Music

When I set out to try to compose music for the 10 poems from In Bob’s In Balfour Street book we hadn’t got to on the Winter Night At Liffey CD, I tried to do simple but atmospheric musical motifs that would infuse a recurrent sound associated with Bob’s poetic themes. I heard my music sitting further back in the mix than the quite formally shaped melodies I had conceived for the four earlier poems recorded on the Winter Night At Liffey CD.

Also, I was attracted to the concept of ‘continuous music’ associated with Lubomyr Melnyk, as it encourages the pianist to respond variously to a music score rather than play ‘note perfect’ from start to end as if in an examination. For the Hidden Vale CD, ‘continuous music’ seemed a fitting strategy for the melody to be quite flexible around the spoken word which can easily, and interestingly, change (timing, words, delivery) every time the piece is performed.

I thus set out quite consciously to shape the musical motifs for these 10 poems around a shared, simple chord structure, mainly C major 9, D minor, G major 7, with variations, to give them a harmonic unity and allow for easy transitions to improvisation, even experimentation, in any subsequent performance. This worked quite well for a while. For example, few might gauge on first listening that My Godfriend, Hidden Vale, and Oddity have pretty much the same chord sequence,so different are their moods and execution.

Yet, for all 10, this chord pattern proved a little too consistent so I replaced what I had for Considering Life and went to a totally different, much loved but under-used,chord sequence employing sharps to give a higher pitch by one semitone. I then turned to E flat / A flat major for Thoughts While Staring At the Sky to get that dreamy effect, and F major / B flat major for The Birds, and On Cradle Mountain to introduce a more solemn, reflective mood. A good friend, Pete Costello, who trained as a violinist at the Tasmanian Conservatorium of Music, was the first person apart from Bob and Paul to hear all my rough demos for this CD and kindly observed:

I hear them as romanticism meeting haiku. Of course ‘haiku’ is a three line poetry form but all your pieces seem to be able to deliver their message in a concise way, unlike the romantics, and I consider this a strength indeed - a modern romanticism.

Sean Lowry, award-winning composer and producer for DefFX, founder and director of Project Anywhere [see: seanlowry.com] and also Melbourne University Faculty of Fine Arts and Music, listening to the Hidden Vale tracks was immediately drawn to thinking about the intense cross-pollination across all the arts during the Late Romantic Period, when ideas spread quickly across literature, music and the visual arts. He also heard parallels to the genre of lied, (art songs for voice and piano) and, more recently, to developments in pop such as the musical expressions

of Grouper (Liz Harris) - e.g., combining thin melodic textures with richly immersive washed out cinematic reverb. This is a style I want to develop in my next project.

UNBROKEN BY STEVE CRUMP - NEW ALBUM OUT NOW!

Publicly recognised as “Hobart composer, pianist and environmentalist” (Cygnet Folk Festival Earth Celebration program, 12 Jan. 2020, p.4), Steve Crump has released his 3rd CD, “Unbroken”. Recorded on a vintage concert grand at “Mixmasters” studio in the Adelaide Hills with Mick Wordley the sound magician and Heath Cullen producing and double-tracking guitar, clap sticks, harmonium and piano over Steve’s playing. The title track was used as the soundtrack for a video for the Restore Pedder Campaign launched at Sidespace Gallery in Hobart at the end of 2019.

The theme running through “Unbroken” is of shadows as a way of acknowledging people who have shaped four of these songs. Respectfully, “Bapa” offers gentle shadows of acoustic guitar as if Gurrumul is playing too (which he is in Steve’s heart); the clap sticks given to Steve by Balang (Tom E Lewis) sound echoing shadows over “Barrumungu” that includes a section written for Tom; the harmonium on “Winter Night” hints at Bob Brown playing his pump organ in his house at Liffey, as in Bob’s poem that triggered this piece; and, the joyful shadow of the improvised duets Steve has with his 7 year old grandchild playfully appear in the high treble of “Heaven’s Rain”.

Steve’s CDs are stocked by leading independent outlets: Redeye Records Sydney, Basement Discs and Rocksteady Records Melbourne, Fullers Bookshop Hobart, The Avenue Records (formerly Mojo) Launceston and from this website.

October 2019

On Wednesday 30th October (2019) the opening track for Steve’s soon-to-be released new album “Unbroken” featured as the soundtrack for a music video to promote the restoration of Lake Pedder. The music video (link below) was launched as part of the opening reception of the Lake Pedder - Journey to Restoration Exhibition held at the Sidespace Gallery in Salamanca Arts Centre, Hobart. Read More about it here… 

Click below to open the sheet music for Unbroken