-93 Composer-in-Residence Wolverhampton Music Service – Aqua Vitae for various instruments + live electronics – audience surrounded by musicians and quadraphonic sound projection system
1992 Performing duo with Alan Belk (Voice Squad) performances included Fontana Mix – Cage, works by Berio, Stockhausen, Cardew
1993 – 1999 Director Centre for Research in Music Technology University of Central England/Birmingham Conservatoire
1994 – ‘Why’ – pieces in 4 parts using extended vocal techniques inspired by overtone singing and requiring the same in all parts. First performed in Birmingham the same year.
*1995 MA by research (Creativity + microelectronics)
1999 to date – Sax voice whistle keys in Flying by Night folk group – composed High Peak Suite – recording held in Cecil Sharp House folk collection
*1999 retrained to become consultant in the field of autism PhD + professional quals to permit carrying out assessments etc. however I have remained active in the world of music as performer and composer. I use sound including ‘Improvise to Empathise’ programme in my work.
2000s
2000 Played in ensemble with Jools Holland including show at West Road Concert Hall, Cambridge
2001 Performances of electronic music Berlin, Copenhagen, Athens, using midi gesture devices.
2003 The Rainbow Bridge based (very loosely) on Icelandic Saga – children’s story with companion composing actiities
2011 Commission to compose and perform music to celebrate Centenary of Scott’s journey to South Pole by Scott Polar Research Institute Cambridge. First performance of ‘Terra Nova’ at SPRI at which I was incredibly privileged to ring the bell from Scott’s ship, the Terra Nova.
2010s
Festivals 2000s – 2010s: Middlewich, Stainsby, Off the Tracks, Exile, Birmingham Electronic Music Festival, Cymru Beats
2013 – to date ‘Improvise to Empathise’ project
2016 to date – saxophonist in jazz trio Molly and the Grey Notes
2018 to date – ‘Modular on the spot’ activities taking a modular synth set up to a variety of locations (using battery/solar power) and improvising including Lud’s Church, Yr Wyddfa (Snowdon), Sound Mirrors, various industrial derelict (safe) locations
2019 – Opened show for Ultramarine
2020s
2020 Curated and performed works by Alvin Lucier following his death inc. I am sitting in a room, Clocker, NA Time Capsule, and In memoriam Jon Higgins.
November 2021 to April 2023 – Composer/musician in residence for Birmingham .Modular Organisation (monthly performance at Centrala, Birmingham)
Electronic music compositions some modular, some with synthesisers, some with acoustic instruments inc bass clarinet, sax, luminist garden (by Folktek) and voice.
Perambulations released 2020, Witch Tones 2021, 5 Places to Bathe 2022.
2022 Companions for String Orch, solo oboe, solo ‘cello, and piano
2022 Seeds Talks – touring project giving talk on plant networks, biofeedback, and performance using biofeedback into electronic devices. Also music and neurodivergent people.
Drone Bath – Performance at Moseley Baths with 14 other musicians each located in individual slipper bath cubicle
Making music with Moss project using biofeedback – performance at Artefact, Birmingham
September 2022 performance of Under composed for restaurant in Norway at Bloc, Glasgow
Recent shows include: Iklectik, Cafe Oto, Chapter Arts Cardiff, Kanteena Preston, Centrala, Hare and Hounds, Artefact & St. Paul’s Church Birmingham
Festivals: Below the Salt Middlewich, Off the Tracks, Stainsby, Celebrating Cromford, Exile Peak District
Media: BBC Introducing, RadioFreeMatlock, Brain Voyager’s Electronic Fusion, Breakfast in the Ruins radio show, Seventh Wave radio show.
Currently working on:
- The Allotment Project (music for the avant-gardener) inc collecting field recordings made by people in their allotments, gardens, by their window boxes, etc. and learning to play Northumbrian Smallpipes which I intend to incorporate with a modular set up in a composition. Also learning to use Envelop for Live in order to explore the immersive potential of sounds using this spatial audio distribution toolkit.
- 5 Places to Bathe location influenced tracks on CD/cassette heavily influenced by field recordings of wild swimming locations.
- Ambient Tour (imaginary mixes) Dark Tourism edition including tracks inspired by dark tourism locations, e.g. Lake Chagan (radioactive lake in nuclear crater, Kazakhstan) piece for geiger counter, radioactive objects (not dangerously so) and electronic menagerie.
- Four Seasons of Mists and Mellow Fruitlessness (tonight is the night, where four seasons become one) – reactionary electronic composition infuriated (rather than inspired) by climate change
- Movement and Imagination (the automata sing) – an album of tracks currently being finalised exploring the mystery of movement in automata inspired by my fascination for automata and other machinery.
*work/qualification moments that are outside but inform music making