Faber Music

This tiny fragment of Aeschylus’ Prometheus Bound, sung in Greek, was written for the Holst Singers in January 1989, and is intended to be the first of a short sequence of choruses.

Instrumentation: 0000 - (2)100 - perc(1): chime/tam-t - strings (trumpet may be replaced by an oboe)

Djilile was commissioned by the South Bank Centre for the Purcell Tercentenary. As a schoolboy, I was so excited when I first heard the “Lament” from Purcell’s Dido and Aeneas, that I wrote several wo...

Instrumentation: 2(II=picc).2.2.2 - 4200 - timp (4 drums) - strings (min. 65432) I wrote the original version of Sinfonia in 1995 for the English Chamber Orchestra, who commissioned it to mark their 3...

I first met the Brodsky Quartet at the Dartington International Summer School in 1993. Mike, Ian, Paul and Jacqueline were preparing for a concert of my music, and we quickly established a firm friend...

I. Aria cappricciosa II. Intermezzo III. Aria conclusa My Divertimento for double string quartet was written at the request of Sir Peter Pears for the 1982 Aldeburgh Festival, and is dedicated to him....

A Leap in the Dark is a mosaic of short pieces, most of which are long unison lines, or short chorales. A Leap in the Dark was commissioned by the Guildhall String Ensemble with funds provided by the...

I wrote this piece for the BBC’s celebration of Henry Purcell, ‘Music for a While’. Purcell wrote A Staircase Overture so I decided to write Another Staircase Overture, starting, like Purcell’s, with...

Concelebration is a ritualistic work in which the four melodic instruments go their own ways and yet from time to time meet and ‘dance’ together. A starting point was Bishop John of Winchester’s fine...

Commissioned by The Nash Ensemble with funds provided by IBM. In Buddhist writings the lotus, padma, signifies the world of form in all its individuality through which the light of reality shines. A l...

Instrumentation: ob.ob(=ca).bsn – harpsichord This is a parody of Stravinsky's parody of classical styles. Schoenberg's mockingly scornful parody of Stravinsky as "Der Kleiner Modernsky" serves as a p...

Instrumentation: ob.ob(=ca).bsn – harpsichord This is a parody of Stravinsky's parody of classical styles. Schoenberg's mockingly scornful parody of Stravinsky as "Der Kleiner Modernsky" serves as a p...

Instrumentation: fl.picc(=fl).2 ob.2 cl(I=Ebcl.II=bcl).2 bsn – 2 hn Serenade was commissioned by Glyndebourne Festival Opera. Written to preface performances of The Magic Flute, my Serenade ends with...

Instrumentation: 1.1.0.bcl.1 - 1000 - pno - vln.vla.vlc.db Written for Speculum Musicae at the request of Oliver Knussen. L, bent… is a short, fast piece written to celebrate my brother David’s 50th b...

Instrumentation: 1(=afl+picc).1(=ca).1(=bcl).1(=cbsn) - 1110 - perc(1): BD(with foot ped)/hi-hat/4 tom-t/3 tam-t - pno - 2 vln.vla.vlc.db Contraflow might be compared to a journey in which the return...

Instrumentation: fl(=picc).ob(=ca).cl(=bcl).bsn - pno My initial ideas for this piece were more obviously connected with colours than is the finished work, which consists of an abstract series of vari...

Instrumentation: fl - perc(1): vib/mar/glsp - harp - vla

My Clarinet Quartet, which I wrote in the early months of 1984, is in two sharply contrasted movements. The first, a theme and variations, begins by alternating allegretto sections, which are dominate...

In October 1986, when I was in Czechoslovakia, I visited the town of Kromeriz to see again Titian’s great painting The Flaying of Marsyas, which I had seen in London exhibition in 1983. It is a horrif...

In October 1986, when I was in Czechoslovakia, I visited the town of Kromeriz to see again Titian’s great painting The Flaying of Marsyas, which I had seen in London exhibition in 1983. It is a horrif...