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Year: 2019 Duration: 60'

Libretto by Cristina Battocletti and John Palmer

Four singers: Soprano 1: Ivana; Soprano 2: Martina; Mezzosoprano: Frida; Baritono (Baritenore): Rocco.
10 extras
Ensemble: Fl / Bass Fl,  Clarinet in B-Flat /  Bass Clarinet,  Tenor Trombone, Percussion (1), Piano, Vl, Vc, Db, Electronics.

Commissioned by the Istituzione Teatro Lirico Sperimentale di Spoleto “A. Belli” with funds provided by the Ernst von Siemens Foundation.

World premiere: Teatro Caio Melisso, Spoleto, 6th, 7th, 8th September 2019.

Conductor: Vittorio Parisi
Stage Director: Alessio Pizzech
Ensemble del Teatro Lirico Sperimentale di Spoleto with John Palmer (electronics)

Year: 2013 Duration: 17'

Crossing Dialogues was commissioned from and written for the Open_Music quartet, a contemporary music ensemble dedicated to the interaction between written and improvised music. Since my childhood I have always been attracted by improvisation as both a stand-alone performance practice and in conjunction with a written-out composition. I guess it is both its ritual character and its focus on the now that makes it so attractive to me: the perception of the very instant as an irreplaceable moment within a continuous flux that faces me with an unrepeatable condition. In my own musical practice I have always perceived improvisation as a twofold experience: an improvised-composition being at the same time a composed-improvisation. Form being the crucial link between the two notions.

Additional Info:

Commissioned by Open Music, Stuttgart and first performed by the Open Music Ensemble at  Staatsgalerie, Stuttgart, 21st November 2013.

Instrumentation: Violoncello, Violin, Piano, Vibraphone

Year: 2016 Duration: 14'

Alba (en. Dawn) was written as a tribute to life: sound coming from and returning to silence.
Alba was commissioned by the Society of Classical Musicians and first performed on the 5th October 2016, BKA, Berlin, by the Modern Art Ensemble.

Instrumentation: Violoncello, Viola, Violin, Piano

Year: 1995 Duration: 9'

Similar to a Pythagorean theorem, where being given two elements an established procedure will produce a new third factor, this music unfolds from two melodic units from which a third one is established immediately. The three themes are developed separately on alternating instruments and gradually merge into a new final statement, a meta-theorem so to speak, or a theorem in the theorem.

Additional Info:

Commissioned by the Bath Festival, UK. Second prize winner of the 1996 Tokyo International Competition for Chamber Music Composition. Selected by the ISCM Bulgarian Section in 1996.

First performed by The Gould Piano Trio at The Guildhall, Bath 2nd June 1995.

Instrumentation: Violoncello, Violin, Piano

Year: 2008 Duration: 9'

Based on a text written in memory of a friend who passed away in 1988, Transient was written in 2008 for soprano, prepared piano and two electronic sources, one consisting of live processing, the other including the text – whispered, spoken and sung – transformed in the electronic studio. Another important vocal source is breathing, imagined as a metaphor of life after life. The unfolding of the music is based on a relational system where a word (a phrase or a concept) of the poem is associated to a specific pitch. The syntactic relations established between pitch and word (meaning) have generated musical phrases articulated in six sections corresponding to the six verses of the text.

Additional Info:

Text by John Palmer. Selected at the 36th Bourges International Competition Electroacoustic Music 2009 in Section II: Trivium – 3rd category. May also be performed as a duo (soprano & electronics) or as an acousmatic work.

Acousmatic version first performed at JSEM/MSJ Electroacoustic Festival 2009, Nagoya City University, Japan, 10th May 2009.

Duo version premiered by Marie-Pierre Roy (soprano) and John Palmer (electronics) at the Contemporanea Festival, Udine, Italy in 2011.

Details about the acousmatic version

Instrumentation: Electronics, Soprano, Piano

Year: 2016 Duration: 5'

Additional Info:

Written for the 2016 Festival Risuonanze.

Instrumentation: 2 Flutes

Year: 2016 Duration: ca. 10'

Additional Info:

The electronics consist of a stereo soundfile. The piano may be amplified. First performed by Kaspar Kalnin (electronics) and Heloïse Ph. Palmer (piano) on 9th November 2016, Arena Festival, Riga, Latvia.

