University of York Music Press

Simaku’s new album ‘con-ri-sonanza’, released by the Swedish label BIS Records in November 2020, continues to capture the attention of international music press. Following excellent reviews published in Germany (Das Klassik & Jazz Magazine), UK (Gramophone and the BBC Music Magazine) and France (Diapason), as well as broadcasts by France Musique, Portuguese National radio, and American Ecclectus radio in Seattle, a review has been published in the 1/2021 issue of the German magazine Neue Zeitschrift für Musik.

Ed Hughes’s music features in this year’s Brighton Festival on the free ECHOES Interactive Sound Walks App. The Brighton Festival Ditchling Museum Music Trail launches this Saturday and is available free at any time until 30 May. If you’re anywhere near Ditchling and Ditchling Museum of Art + Craft in May, please do download the App and enjoy Ed’s music  (‘scintillating lyricism’-The Times) as you walk in the South Downs National Park.

We are delighted that David Lancaster’s haunting saxophone quartet Swan was broadcast on RTE Lyric FM on Saturday 27th March, on the programme Purple Vespertine.  The presenter Ellen Cranitch applauded Lancaster’s work and its performance, saying: ‘It paints a great picture indeed’.  The performance had been recorded by the Delta Saxophone Quartet on their recent album ‘Bowie, Berlin and Beyond’.

An excellent article about Simaku’s choral piece La Leggiadra Luna has been published by Simon Cummings in 5:4 – a blog devoted to the 'most interesting, innovative and impressive music of our time’.

UYMP is very saddened to hear of the death of composer Simon Bainbridge.  Simon was highly revered in the world of contemporary music, both as a composer and as a teacher of composition, latterly as Head of Composition at the Royal Academy of Music from 1999 until 2007.  Our sympathies go to his family.  

Ettore Garzia thoroughly enjoyed ‘The Blue Voice of Water’ (an orchestral collection), and ‘Archipelago’ (for percussion ensemble), and had plenty of thoughts to share on both.

We are delighted that pianist Alex Wilson has commissioned house composer Sadie Harrison to write a substantial new work, generously supported by a further grant from the RVW Trust. The project was granted a previous award from the Ambache Charitable Trust. The collaboration came about after Alex’s recent release of a Toccata Classics CD of works by the little-known Australian composer Frederick Septimus Kelly, who died at the Battle of the Somme aged 35.

Described by the French National Radio as ‘astonishing music’, Thomas Simaku’s new album con-ri-sonanza, performed by internationally acclaimed musicians Quatuor Diotima and Joseph Houston, continues to receive excellent reviews in the British music press.

We are delighted that Sadie’s new work Fire in Song (2020) recorded by Gemini on Divine Art/Metier has received an excellent review on Classical Explorer (Colin Clarke).

Clarke writes: ‘And so to the "final" work, Sadie Harrison's Fire in Song (I say "final" in inverted commas as there's a "bonus work"!). It was written in 2020 for clarinet, viola and two clapstick-playing narrators (here Aleksander Szram and Sophie Harris). 

Trilogy Ensemble will give a first, online performance of David Lancaster’s new trio for flute, viola and harp in their online concert from Helmsley Arts Centre on Saturday 20th March 2021 at 7:30.

We were very pleased to see an in-depth review of our ‘Anthems for Sopranos, Altos, and Unison Male Singers: 10 anthems for the church year’ in this month’s edition of Choir & Organ. Jeremy Jackman finds plenty of positives in our collection, which is published by The Royal School of Church Music (RSCM).

Thomas Simaku’s new album of chamber music, con-ri-sonanza, released by the Swedish label BIS Records in November 2020, has captured the attention of the music press and radio stations alike. Performed by Quatuor Diotima and Joseph Houston, two works from this album were featured on French national radio, France Musique, which described Simaku’s music as ‘astonishing’, in a programme of contemporary music broadcast on 7 February 2021.