THREE WORKS SEEKING PREMIERES
The pace of my commissions for Wind Ensemble has slowed due to the lack of performing opportunities. Three commissions still require a world premiere:
During my time at Cornell University in 2008, I was fortunate to meet an outstanding young composer from Poland, now Professor at the University of Toronto. We discussed wind repertoire, and he agreed to write a work for school band, Recollections, 2009, already published by Maecenas, a quirky challenging piece at about Grade 4. In addition he set to work on an extensive Percussion Concerto written for Evelyn Glennie, as yet unperformed.
Edwin Roxburgh wrote two works for me, the intensely moving oboe concerto Elegy for Ur, 2006, and the vibrant effervescent Aeolian Carillons for school band in 2007. He has followed these up with a wonderful Piano Concerto, with some extraordinary virtuoso writing for piano.
The first work in my series dedicated to the memory of my third son William was by Matthew Taylor, Blasket Dances, 2002, with its evocative portrait of life off the West Coast of Ireland, and after we met by chance at a BBC Prom, he agreed to follow this with another miniature tone-poem, Bignor, 2014.