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In the isolated settlement of Ahipara in the far north of the North Island of New Zealand a tiny white church sits on a hillock looking out to a range of low brooding hills. In the cemetery below, an angel stands on a pedestal at the head of a grave. One day in 1992 renowned New Zealand photographer Robin Morrison came to the church and captured the essence of the angel’s vigil in a memorable and famous image.

In late 1997 the composer Chris Blake travelled to Ahipara and stook in the same place and experiences the same image. The outcome was a short work for string orchestra which captures the hope and desolation of the angel and the memory of the soul over which she stands guard. The work was created for conductor Andrew Sewell and is based, at his suggestion, on a passage from an earlier work We All Fall Down for obliggato cello and orchestra.

This work is one of a series of four, making up The Northland Panels. They were written and premiered as separate works.

• Christopher Blake: Angel at Ahipara - hire set 

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• Blake: Angel at Ahipara; computer set 

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• Christopher Blake: Angel at Ahipara; audio 

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• Christopher Blake: Angel at Ahipara; video 

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• Blake: orchestral works 

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• Music by Christopher Blake 

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• Christopher Blake: Angel at Ahipara  Year: 2012 

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• Rimmer: At the Base of the Whirlpool; computer set 

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• Rimmer: At the Base of the Whirlpool; computer-set 

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• 175 East vol. 4  Year: 1999 

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• Rimmer: At the Base of the Whirlpool; computer set 

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• Rimmer: At the Base of the Whirlpool; computer-set 

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• Rimmer: At the Base of the Whirlpool; computer-set 

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• 175 East vol. 5 

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Distant Voices was written in 1999. I played the first public performance in the New Music Festival in Cincinnati in the same year.

The only one of my compositions in which authentic Chinese folk melodies play a part of the motif, Distant Voices is quite within my body of work. In this piece I use traditional melodies to pay tribute to the musical and singing styles of my native land. Exploring compositional possibilities through these source melodies without distorting their essential folkloric qualities, I recast the rich, microtonal palette of the folk tradition through exploring the sonority of the piano.

The folk-songs employed here are Nostalgia from Inner Mongolia, Love Song from Kangdin from my native Sichuan, and Blue Flower from Shanbei. Each melody serves as the departure point for the three movements that are developed through processes resembling the variation form. The first movement is introspective and desolate, reflecting the narrative of a migrant labourer’s homesick lament upon seeing snow falling; the second movement is exuberant and restless, evoking dancing and drumming. I dedicated each movement to a remarkable musician, the composer Joel Hoffman, my father, the composer Gao Weijie, and the pianist James Tocco.

Gao Ping, from Gao Ping – Chamber Music, NAXOS

• Gao Ping: Chamber Music  Year: 2006 

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For Violin, Violoncello and Piano was completed in 1999 for the final year of my Masters degree. It was first performed at the Nelson Composers Workshop that year by Mark Menzies, Katherine Hebley and Donald Nicholson. Here it received the Workshop prize, and later in the year the work also received the main prize in the Victoria University School of Music Composition Competition.

The piece follows no programmatic ‘storyline’ but moves rather within shifting emotional sound-worlds. The opening is very ‘inward’, and the intensity eventually builds and explodes into areas of anger or yearning, or maybe something far more subconscious and indefinable. Moments of beauty surface above the intensity, and the journey ends having come full circle – introspective, transcendent, resigned.

Penelope Axtens
Notes taken from NZTrio – Spark, Morrison Music Trust MMT2066

• New Zealand Trio - Spark  Year: 2004 

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• Marshall: Hikurangi Sunrise; computer set 

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• Wild Music   Year: 2004 

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• Powell: Ophelia Songs; computer-set 

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• Powell: Ophelia Songs; CD 

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• Gareth Farr: Ruaumoko 

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• Island Song  Year: 2010 

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This piece was inspired by the famous Pink and White Terraces in New Zealand which were destroyed by the eruption of Mt Tarawera in 1886. The Pink and White Terraces were huge naturally occuring staircases, created by deposits of silica in crystallised form over many centuries. People came from all over the world to view the terraces, described as the eighth wonder of the world. According to legend, there was a premonition of the disaster in June, 1886. While travelling across a lake near the terraces, some tourists and their Maori guide saw a mysterious canoe of Maoris nearby. They disappeared and were never seen again, and no reasonable explanation could be given for their existence. However, some local Maori took this ‘spirit-canoe’ as an omen. They were right. Before dawn the next day, Mt Tarawera erupted for five hours, destoying the Pink and White Terraces and killing 153 people. It was New Zealand’s worst volcanic disaster of recorded times. This organ piece attempts to incorporate elements of the story into its musical gestures. The big opening chords describes the might and force of Mt Tarawera. Then follow two quieter ideas, interrelated, which portray the gently bubbling beauty of the ‘White Terrace’ and then the ‘Pink Terrace’. The eruption is heralded by low thundering trills on the pedals and sweeping upward runs on the keyboard. The main theme that follows is toccato-like and conjures up visions of wild panic among the people. This theme reappears on full organ at the climax, and the music gradually subsides. The Tarawera chords from the beginning return like a solemn chorale for the dead, and the music drifts off into the distance, like smoke from the crater. Pink and White was commissioned by Martin Setchell with funding from Creative New Zealand, and was composed especially for the new Christchurch Town Hall Rieger organ. The composer is indebted to Martin Setchell for his advice and help with scoring for the organ.

• Ritchie A.: Pink and White; Computer Set 

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• Ritchie A.: Pink and White; computer set 

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• Pink and White - New Zealand Organ Music  Year: 2005 

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• Psathas: Saxon; Computer set 

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• John Psathas: works 

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• Dalewool Auckland Brass: Variations 

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