 |
|
aka
The Starburst Symphony was my first (and currently only) symphony. I wrote it in 1999, as a present for Alex. When he recieved it, he commented "Nobody's ever written me a symphony before".
The Starburst Symphony was written for orchestra. Unfortunately, not having access to an orchestra at the time, I was faced with a choice between hunting around for a friendly symphony orchestra who were not adverse to doing favours for beer, playing the symphony on tin cans and bits of string, or programming a computer to play it. Fortunately, I knew a bit about MIDI sequencing, and was able to obtain an orchestra soundalike in the form of a small box about the size of my hand. The orchestra sounds were pretty good, but obvious the music would benefit greatly from representation on more substantial instruments.
Towards the end of the symphony there's an aria. By happy coincidence, I happened to be in contact with a pretty damn excellent professional soprano by the name of Florence Millon at the time, and she recorded the vocals at Seventh Star Studios in time for my present to Alex. Alas, Florence does not wish her recording of Starburst Aria to be made public, and so ... pending another vocalist ... the symphony was never made available to the public.
(It is true that I trained as a soprano, by the way, but I know my limits. Aria is a difficult song to sing, and requires someone considerably better then me to perform it).
Nonetheless, the symphony was recorded, and released as an album with a limited edition of one. I have decided to place some of my favourite extracts from the symphony here on this web site, so that anyone interested can dowload the various bits as MP3s and actually listen to them. Butterflies was made available on the internet some years ago, back when the symphony was first made, but the remaining songs are made available here for the first time.
|
|
Of course, it goes without saying that if there are any top notch sopranos and / or orchestras out there willing to help turn this work into a more satisfying reality then please email me and good things will happen.