How much digital music and film have I bought? I think I ‘own’ virtual boxsets of a couple of TV shows and have a tentative digital music collection too. But I am undisciplined about where I store it or what account it is linked to, and so on. And some of the services I purchased … [Read more…]
Composers*: We are taking submissions for our 54th Annual ‘Pyramidová Hra’ Composition Competition. Compositions must be written for the livenka accordion (please see attached YouTube video for history and instrumental techniques and familiarise yourself with the left hand lever system if you are not already aware) and any combination of the following: tin whistle, shō, … [Read more…]
I really enjoyed watching some of the coverage of Glastonbury 2024 on TV this year. As I’m sure is the case for many, watching it has become a bit of an annual fixture for me and my partner. I’ve only been to the festival once (2014), when I was there as a session pianist for … [Read more…]
It was a lovely surprise to see an email from BBC Introducing this morning mentioning that my piece ‘Among Summer Hills’ from the Evening Chorus EP I (re)released last year had been included in the latest episode of The Sleeping Forecast. This one’s theme is the summer solstice and the history of Stonehenge (“It’s killing … [Read more…]
Q: What’s the one thing that’s even less profitable than streaming music? [drum roll] A: Sitting and checking your music’s streaming statistics. Spotify for Artists is just one of many tools that tells you loads of quite specific statistical information about your listeners, such as what cities they are concentrated in, how many tracks each … [Read more…]
Well, it’s time for a new single to be released, which is the fourth and possibly final track to be released ahead of my second solo piano album. I’ll be sharing the tracklist of that pretty soon. This one is called ‘Fleur 05 07 18’, named for the sunny day on which I first came … [Read more…]
Where were you when you first saw Apple’s 2024 advert for the iPad Pro: ‘the thinnest product they’ve ever created’? That’s what people will ask each other in 50 years. Maybe that’s what their descendants will ask each other in 500. A cataclysmic world event. A mission statement for the future. A giant hydraulic press … [Read more…]
I’ve been interested to read the press around Taylor Swift’s new album. These big cultural events tell us much about where society’s collective head is at regarding the music industry, consumerism, the artist vs the art, and culture in general. I haven’t listened to much of Swift’s later work but I found the single ‘Anti-Hero’ … [Read more…]
It’s release day of a new track and, with it, that feeling that I’m doing both too much and not enough to get the word out there to people. What I am trying to get my head around is how relatively unimportant release day for a track is, compared to what a piece of music … [Read more…]
In one chapter of ‘Remembered For A While’, an anthology of essays and reflections on the life, music and inner world of the musician Nick Drake, there are lyrics and even a prospective tracklist for what would have been his fourth studio album. Of course, his life was tragically cut short, and that album was … [Read more…]
Like many a brave soul before me, I figured it’s time to start a blog. I never really planned to do that on this site, which I felt was best left as a fairly minimal showcase of my work with some contact details and links for those who were interested in hiring me as a … [Read more…]