Two-time winner of SOUNZ composition prize

Corwin Newall (Kaikorai Valley College, Dunedin) has been awarded the SOUNZ prize for the composition section of the 2009 New Zealand Community Trust Chamber Music competition. Adjudicator Anthony Ritchie selected Corwin's 57 Octaves Below for piano, flute and violin as the winning work from 13 entered by students from all over New Zealand in the competition managed by Chamber Music New Zealand.

Corwin also won this prize in 2007 for The Budgie for flute, clarinet and piano. He was also selected for the Todd-NZSO Young Composers Award and Readings in 2007 and as winner of the overall 2009 Shakespeare Festival composition competition at Queens' birthday weekend will be the student composer for the 2009 SGCNZ National Shakespeare Schools Production.

"The inspiration for 57 Octaves Below comes from my fascination with physics and astronomy," Corwin tells us. "The deepest musical note in the universe (according to the Guinness Book of Records 2005) is a B-flat, 57 octaves below middle C.  It is on the other side of the universe, several million light years away.  It's pitch is a billion times lower than the human ear can detect, and is being propagated through a ‘supermassive black hole’.
 
"I thought that this was quite exciting and imagined how long a journey it would be, moving to the other side of the universe, if the black hole’s note (or a nearby solar system) were to become something of a tourist attraction!  The piece I have written obviously isn’t a million years long (!), but the tempo markings do include things like ‘we’re nearly there!’ and ‘space looks pretty empty to me’.
 
"57 Octaves Below is in B-flat minor because of the pitch of the lowest note known to man, and the ‘loner’ note (the only black note with no others next to it) at the bottom of a standard piano is used often.  However, 5 flats created tuning problems for Rosalind Manowitz on the violin!

"My favourite New Zealand compositions are Kembang Suling and Volume Pig by Gareth Farr, and Drum Dances by John Psathas.  I have studied them in music class at high school, and their busy rhythms, general loudness and complexity have probably strongly influenced 57 Octaves Below and other pieces that I have written this year."
 
"I would love to work with directors and create film scores.  Film composing would be a dream job really – especially because I would be drawing on everything I have learned about music in the 10 years I have been paying attention to it."