University of York Music Press

Evensong at Exeter College, Oxford, on Friday 4th June, honoured renowned UYMP composer Professor Robert Saxton, who has been Professor of Composition in the Faculty of Music/Tutorial Fellow in Music at Worcester College since 1999. Saxton's beautiful choral work Our Father, whose creative will was given a ‘very fine, distanced rendition’ by Exeter College Choir, who sang through masks and were conducted by the talented Christopher Holman. 

UYMP is very excited to announce the launch of a new blog series entitled 'Caesura'. Over the next few weeks we will begin to share reflections written by our composers on their experiences over the last year, including the challenges they have faced and the projects they have undertaken.  Watch this space for the first blog, to be published soon!

In exciting news, Hilda Paredes is one of sixteen composers selected by Wigmore Hall, as part of their Lockdown Commissions Scheme. This is the largest ever one-off commissioning scheme in the history of the hall, completing its 120th anniversary celebrations.

We are absolutely delighted that Sadie’s song for tenor and piano, Easter Zunday has been featured in Jane Manning’s fabulous volume Vocal Repertoire for the 21st Century (Works written from 2000 onwards).

The work was commissioned in 2008 for NMC Recording’s 20th Anniversary and recorded by Benjamin Hulett and Andrew Ball for the NMC Songbook.

UYMP is delighted that James Weeks’ new CD, 'Summer', has been released on Another Timbre label.  The music was recorded by talented young players the Explore Ensemble.  The CD features James' works Summer, Violet, Violute, Düsseldorf, Durham and Siro’s Garden.  It can be bought as a download from Bandcamp or as a CD directly from the label Another Timbre.  An interesting interview with James Weeks on the ideas behind these pieces and how they came into being is available on the Another Timbre website. 

Thomas Simaku’s award-winning piece, Soliloquy V – Flauto Acerbo for Recorders has received another performance in the Netherlands. The talented young musician Emily Bannister performed this challenging piece at the Bernard Haitinkzaal of Amsterdam Conservatory of Music in April 2021.

Commissioned by Chris Orton and the BBC Performing Arts Fund, the piece received a British Composer Award in 2009, described by the BASCA judging panel as ‘visionary and entirely original’.

We are very pleased that violinist Sophie Hinson is premiering Sadie’s The Love Affair for singing instrumentalist’ (2020) on 2 June, commissioned as part of the Royal Academy of Music's 200 PIECES - celebrating the Bicentenary of the RAM in 2022. 

Sadie writes: 'This short piece was written during September-October 2020, commenced and abandoned several times during the UK Covid-19 lockdown period. Inevitably, perhaps, it is a reflection of the times - a performer and their instrument in isolated togetherness: a love letter from one to the other.

UYMP are absolutely delighted to announce that Sadie Harrison has been awarded a PRS Foundation OPEN FUND grant for a 2 year project entitled PASTURE & STORM (New Music for the Single-Handed Pianist). Over the next year, Sadie will be writing eight new works for the internationally renowned virtuoso left-handed pianist Nicholas McCarthy, Sophia Benton (a former pupil currently studying as a single-handed pianist at Welsh College of Music and Drama), singer Peyee Chen and the Bristol Ensemble conducted by John Pickard. These works will include piano solos, piano duets, duos for flute/piano and violin/piano, a trio, quintet and single movement concerto.

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’.