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Background
Composition
has been an integral part of my musical activity since I was a child. From
the age of 10 I was composing my own melodies and arranging tunes I heard
on the radio and on records for fellow elementary school students. (You can view
a sample on my trombone page.) By
the
age
of
12
I was
writing
and arranging for my own ten-piece jazz-rock ensemble, which performed
arrangements of bigband tunes ("A Whiter Shade of Pale" as performed
by the Daly-Wilson Bigband, and "Mystery" as performed by Manhattan
Transfer) and more contemporary pieces. We were performing in the community
and also
at school.
My writing experiments through high school also took me to the genres of pop and small jazz combos. One group I lead was called "Jade", and was modelled on the J.J. Johnson and Kai Winding two-trombone collaborations. By 12th grade I was transcribing the records of contemporary jazz bassist Dave Holland and his ensembles. From age 18 I lead a quintet based on Holland's called "Contemporary Focus", in which I played trombone. This quintet was the chief performer of my compositions through my undergraduate years in Brisbane, and had a second incarnation in my post-graduate years in Boston, this time with me playing bass rather than trombone.
In my Bachelor of Music undergraduate degree, I took composition and electro-acoustic composition lessons as my second-study. My teachers were Mary Mageau, Gerhard Brophy, Rodolphe Blois and Stephen Cronin. Here I was formally introduced to classical and contemporary composers of the 20th century. I also began working in the field of musique conrete, with tape in the studio. My compositions for the ensemble "Artisans Workshop" can be heard in the recordings section of this web site.
During my Graduate Diploma studies in Boston, I studied composition formally with Dominique Eade and Pozzi Escot. I was introduced to Third Stream techniques, and also studied the role of mathematics in music, Chaos theory and non-linearity. During this time I was granted a commission to compose a program of original music. This gave birth to such pieces as "Spare Change" which features taped interviews I made with homeless people on the streets of Boston, set to drum kit, bass guitar, violin, and cello. I organized and presented groups from jazz quartet to small and large chamber ensembles as my job as Director of the Jazz Composers' Ensemble at New England Conservatory (1993-1995), taking over from the late great Jimmy Giuffre.
After graduating and returning to Australia from the USA, I composed and performed original compositions, including many commissioned works. These have been premiered in a variety of venues including the Concert Hall, Theatre and on the radio. These commissions included:
"Wide
Awake" - a theatrical commission from "Out of the Box" early
childhood productions
"VK4SS" -
an electronic piece commissioned by ABC Classic-FM Radio
"Airwaves:
100 Years of Radio" - a multi-media commission by Arts Queensland and
the Queensland International Biennial Festival of Music
"Kaizen" -
a Contemporary Classical chamber orchestra commission by the National Academy
of Music
I also wrote an extensive body of repertoire for my contemporary ensemble "Loops", which actively toured, performed and recorded, often with guest artists. My compositions for this ensemble can be heard in the recordings section of this web site. It is these small-group compositions which fuse jazz improvisation with the structures of Western Classical and North Indian Classical music which continue to form a central thrust in my composing.
In 2002 I returned to the USA, spending 3 years in Los Angeles and 1 year in Boston. During this time I provided writing support for many other composers, including the composer Brandon Roberts and the movie "Sea of Fear", and various songwriters. Commercial compositions have aired on Cable TV advertisements. I also supplemented my composition-related studies with lessons, seminars and classes with Lee Hyla, Robert Cogan and Pozzi Escot.
Qualifications
• Master
of Music (with Academic Honors)
• Graduate
Diploma in Contemporary Improvisation (with Distinction in Performance)
• Bachelor
of Music (with Distinction)
• Full
Writer Member of the Australasian Performing Rights Association, with over
100 registered compositions
Services
offered
MUSIC
COPYING: Create
professionally-notated sheet music from your hand-written scores and parts.
MUSIC TRANSCRIPTION: Create professionally-notated sheet music from your recordings.
ARRANGING: Arrange a composition for any combination of instruments/voice, from rock band to orchestra.
COMPOSITION: Create an original composition for your ensemble, media project, or event.
LYRIC SETTING AND SONGWRITING: Set your original lyrics to music, for any instrumental combination.
Please contact me for a tailored quotation.
Samples of compositions
To
give you an idea of what my own compositions look like, I have made some of my compositions available on-line. These are able to be viewed and played
for free, and downloaded and printed for a small fee at Score Exchange (formerly Sibelius Music).
Before you can do this you may need to install the free Scorch plug-in into your
web browser.
Click 
to
download the necessary plug-in.
Come and visit my Score Exchange page!