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I’ve admired John Psathas’ music for years, for its incredible sense of energy, its ability to defy categorization, and its cultural pluralism. With 4BY4 (his first non-pitched percussion piece), John delivers on all counts … and then some. If David Weckl, Christopher Lamb, Steven Schick and Giovanni Hidalgo – all percussion virtuosi from widely different genres – were to have a jam session, I can’t help but think that it would sound something like 4BY4.

Each of the four players plays a drumset-like set-up; one player has two snare drums a hi-hat, a tambourine, and a cymbal, another has two congas and a hihat, and the remaining two have tom-based set-ups. However, what binds these four seemingly disparate voices is the kick drum, which all four drumsets have. At times, these four drums pound a relentless beat in unison, and at others they’re split into complex rhythmic counterpoint.

It is this, in part, that makes 4BY4 such a great piece and a perfect fit for this album. John manages to take culturally different instruments, each with different playing techniques, and link them together with a common element – the kick drum. It is cultural pluralism at its best, with each voice maintaining its unique sound and identity, but seamlessly integrated into a common whole.
- Omar Carmenates

• John Psathas: 4BY4; video 

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• Omar Carmenates: The Gaia Theory CD  Year: 2012 

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• Mike Nock & Laurenz Pike - Kindred  Year: 2012 

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I did intend to sit down and compose an orchestral epic. I really, really DID, honest. Could I help it that as soon as I made that decision, the saxes started up a 1920s tea dance in my computer?! Only it’s not all sweetness and light and good ol’ days, in fact it sometimes gets a little murky in there, to say the least…

• Audain: A Charleston Kick With Steel Caps; computer-set 

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• Audain: A Charleston Kick With Steel Caps; computer-set 

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• Two works by Yvette Audain 

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This piece was originally the fifth movement of a short Christmas cycle (“Angels and Shepherds and Wise Men All”) was written in 2012 for the end of year concert by South Auckland Choral Society to be conducted by the composer. The concert included my school choir, St Mary’s Schola, and I was keen to write something that the combined forces (including the soloists) in the concert could sing together.

The cycle doesn’t try to encapsulate the entire Christmas story, but focusses on those characters on the edge of the story – the angels, the shepherds and the wise man. In this piece, the characters who gathered around the infant Jesus are focussed on: the animals, the angels and the shepherds.

• David Hamilton: A Child Lay in a Little Crib - hardcopy score 

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• David Hamilton: A Child Lay in a Little Crib; audio 

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• The Treble Voice Choral Music of David Hamilton Vol. 4  Year: 2013 

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NEW YEAR’S RESOLUTION 2010: Stop writing dishonest programme notes.

This work was conceived in the abstract and does not relate to human experience. It does not illustrate the composer’s state of mind, he having suddenly found himself awake in the middle of the night, unable to control his thoughts. While the experience of insomnia, especially when suffered over consecutive nights, can be physically and emotionally crippling, at times the abundance and insistence of multiple streams of unwanted thought (unruly Beta waves) can be, if not pleasurable, then certainly fascinating. This piece does not seek to illustrate this through music, nor does it sonically pose this question: why does the brain seize control of the consciousness and produce such a plethora of unwanted activity that sleep is made impossible and the host becomes miserable?

At times, certain thoughts seem to somehow rise above the melee of insomniac thought and become quite focused and of seeming import, however inane these might seem in the cold light of day. This is not portrayed in the music by infrequent parings-down of texture and emergence of single, insistent motivic ideas. The music doesn’t describe how such thoughts soon get swallowed up as the jumble of thoughts returns and the victim adjusts position once again, glancing desperately at his or her clock radio and resolving hopelessly to try to make yet another attempt at deep breathing and sheep counting work.

The composer could claim that the work is about these things, but that would be a lie; he no longer wishes to construct programme notes after the act of composition that conform to some conceivable extra-musical agenda.

This version of this work is the first of a number of versions, with another swapping cello for viola and another as a solo guitar piece currently projected.

The work was requested by Dylan Lardelli and is dedicated to this increasingly mythic musician.

• Watson, C.: about nothing...really; computer-set 

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• Watson, C.: about nothing...really; computer-set 

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• Watson, C.: about nothing...really; computer-set 

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• Watson, C.: about nothing...really; computer-set 

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• Chris Watson: about nothing...really; video 

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• Chris Watson: about nothing...really; video 

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• Chris Watson: about nothing... really 

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• Mike Nock Trio Plus - Hear and Know  Year: 2011 

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• Mike Nock & Laurenz Pike - Kindred  Year: 2012 

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This work for clarinet quintet in three movements was written following time spent in the north of Scotland, during which I visited the remote and desolate places that my family left behind when they emigrated from Scotland to New Zealand in the 19th Century. Although the music is not intended to be strictly descriptive, the image underpinning the work is that of an infinite shore that stretches from the line of steep cliffs at Badbea overlooking the North Sea, around the world to the rocky southern shores of Aotearoa New Zealand. The work draws on the tonal colour and extremes of pitch that are possible in the clarinet, and the extraordinary platform of sound of the string quartet.

• Webster: An Infinite Shore; computer set 

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• Webster: An Infinite Shore; computer set 

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• 5 Works by M Louise Webster 

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This work is dedicated to Barry Margan, who commissioned it. We collaborated extensively on its inspirations, sonic, literary and metaphysical and he provided the poetic titles of the first and third movements. The title (and that of the second movement) and the garden was full of voices is from a line of Bill Manhire’s: I stayed a minute/and the garden was full of voices.

The garden and its metaphorical voices, songs, chants and echoes come to life in this ritualistic and meditative work, from the tui calls of the first movement, transcribed directly from my garden, to the more abstracted whistles and nocturnal, dreamlike vocalisations of the second and third. A preoccupation with repeated notes throughout sprang from those of the tui which pervaded Auckland this summer.

• Eve de Castro-Robinson: and the garden was full of voices - hardcopy score 

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• Eve de Castro-Robinson: and the garden was full of voices 

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• SOUNZtender Concert - 2010 

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Angels Flow was composed for harpist Helen Webby, for her CD of New Zealand harp music, entitled ‘Pluck’. This piece imagines a parallel between the sound of harp music and the movement of spirits, or angels. In some cultures, such as Maori culture, sounds produced by instruments have spiritual properties. Music can tap into a part of the mind that transcends reality, and puts us in touch with imaginary, spiritual worlds. In this piece the flowing movements of the angels are unpredictable and capricious. A gradual modal change through the piece finds rest at the end, as the music descends to the lower register of the harp.

Angels Flow was premiered in the 2012 Otago Festival of the Arts, and is one of ten works commissioned and recorded by Helen Webby for her CD ‘Pluck’, released by Ode Records (Manu 5144). Helen Webby wishes to acknowledge the generous support of Creative New Zealand, University of Otago and John Egenes, producer. ‘Pluck’ is the first anthology of New Zealand harp music.

• Anthony Ritchie: Angels Flow - hardcopy score 

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• Anthony Ritchie: Angels Flow - downloadable PDF 

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• Helen Webby: Pluck  Year: 2012 

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