Rocking the Boat

Some of the most fascinating moments in the history of music, for me, have been when composers have said ‘enough of this, I want to do something differently!’. Whether these differences then manifest themselves as changes to structure, tuning, rhythm, compositional systems, instrumentation or style, the ability to challenge the status quo of the performer or listener can be one of the composers’ most useful tools.

So with this in mind, it was of great interest to me to see a promotional video last year from composer Simon Dobson, widely known in the brass band world, announcing a crowd funding bid for a project to do something quite different.

Something in this really resonated with me. As composers, we all have musical influences and yet sometimes, and I include myself in this, combining the sometimes disparate and eclectic strands of your influences and projects together seems a completely impossible dream, or indeed, a completely unwanted one!

The Brass Band genre has often been portrayed as archaic, very traditional and quite formal, and Simon’s work has already pushed the genre into newer areas such as the piece Penlee, which recently and unexpectedly came very high up in the Classic FM hall of fame:

Simon also won a BASCA Composer of the Year in 2012 for his work A Symphony of Colours, 20 minute tour-de-force:

The thought of helping to fund a record combining elements of brass band, classical, jazz, dub step and avant-garde was very appealing and it was with great pleasure this week that the results of the project dropped through my door, the album ‘Euneriophrenia’, as eclectic and interesting as promised.

The experience has highlighted a few things for me. As music lovers, try browsing the crowd funding sites, such as Sponsume, Kickstarter or IndieGoGo, find projects that are interesting and personal to you, and back them. For a small outlay, you get to back and receive a new work and feel personally involved in its production, supporting worthy composers and artists to produce something different. As composers, can the process of trying to combine some of your disparate and eclectic tastes lead you in exciting new directions?

You can find some examples from Simon’s Euneriophrenia album below. More information about his work can be found at www.simondobson.net and www.twitter.com/peacekidxxx . You can also listen to more of the album and purchase it from HERE.

The opening track: Crystal

My personal favourite from the album: Clash  (Click HERE to listen)