Login

Enter your username and password

Forgotten your username or password?

Your Shopping Cart

There are no items in your shopping cart.

Voice of the depths

Sheet Music: Score

Voice of the depths : for piano, percussion and pre-recorded electronics / Peter McNamara.

by Peter McNamara (2015)

  • Purchase Price: $50.00 (Usually ships in 1-4 days) — Add to Cart
  • Library Availability: 785.3912/MCN 1 — Reference (not for loan) copy only
  • Instrumentation: Grand piano, percussion (1 player), pre-recorded electronics (stereo).
  • Audio Sample

    Performance by Sideband from the CD Selected Works by AMC Represented Artists, vol. 75.

$50.00

Add to Cart

Usually ships in 1-4 days

Shipping Info

Product details

In 1939 Russell Keats, the eldest son of Australian composer Horace Keats, joined the Royal Australian Navy and was subsequently posted to the heavy cruiser HMAS Canberra. Russell Keats served on the Canberra for the next three years, mostly on convoy patrol, but in 1942, the Canberra was sent to Savo Island in the pacific to provide assistance to the Gaudalcanal campaign against the Japanese. During the morning of August the 9th the Japanese fleet of battle ships launched a daring and unexpected raid on the allied fleet, during which HMAS Canberra was critically damaged, and scuttled later the same morning when she was deemed to be unsalvageable.

Tragically, Russell Keats was killed during the attack. His father and entire family was devastated by this event, and Horace Keats composed a very solemn and reflective song in memory of his son entitled Over the Quiet Waters.

Voice of the Depths is composed for piano, percussion and pre-recorded electronics, and follows the story of Russell Keats during his deployment on the HMAS Canberra. Spoken passages of text from the letters sent home to his family, read by his brother Brennan Keats, outline and initiate the structural points of the work. The pitches from the central motif of Over the Quiet Waters form its harmonic basis, and are used as fundamentals from which other pitch material is derived from their physical-acoustic properties.

These physical-acoustic properties are used to synthesise sounds in the electronic component of the work, and are re-enforced in the piano and vibraphone parts. A speaker is also directed into the piano internal mechanism to agitate the strings creating sympathetic vibrations at various points. This results in a subtle reverberation effect that blends with the electronic reverberation and creates deceptive tone colour transformations.

Published by: Wirripang [979 0 720167 95 4] — 1 score (16p. -- A4 (landscape))

Difficulty: Advanced — Challenging coordination between electronics and some challenging cross rhythms

Duration: 14 min.

First performance by Sideband at Sideband: The Fading of Culture and Memory (The Old Darlington School) on 2 Apr 2016

Includes program note and performance instructions.

Includes CD of pre-recorded electronic accompaniment.

Typeset edition.

ISMN: 979 0 720167 95 4

Related products

This work is also available in the following products:

From the Depths
CD: From the Depths / Sideband.

Selected Works by AMC Represented Artists, vol. 75.
CD: Selected Works by AMC Represented Artists, vol. 75.

 

- Browse other works published by Wirripang

- Browse other works for Duos: Percussion, piano with pre-recorded sound

- Browse other works by Peter McNamara


User reviews

Be the first to share your thoughts, opinions and insights about this item.

To post a comment please login