Instrumentation: Electronics, Piano

Year: 1989 Duration: ca. 5'

Improvised composition / composed improvisation.

Instrumentation: Piano

Year: 1987 Duration: 9'

Improvised composition / composed improvisation. First performed by John Palmer (piano), Christian Hartmann (double bass) on 8th July 1988, Rathaus, Sursee (version for piano and double bass).

Instrumentation: Piano

Year: 1990 Duration: 10'

In Tibetan Buddhism Shambhala is the name of the pure land. Although there are many literary references describing it as a physical place situated in central Asia, the Tibetan myth of Shambhala refers to an imaginary place of peace and happiness dwelt by enlightened people.

The world premiere took place at the Tempelgesellschaft in Stuttgart on 20th September 2014 and was performed by Heloise Ph. Palmer.

Instrumentation: Piano

Year: 1989 Duration: 4' 20"

Improvised composition / composed improvisation.

Instrumentation: Piano

Year: 1993 Duration: 11' 30"

I wrote Renge-Kyo having been inspired by the principle of causality. I was intrigued by the interaction of cause and effect taking place from the most tenuous occurrences in daily life to large-scale events that may shape the history of the world. In Japanese Buddhism Renge (the lotus flower) symbolises the simultaneousness of Cause and Effect (the flower and the seed pod) and the ability of self-purification (the blossoms in the muddy swamps). Kyo means Sutra (teaching) and Sound as vibration; it represents the continuity of all things. I associated the Cause with the piano and the Effect with the electronics. Throughout the piece the two instruments are interrelated in an asymmetric alternation of actions and reactions taking place on two superimposed and at times altered layers of time.

Renge-Kyo was commissioned by the Konzertzyklus La Calma in Lucerne, Switzerland, in 1993 and selected by the SPNM in Great Britain in 1994. The world premiere was performed by John Palmer (piano & electronics) at the Wartegg Schlössli at Lucerne, on 21st January 1994.

CD recordings by Carol Morgan and John Palmer

 

Instrumentation: Electronics, Piano

Year: 1989 Duration: ca. 50'

Musica reservata is a collection of 12 short pieces for solo piano composed from December 1988 to May 1989, mostly during the night. It may also be performed by two pianists on two pianos by playing two different pieces or indeed the same piece simultaneously. Each piece of musica reservata may also be performed alone, as an autonomous, self-contained piece.

Additional Info:

First performed by Friederike Wild at Chamber Music Hall, University of Music of Stuttgart, Germany, 7th November 2012.

Instrumentation: Piano

Year: 1988 Duration: 5'

The intriguing phenomenon of the déjà-vu prompted me to write a music flowing on two dissimilar dimensions: on the one hand an explicit vicinity of sound unfolding in an almost pointillistic fashion; on the other hand a wider space obtained through the use of both the sustain and sostenuto pedals on which chords, short melodies and single resonances are projected.

Dedicated to John Cage.

Additional Info:

First performed by John Palmer on 22th November, 1990 at Trinity College of Music, London.

Instrumentation: Piano

Year: 1990 Duration: 6'

In the pantheon of ancient religions, the myth of Athena is possibly the most intriguing and diversified of all the gods. Throughout the years her image has been persistent in my dreams and I finally wrote this music perhaps in a state of trance in 1990 at Elstree, Hertfordshire. For some logically inexplicable reason the score disappeared and the music was forgotten almost immediately. Yet, it surfaced again several years later, in 2013. I recorded the music in the same year.

The world premiere of Athena took place at the Stadtbibliothek “Walter Bauer” in Merseburg, Germany, on 21st October 2015 and was performed by Heloise Ph. Palmer.

Instrumentation: Piano

Year: 2005 Duration: 17' 10"

“After silence, that which comes nearest to expressing the inexpressible is Music” (Aldous Huxley). After silence is a cycle of works written for piano and electronics exploring the perception of resonance in relation to sound as a quest for silence. The preposition after indicates both a temporal condition and a search for deeper states of consciousness.

After silence (1) was inspired by a text I wrote in 2005: after silence / space mirrors / reflecting / invisible sound. / away from… / I stand motionless / listening / through the barely audible.

Additional Info:

Electronics: ring modulation, reverberation and tape. May be also performed on a Fender Rhodes.

