The ABC has recorded a significant number of Australian works throughout its history. This is a wonderful initiative in terms of making recordings of Australian music available to the world.

One piece of mine has been included in the initial tranch: In Memoriam (Concerto for Amplified Cello and Orchestra). This is from the premiere performance with soloist Nathan Waks and conductor Richard Gill with the Sydney Symphony Orchestra.

One of the latest is from Gramophone, which said:

“The latest effort from the Canadian violinist reveals a serious artist using her fame to bring a worthy new work to light rather than focusing on herself. The generic title of Matthew Hindson’s Violin Concerto is almost false advertising, as its three movements are vibrant programmatic music. It’s the sort of work that should get audiences running, not walking, back to concert halls on new-music nights… such joyous music can only be written by a composer both optimistic at heart and confident enough not to give a hoot what colleagues might think of its simplistic theme and sensational treatment.” (Andrew Druckenbrod)

New Music Up Late presenter, Julian Day.

If you happen to catch this show, you’ll hear a suitably eclectic selection of music ranging from Penderecki to Ross Edwards to Merzbow to Carcass. It will also be streamed from the New Music Up Late website for delayed broadcast.

It’s quite amazing how the selecting music like this can result in contemplation upon the whole compositional process.

This is a really amazing recording in a number of ways. Firstly the performance is outstanding, as can be expected. Secondly, it is available not just as a normal CD but also in Super CD audio. Thirdly, there are some excellent other pieces on the disc: John Corigliano’s Red Violin Suite and also Liszt’s Totentanz arranged for violin instead of the normal piano by Martin Kennedy and Lara herself.

Audio Excerpts:

Excerpt from “Wind Turbine at Kooragang Island” (first mvt.):

Excerpt from “Westerway” (second mvt.):

Excerpt from “Grand Final Day” (third mvt.):

There have been some excellent reviews, which is always nice.

This disc is available through Amazon.com, through CD retailers worldwide and also through iTunes (search for Hindson in the iTunes store - they even have the complete liner notes).

Click on the image to download the PDF.

There is a good article on harmonics with a useful table at: http://www.musicalobservations.com/publications/harmonics.html

All seems to be working now. Apologies for any inconvenience.

These are numbers with a caret on top:

This is available for free download from the Free Fonts page.

I was not able to be there but judging from feedback as well as reviews in the New York Times and MusicalAmerica.com, it was a great success.

Thank you to wordpressmobile.mobi for this facility.

William Barton and I are having a new composition premiered by the Sydney Symphony Orchestra in the Concert Hall of the Sydney Opera House on 2-4 April, 2008.

The work is called Kalkadungu, which is the name of the tribe from which William originates. It’s scored for a soloist playing electric guitar, singing and didjeridu (obviously William is performing this part!) with orchestra.

It was very interesting being part of a co-commission, that is, the piece was written both by William and myself. This approach may be common in the popular and jazz music traditions, but I can’t think of many examples from classical music where this happened (the orchestral works of Paul McCartney perhaps). Writing an orchestral work is such an intricate task that it doesn’t normally lend itself to compositional collaboration, but in this case we used a common starting point: an Aboriginal chant William wrote when he was just 15 years old (listen to one of William’s pieces based on this chant here).

Programmatically, the piece is based around the events and ramifications of the troubled history between the Kalkadungu tribe and European Settlers. The Kalkadungu people were a fierce tribe of warriors who conducted a campaign of guerilla warfare for 15 years, before being decimated in battle by the combined troopers of Queensland in 1889 at Battle Mountain, near Mount Isa.

For more extensive programme notes, click here.

Kalkadungu was commissioned by Maggie Gray and Roger Allan. Australia is lucky to have philanthropists such as Maggie and Roger who support the needs of indigenous people in our community. They are both heavily involved in indigenous affairs and have recently started a company called “Indigenous Capital” that provides capital for indigenous projects and subsequently returns all profits to the indigenous community.