Australian Music Centre | Breaking sound barriers

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The Australian Music Centre's catalogue does not include any recordings or sheet music of this work. This entry is for information purposes only.

It is listed in our catalogue because an event featuring a performance of this work was included in our calendar of Australian music. Details of this performance are listed below.

Work Overview

Palette Pieces is a major series of works based on the first watercolour palette I made for myself during the COVID-19 lockdowns in Melbourne, Australia. It comprises 24 solo pieces, each representing individual watercolour paints from that palette, and an ongoing collection of "paintings", duo pieces based on unique 3-colour "limited colour palettes" - a common study for beginning watercolourists.

For the initial series of Palette Pieces I asked 8 musicians from across Australia to select their favourite 3 colours from my palette. I'm very grateful that Alicia Crossley (recorder), Laila Engle (flute), Ben Opie (oboe), Jason Noble (clarinet), Jay Byrnes (saxophone), Amy McCarthy (trombone), Joshua Hill (percussion), and Jane Aubourg (violin), decided to come on board as collaborators. Their selections informed the 3 colour solos for their instrument, and a longer "painting" piece combining their selected colours.

Since that initial series, all 24 colours have been adapted from their original instrument, and are now available together in this collection, 24 Palette Pieces.

For Palette Pieces, ideas start out as pitch cells (aligned to specific pigments), which evolve into tubes of paint - 1-minute solo pieces. In this way, colours that share ingredients should sound similar, but not the same. This collection is based on specific paints, the 24 colours in my very first watercolour palette, all made by Melbourne manufacturer, Art Spectrum. So each colour references their pigment composition at time of writing.

Finally, paint alone doesn't make an artwork. So, any 3 colours can be combined to commission a unique "painting", a 5-minute work for instrumental duo, or instrument and electronics, based on the musical material in the 3 selected colour solos. Each unique colour combination will only ever be commissioned (and composed) once and can be requested via my website.

Work Details

Year: 2025, this version: 2024

Instrumentation: Versions currently available for: recorder, flute, oboe, clarinet, saxophone, trombone, percussion, violinForthcoming editions: piano, viola, cello, double bass, and voice

Duration: 24 min.

Difficulty: Advanced — varies from simple to challenging for a first year university student

Contents note: Lemon Yellow Permanent Indian Yellow Vermilion Permanent Coral Permanent Crimson Flinders Red Violet Flinders Blue Violet Ultramarine Blue Antwerp Blue Tasman Blue Australian Turquoise Phthalo Green Australian Green Gold Australian Leaf Green Dark Indigo Blue Payne’s Grey Warm Sepia Mars Violet Pilbara Red Burnt Sienna Natural Australian Red Gold Yellow Ochre Naples Yellow Australian Grey

First performance: by James Wannan at At First Light: A Hidden Curiosity (Church Street Studios) on 14 Jun 2025