First performed by John Palmer (Fender Rhodes & electronics) on 24th November 2005 at Salon des Arts, London, UK.

Instrumentation: Electronics, Piano

Year: 2011 Duration: 12' 35"

Thereafter was inspired by the sacred trinity of ancient Egypt consisting of Ausar, Auset and Heru, and the related symbolism of Egypt’s mystical triangle as described by Plutarch in volume V of his work Moralia. The Ancient Egyptians believed in an animated universe where all things are permeated by energetic forces containing a soul. Moreover, numbers did not only express quantities but also principles of nature and their related energy. Like every other component of the universe, numbers were also male and female.

Additional Info:

Commissioned by the ALEA Association, Italy, and first performed by Marco Bidin at University of Music, Stuttgart, 20th February 2013.

Instrumentation: Electronics, Organ

Year: 1999 Duration: 8' 52"

When the acquisition of a new viewpoint begins to take shape, intuition becomes the tool for exploring other states of mind located beyond logical understanding. I have interpreted the experience of satori as the unfolding of a deeper insight into the truth of reality, an enlightened consciousness flashing into a new spiritual actuality.

Instrumentation: Harpsichord

Year: 1993 Duration: 13' 10"

“… if  nothing  passes  away, there  is  no  past  time, and  if  nothing  arrives, there  is  no  future time, and  if nothing  existed  there  would  be  no  present  time.  Take  the  two  tenses, past  and  future.  How  can  they  ‘be’   when  the  past  is  not  now  present  and  the  future  is  not  yet  present?  Yet  if   the  present  were  always  present, it  would  not  pass  into  the  past: it  would  not  be  time  but  eternity.”   (St. Augustine, Confessions)

Beyond the bridge is a composition constructed upon a system of multi-dimensional form: the large triadic structure appears in superimposed combinations of the three main sections played on three different spaces. The central motif consists of the note D unfolded by the partials of its harmonics series. The cello symbolises a journey that begins at a very distant place, gradually getting closer to an imaginary space, and finally returning to its initial place.

   

Additional Info:

‘Beyond the bridge’ was written in 1993 for Zoe Martlew and was awarded second prize at the 1994 Bourges International Electroacoustic Competition, France. It was also selected by SEAMUS (the American Society of Electroacoustic Music) in 1996. The world premiere took place at the Wartegg Schlössli in Lucerne, Switzerland, on 22nd January 1994. The performers were Zoe Martlew (cello) and John Palmer (electronics).

Instrumentation: Electronics, Violoncello

Year: 2006 Duration: 13'

In this music I have dealt with space and sound as attributes of moving images in time. The alto flute provides the timbral material for the electronics consisting of multiphonics and harmonics, whilst the piano ‘colours in’ the flute’s timbral variations with short motives deriving from the flute’s melodies. As in a moving universe, both instruments are projected onto dissimilar spaces delineated by the spectral content of the flute.

Afterglow is the third work of a triptych based on piano and a woodwind instrument where I have explored each duo in terms of spatial and timbral relations. The triptych consists of nowhere (clarinet, piano and electronics), from the lake (oboe and amplified piano) and afterglow (alto flute, piano and electronics). As in the other two works, in afterglow my perception of space was inspired by a short poem using minimal syntax and condensed imagery.

Additional Info:

Afterglow was commissioned by and written for Arianna Palin and Detta Danford. The premiere took place at The Space, in London, during the Enterprise Festival on 23rd June 2006. The performers were Detta Danford (flute), Arianna Palin (piano) and John Palmer (electronics).

Instrumentation: Electronics, Piano, Alto Flute

Year: 1991 Duration: 5'

Some years ago I wrote a piece for string orchestra called “Music for the World”. It was a conscious emotional reaction to some disturbing political events that occurred in the world in the early 1990s.  I was interested in exploring the meaning of two contrasting human dimensions symbolised by two dissimilar musical textures, and an interacting space where a “there-ness”, represented by the the resonant body of the main orchestra, is opposed to a “here-ness” represented by the string quartet placed in its centre.

Additional Info:

A string quartet plays in the centre of the stage being surrounded by the string orchestra.

Instrumentation: String Orchestra, Violoncello, Viola, 2 Violins