~Sera's journaL~

Names such as John Psathas, Gillian Whitehead and Gareth Farr might not be as well known as Mozart, Beethoven and Brahms, but New Zealand audiences are getting used to hearing new sounds from Kiwi composers.

The profile of locally made music is growing and that's at least partly because of SOUNZ, the Centre for New Zealand Music. Most people outside the classical music scene have never heard of it and SOUNZ staff - a team of four including executive director Scilla Askew and marketing coordinator Stephen Gibbs - are aware of their invisibility. They say they're like wedding planners, working away behind the scenes with the aim of getting work by New Zealand composers performed and broadcast as much as possible, both here and overseas.
Ms Askew says in the past decade there has been a noticeable change in attitude to Kiwi music, and not just in the pop and rock genres.
"People know more composers than they used to, particularly the concert-going public. It wasn't that long ago when you'd ask someone to name a New Zealand composer they couldn't. Then for a while it was only Gareth Farr, and now people would probably mention John Psathas and Douglas Lilburn and Gillian Whitehead, Jack Body and a few others."
SOUNZ is a charitable trust set up in 1991. Most of its funding comes from Creative New Zealand (a modest $170,000 a year), the Australasian Performing Right Association (Apra) and Phonographic Performances New Zealand. It works closely with composers and performers - from small choirs to the New Zealand Symphony Orchestra - encouraging them to include New Zealand music in their concert programmes. Its board of trustees is advised by a panel of composers.
SOUNZ, which has its office on Cambridge Terrace, Wellington, is home to the largest accessible collection of New Zealand music in the world. The library holds 8000 works on its database, by more than 275 composers, including 4080
recordings and 4662 scores, most of which are available to borrow or buy. The New Zealand music library can be easily accessed through its website [link] with an annual membership fee.
But Ms Askew, an accomplished singer, doesn't want the centre to be seen as an archive. Its goal is for music by local composers to be performed for as wide an audience as possible.
"It's all about access to the materials, we want to get it out there," she says. "In the end the music is still the composers', we don't take copyright, we have non-exclusive licences so if they get the opportunity to have their music published by a big international publisher they're absolutely in a position where they can just say yes. That's exactly what we want."
Composers can license SOUNZ to sell hard copies or downloads of their scores on their behalf, or give permission for a sample of their work to be available on the SOUNZ website. Since about 90 per cent of New Zealand music is unpublished, the centre is the main way for it to get into the public arena.
Next Monday and Tuesday, during New Zealand Music Month, SOUNZ will hold one of its regular readings of New Zealand orchestral works with the NZSO in Wellington. These events are an opportunity for local music to be heard live and a way to encourage recordings and further performances. Next week some of the work showcased is by newcomers, such as Wellingtonians Simon Eastwood and Hermione Johnson, as well as by established composers Mike Nock and Michael Williams.
Ms Askew says there are plenty of signs that local classical music is in good health. SOUNZ lists events featuring New Zealand-composed music on its website. Already there have been 250 this year, compared with 700 last year. The number of online music sales has quadrupled since SOUNZ launched its new website last November, with web hits split evenly between overseas and local visitors, and the number of composers on its books has doubled in the past decade. "Composers can't lodge their work with us unless they've already had some sort of track record," Ms Askew says. "It's not just people having a whim that they might like to write a piece of music. These are people whose work has been performed by established or recognised performers or it's been broadcast or commissioned by a festival."
She believes SOUNZ, alongside other organisations, has made a significant difference in the past 10 to 15 years, with people now more accepting of new music.
"For traditional concert-going audiences new music has always been quite a problem. They've tended to be quite conservative about their taste in music and want to hear the things they feel close to, like Beethoven's 5th, and it's really great to see that that's changing a bit, particularly in Wellington where there's a really vibrant arts community."

[link]

SO today is the beginning of NZ MUSIC MONTH! get out there ad enjoy it
Support local bands, composers, etc and get them the recognition they deserve.

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Здравствуйте!

so i've been kinda in and out invisibly.....i am alive, writing loads of crap in the hope of a miraculous recovery of writing skills and planning a painting for next holidays (july..) and eking out existence as a music student. flatting and such is fantastic, and i'm in love with my cello - я люблю нино виолончело! Russian is slowly progressing....i can say a few words and am loving it more and more as i learn more. hopefully i should be able to hold basic conversation by the end of this course... XD

How is everyone?

да сведания!

~Sera-Сера

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FEATURED DEVIANT(S):



amazing angles and oils and portraits [link]



abstract to surreal to general awesome [link]



PERFECTION SUITCASE 1 [link]

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