Profiles

Musicologist - composer - dreamer

I have been interested in composition since I began learning the bass guitar at the age of 14. I have studied a BA in Music, an MMus in Composition and a PhD in Critical Musicology, all at the University of Leeds. I am due to finish the PhD at the beginning of 2010.

My thesis looks at the emergence of the label New Complexity and its subsequent reception in Britain. I have come to the conclusion that this label is, simultaneously, downright unhelpful and utterly crucial for an understanding of the music which it purports to categorize. Its unhelpful because it prioritises aspects of the music which give a very one-dimensional experience -- an experience which has, in my view, led to its neglect and marginalization in this country. The label is crucial because it is part of the history of the sounds, part of how they were received, part of what gives the music its meaning, part of what makes it significant.

Below is more information on my thesis, my interests and an indication of my own stance towards contemporary music and culture. 

As a result of my current research I am interested in questions such as: "What does the British reception of the label "New Complexity" and associated music tell us about British attitudes towards contemporary music during the 1980s?"; "What does the phrase contemporary music mean in this context?"; "How was/is contemporary music separated from other forms of music making?"; "When did that process begin?"; Where does that process have its history?"; "What are the effects of this separation and what do they tell us about social and cultural aspects of British society?"; "Is there such a thing as British music?"; "If so, how can you tell?"; "What sorts of discourses dominated British attitudes to new music in the 1980s?"; "What are the effects of a musician's social and geographical background on musical, stylistic and aesthetic choices?"; "Who had power (economic and/or symbolic) and who was marginalised during this time?"; "What was the impact upon contemporary music from free-market economic policies in the British arts sector?"; "What were the effects of wider social, political, cultural and technological developments on the ways in which music was heard and made in Britain?"; "Is it possible to draw links between the musical practices of composers associated with this label and the British political landscape of the 1980s?"; "If so, how does one do this?"; "What does it mean when so-called complex music is discussed in such a way that suggests it is not British?" 

I am interested in all kinds of music making, however, not just that which I'm studying; I suppose I'm attracted to a certain commitment to the art, the skill, the craft, the uniqueness, the "special-ness" of making music; not all music-making, in my opinion, can be considered in these terms (and the dividing line is certainly not based on the popular/art music distinction).

I look forward to experiencing all sorts of new things, in a variety of mediums, and meeting lots of new people who are interested in discussing what music is for, what makes it good and what makes it bad, why it might be important for a healthy society, and why market-driven, mass-produced pap with no soul whatsoever must not be allowed to dominate cultural space! I think these sorts of issues are really important and I urge everyone to engage with them.

As far as I'm concerned, I'm sick and tired of all the doom and gloom in the world, although I can well understand where it has come from and why people feel it. I am sick and tired of the sense that there is nothing we can do about anything and that the doom and gloom is inevitable. I really don't think that it is inevitable even if it is very real for a great many people.

As such, I feel it is important that those who engage with Sound and Music realise that it has the potential to be whatever its members wish it to be. This is a fantastic opportunity to create something of lasting cultural worth and, more importantly, of immediate and continuing cultural impact. It may sound unlikely, but I see no reason why it is not also an opportunity for engaging with some of the most important questions facing our world today: in the face of impending ecological disaster, and of increasing social inequality, what can music do? What can it say? What should be said?

There are of course no simple or right answers to these questions (as if such things might exist!). They may even be the wrong questions. Lively debate and dedicated music-making is required, and it is not for any one person to decide what's in and what's out, although I appreciate that my writing here may have those sorts of overtones!! Please don't think, "Here comes the crazy revolutionary lefty hell-bent on colonizing a new music organisation." This is not what I'm interested in.

But I am certain that when new forms of music and sonic art (do we really need the distinction?) emerge then part of their purpose -- their responsibility? -- is to challenge and to explore the sonic world in weird and wonderful ways, and to engage "new" people too. In so doing, it may carve out spaces where we can ask probing questions about the wider world; our world, which is not only ours, and which is daily threatened by the desire to consume all the planet has to offer us. Music need not be yet another product to be consumed; for those of use who are into it (and not everyone is), it should be, as indeed it often is, heard, felt, enjoyed, criticised, experienced and all the other personal emotions and thoughts which are important to us as thinking, feeling, individual beings. Music should be savoured and it should be cherished. In this respect it shares qualities both with us as the fortunate humans that we are (or at least I feel I am), and with the world on which we depend for life. After all, without us and without the world, there is no music.