...But in Matthew Roddie's rambunctions, riotous pastiche of martial music, delivered with Ivesian elan, we saw one of tomorrow's real stars: a young lad with staggering technique, consummate style and an awesome inspiration...

[Light Source] ...a young modern composer's response to the never quite stated tune of Burns's Afton Water - they bestowed real feeling for the music's gradual progress from acerbic vigour to frail and finally touching inertia...

...Arena, by Matthew Roddie, a startling talent of whom I've written before... showed a mature craftsmanship, especially in matters of length and structure. An atmospheric and rippling exercise in more or less continuous motion, Arena is a model of restraint and understatement whose flow and momentum were unbroken by the chattering interruptions of individual instruments...