Music Groups

Current vehicles of creative urges:

Me (and the piano)

My hands, the interface, primary medium of doing in the world: -gripping, holding, manipulating, stroking, caressing….and so many other things; -moulding and expressing, changing the world….holding ‘on’ and letting ‘go’, stroking, caressing, touching,

…feeling textures, emotions and others, a direct channel from the heart, spontaneously expressive of the psyches deepest expressions and desire… hands: a life of their own, gesturing, giving lines, shape and expression to speech, and song…

Inner Voices

Why the Inner Voices? At times working in a string quartet format, with guest artists(particularly improvisers) became too complex and limiting, and Rudi and I found it easier to experiment and be more fluid (and it certainly made rehearsals a lot easier). At times it became a simple way of defining any combination that wasn’t quite quartet based. In the end we found it to be our format of choice, (particularly sax, electric viola, didjeridu, keyboards and percussion) and so it has come to pass;  I/we have morphed into the Inner Voices.

Sydney Chamber Orchestra

For the occasional project requiring larger scale musical (orchestral) forces, I created the “Sydney Chamber Orchestra” for recording projects which came my way (for example, the recording and broadcast of my Symphony No 1, “As Night Follows Day…” (2001) or theme music for ABC Radio National broadcast) or various public performances. (see video clip) Formed around a core of my colleagues from the Elektra String Quartet and the Inner Voices, as well as friends from the Symphony, the Sydney Chamber Orchestra allowed me to enjoy the more traditional classical format and repertoire I used to be involved in.

New Gen Philharmonic

Who were these young people, who seemed to be appearing amongst us in ever greater numbers and presence? So energetic, enquiring, and wanting it seems, their share of the action; and of the meaning that comes with the creating, and defining, of a world of their own. What to do…resist, and try to hold them back? Ignore them and get on with ones own life? Or relax and create a space where they, the young ones, the ‘new generation’ can find…whatever it is that they need to find.

Previous vehicles of creative urges:

Elektra String Quartet

Formed in 1990, the Elektra String Quartet was one of Australia’s most innovative and prolific ensembles in the contemporary music scene for many years. Performing in both metropolitan and regional country centres, as well as South America and Europe, it presented an always exciting and accessible range of music, with particular focus on Australian composers, and the compositions of its artistic director, Romano Crivici.

Paranormal Music Society

A hard one to categorise, the Paranormal Music Society somehow balanced the stricter, more formal side of my personality (which was being expressed in and as the Elektra String Quartet), and although often composing for it (which all of us did) the essence of the Paranormals was improvisation and direct contact with the audience. It came out of my now very long friendship with Linsey Pollak, with whom I always played, so it kind of just developed, and then of course we met Blair…