The answer to last week's question of the week is: Graham Fitkin. Graham is particularly acclaimed for his explorations of electronica and new media, and we are delighted that his concerto for MIDI harp and orchestra will be premiered at the iconic Maida Vale Studio 1 on January 26th, 2011, with Sioned Williams and the BBC Symphony Orchestra conducted by Andrew Litton.
Graham Fitkin
Over the summer break I have been on the phone with Sioned, hearing about the concerto, and you can read what Graham himself has to say about it below. The "rhetorical posturing machismo of modern political life" he describes is about the concerto's references to the Iraq war - that's what the human voices triggered by the harp's MIDI technology are discussing.
'The ability of this new instrument to play recorded samples or trigger MIDI effects and parameters means that the archetypal Western perspective of the harp and its associated heavenly docility can be turned on its head. Unlimited soundscapes can be created, meaning that careful choices have to be made so that the end result isn't simply a gimmicky glossary of effects.
I wanted to inject a certain brutality and rawness into the music and decided exclusively to use speech sounds, many of them untreated and bare. This brought up the notion of communication, understanding and the human voice. I want the music to hover between abstraction and narrative, to use voices we may recognise and to focus on the rhetorical posturing machismo of modern political life in contrast to that dreamy harp sound we're accustomed to.' (Graham Fitkin)
Hearing about this bold and powerful new concerto reminds me of another stunning, angry work of art - the War Requiem - and its composer, Benjamin Britten. Britten's wonderful contributions to the harp repertoire were inspired by his friendship with a famous harpist. Who is she/he?