Piece For 4 Traditional Musicians III

Here is an early attempt at one of the graphic scores. It is performed by 4 fiddlers from Border Fiddles
1. Innes Watson
2. Rachel Cross
3. Carly Blain
4. Shona Mooney

You will hear that the musicians veer off the score especially in in the improvised sections. They were sight-reading the piece and I didn't give them very much instruction, I wanted to see what they would make of it.

I actually envisaged that they would stick to the same pulse and make it more of a traditional jig sound but I think the idea of an experimental piece and the instructions to improvise pushed the musicians to perform not as themselves. It was interesting that in a subsequent take the musicians wanted to pick another fiddle player to play as - they made it into role play. I really wanted them to be themselves...

This practice run has given me a clearer idea of how I will approach the piece, what information needs to be provided and how it might be received by traditional musicians.



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