Recordings below include solos,
small and large groups,
compilations & collaborations
Released digitally, CD, Tape & LP.
Talk
Talk is a composition & improvisation project
with Mark Sanders - Drums & John Edwards - Bass.
In 2018 we made some recordings which I released
with accompanying drawings on Bandcamp
in March 2021.
The focus of the compositions are on rhythm and melody, most of the parts are
interchangeable and can be played by any of us at any time.
solos
Clouds was made for Takuroku - Cafe Oto's online label started during spring 2020. Clouds are recordings made in a friends spare room on half and full size cellos with re-tuned strings, not far from an open window on a quiet row of back gardens. In some of the gaps you will hear the chair creak, the rain fall, the children at a near by child-minders house. The slap and fall of strings, on fingers on wood.
In memory of Beth Hardisty. Rest In Peace.
This 20 minute track comprises a collage of both studio and field recordings using sounds of string and box instruments re-made and played by primary school children from discarded objects, recordings made between 2017-2019 in London, Berlin & the mountains of northern India and includes sounds of valley dogs, people practicing at open windows, children singing, railway works & solo cello pizz harmonics improvisations... (plus some other bits and pieces....)
"Tulse Hill" is a series of improvisations on a cello with the strings de-tuned to new, sometimes micro-tonal pitches. This makes different resonances and creates pleasing tone relationships.
There are only 4 main pitches to be used (apart from pitches over the bridge), so the improvisation element is about discovering and following the natural and evolving rhythms as they unfold.
Barrel
Alison Blunt - Violin/voice, Ivor Kallin - Viola/violin/voice & Hannah Marshall Cello/voice.
The group formed at The Freedom Of the City Festival 2007.
We have released 2 albums so far, both of live performances.
We have been described in many ways by people.
Here are some:
"The British trio Barrel has created a set that is revolutionary, funny and breathtakingly audacious. To the uninitiated, this trio of string virtuosos might sound like musical terrorists. However, it is much more than merely a group of shock artists. Genuine creativity and musical innovation is at the heart of the music on this album; as is extreme humour that takes its cue from Dadaism. In fact it is as if the trio has swallowed the great painter Salvador Dali whole and regurgitated him here with chilling accuracy, rendering his melted imagery with its own sense of musical liquefaction" Raul de Gama Rose
"Decades of instrumental practice along and against the tradition blended inside an intermutual jargon that takes something from the classic and the absurd in equal doses. Heterogeneous composites causing inflammatory euphoria." Massimo Ricci
" The sheer strangeness of it all is astonishing, it resembles a groaning wooden ship floundering against cellophane rocks in a choppy sea of sighing taut wires, officers bellowing wordless commands from the bridge, gusts of wind fluttering its tattered sails. Catch them live if you can, a performance earlier this year at Boat-Ting was, for me, one of the live highlights of 2013 so far, an awesome display of improvisation every bit matched by this fantastic album" Ears for Eyes Blogspot
"Barrel sound unlike anything else. Flurries of notes and clunky bridge nudge noise flutter around gracefully drunken descends, three dowager duchesses sliding down the banister in a rain of ripped confetti." - Stewart Lee
HALFTONE
- a previous DISCUSSION ABOUT MAKING AN OBJECT
Released November 6, 2020
Halftone is:
Caitlin Alais Callahan (double bass)
Tina Hitchens (flute)
Yvonna Magda (violin)
Hannah Marshall ('cello)
Recorded and mixed by Nick Earle in Bristol, January 2019
Album artwork by Hannah Marshall
Album design work by Matthew Grigg, with huge thanks
In memory of Keith Tippett, with love
check out other halftone recordings on bandcamp
