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I am a composer living in London. I have a day job as an IT support assistant in a small company. I was born in London and will probably remain here. I have many and varied interests, the most important of which is music. I read books about evolution, music and the occasional novel. I am heavily influenced by many 20th Century composers. I have had little in the way of musical education. I finished college with an extremely good B-Tech(which is still nothing) and then started the wrong university degree. I haven't been able to go back because of money constraints. I have taught myself many techniques including canon and counterpoint from books and by listening. I'm not sure if I am musically "talented", but I have put an enormous effort in and gained much for my troubles (as a person; not money).The main challenge I have found, with writing music, is finding an individual voice. I am resigned to the idea that you cannot force yourself to be original, but you can at least try. I have found that mixing my influences yields the best results. I like the repetitive nature of 20th Century Minimalist composers as well as the violence and force of Rock and Hip Hop. I write on staff paper and then transfer my ideas onto my PC, usually using a combination of Reason and Cubase. I find that a technological approach to organic music gives me the limitations I need to make something worth listening to. I keep a moleskine music notepad on me at all times in case I need to write something down before I forget it.
Music:Requiem for R&R: see blogMusic in three short parts: This piece was originally for a BBC competition to write music for a nature documentary. I didn't win. It's quite a nice little piece.
It only contains two chords: a C without a 3rd and a D without a 5th. The chords over lap at points creating different consonances and dissonances. The first part is in 7/8, the second 8/8, the third 9/8. The Marimba pattern in each section is essentially the same but with subtle differences that make the time signatures hard to detect. The guitar strums chords in the background fading in and out, this gives the piece its movement. The melody is played on three guitars. The first plays the melody and the second two play 1 and 2 quavers later, respectively. The melody plays in parts 1 and 3.
Rhythmic Variations: I wrote this piece for my mother for her birthday. It is one of my less technically accomplished pieces but I was going through a stage of experimentation. You can see the chords for the piece in the picture on the standalone player. It has a cyclic 6/8, 8/8, 6/8, 7/8 structure. Guitars 2&3 join to add contrapuntal interest. The end section has 3 different time signatures played against each other: 3/8, 4/8 and 5/4. The main experiment was to adopt Glass' approach to constant metre shifts without breaking the flow of the music. I'm not sure if I pulled it off particularly well but it was an interesting experience and my Mother was very pleased with it. Note: I just listened to this after not having heard for ages and came to the conclusion that I am a dreadful guitarist! Oh well, it's too late to give up now...
CD: possibly available sometime in the future, maybe.
If anyone would like a CD of my recent work, (Music in three short parts, Rhythmic Variations, Requiem) could they send me a message. If there is enough interest, I’ll put one together and send it to you for a small fee, just enough to cover the CD and postage with a little extra for the hundreds of hours it takes to write a piece of music. Include in your message how much you would be willing to pay, or examples of other people doing a similar thing.Thanks,Sam Rae
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