David Arditti is a composer of contemporary classical music in a tonal and highly melodic idiom. His works include vocal, orchestral, choral, brass band, wind band, piano, and chamber music, plus scores for film and video. He also plays the piano, accompanies and conducts. He can be commissioned to write music for any group, and also for film or other media.
The much-delayed (by Covid) first performance of my Sonatina for clarinet and piano (Op. 50) will take place in the City of London on Friday 26 November 2021. The performers will be the first-class professionals Peter Cigleris and Neil Crossland. Full details are on this poster.
I am pleased to announce that my Introduction and Allegro Brillante (Op. 41) for flute, oboe and piano has been published by Forton Music, a respected publisher of music for woodwind and brass. Hopefully this is the start of a fruitful relationship with them. Forton also publish works by my friends Cedric Peachey and Liz Sharma, some of whose works I have performed.
Forton have made a video where you can see the score while hearing a performance of the piece. The music can be purchased here.
The recording of the first performance in 2009 can be heard here.
I’ve completed a significant new work. Entitled ‘A Still, Sad Music’, it is a setting for choir, orchestra and (optional) organ of lines 90-113 of ‘Lines Composed a Few Miles above Tintern Abbey’ by William Wordsworth.
I had to consider how to make a demo of this. With instrumental pieces I can just use the audio from the scoring program, but in this case the words are important, which of course cannot be synthesised. My solution is to make a video combining the audio with a scrolling display of the vocal, organ and string parts (the words would be too small if you saw the whole score). This demo is on YouTube.
The orchestration is:
Oboe
Cor Anglais
2 Bassoons
2 Horns
2 Trumpets
2 Trombones
Bass Trombone
Timpani
Harp
Organ (optional)
Strings
In the video the full orchestration may be heard, but only the choral, organ and string parts are seen.
The work could be performed with choir strings, harp and timpani only, or with an incomplete group of wind instruments, particularly if the organ were used. With full orchestra, the organ part would be optional.
Here is this new work, mentioned in the last post, in a realisation made by Dorico and Note performer.
The instrumentation is:
1 Flute (doubling Piccolo)
1 Oboe
1 Clarinet in Bb
1 Bassoon
1 Horn in F
1 Trumpet in Bb
1 Trombone
2 percussionists
Strings
London Composers Forum at the Harrow Summer Music Festival
Thursday 11 July 2019 at 12:30pm, Church of St John Greenhill, Station Road, Harrow HA1 2JE.
I will be playing A New Wedding March, a work I wrote for my brother’s wedding about a decade ago, on the piano, and also a piano arrangement I have made of one of my orchestral marches, Pomp and Circumstance (Op. 23).
This will be part of a concert also including a new flute sonata by my friend Martin Jones, and works for piano and vibraphone by Derek Foster and Michael Regan, pieces for cello and piano by Peter Openshaw and Alan Hilton. and a piano piece by Peter Terry. Admission will be free, with a collection at the end.
The concert is organised by London Composers Forum in collaboration with Harrow Summer Music Festival.
‘World Tour’
Premiere of March of the Pioneers (Op 58)
London Contemporary Chamber Orchestra conducted by Alan Taylor
Saturday 28 September at 7:30pm, Church of St George the Martyr, Borough High Street, London SE1 1JA
The idea of this concert is a journey round the world, with each continent or region represented by a new piece by a different composer. My contribution is a piece representing North America, entitled March of the Pioneers (I told you I was obsessed by marches). If it in any way represents the history of America, then the Native Americans do not come too well out of it. The melodies doffs the cap at the swagger of Sousa and the syncopations of Joplin, and are orchestrated in a style somewhere between Elgar and the Loony Tunes scores of Carl Stalling.
Other contributions to the world tour come from composers Isa Suarez, Marianne Johnson, Liz Sharma, Nigel Patterson, Clifford Hughes, Alison Doubleday, Alun Grafton and Simon Tait, all played by London Contemporary Chamber Orchestra conducted by Alan Taylor. Admission £12 (£10 concessions), tickets on the door or via London Composers Forum.
The London Myriad Ensemble