The Weaver’s Knot
The Weaver’s Knot (2013), a string quartet based on aspects of hardanger fiddle playing and written for the Arditti String Quartet on the occasion of their 40th anniversary for performances in 2014. The ‘weaver’s knot’ (also known as a ‘sheet bend’ in knot parlance) is a traditional technique used for hundreds of years in textile ...
Lespugue Venus
‘Lespugue Venus’ (26-24,000 years old, carved mammoth ivory) – I was transfixed by this beautiful statuette in the Ice-Age art show at the British Museum. It’s in a cabinet right at the start of the exhibition and it took me ages to tear myself away from its radiant presence. According to Elizabeth Wayland Barber, this ...
Video of ‘The Navigator’ opera online
The full video documentation of my opera The Navigator (2008), libretto by Patricia Sykes, now appears on the Institute of Musical Research (University of London) website as part of their ‘New Music Insight’ series. The video was filmed in the Judith Wright Centre just prior to the premiere in Brisbane in July 2008 with the ...
‘sympathetic error’, fragile architecture
I was commissioned by Ensemble musikFabrik to write solo works for two musicians of the group: Axis Mundi for solo bassoon, for Alban Wesly, and The Green Lion eats the Sun for double-bell euphonium, for Melvyn Poore on the occasion of his sixtieth birthday. Both works explore ideas connected to shamanic journeying or alchemical transformation ...
Pearl, Ochre, Hair String
Click for: Video documentary about Pearl, Ochre, Hair String made by Peider Defilla for BR-Alpha. Interview with Liza Lim and excerpts from the premiere performance by the Symphonieorchester des Bayerischen Rundfunks conducted by Lothar Zagrosek * * Pearl, Ochre, Hair String (2010) For orchestra Commissioned by the Bavarian Radio Orchestra and West Australian Symphony Orchestra and with the generous financial ...
Axis Mundi (2012-14)
AXIS MUNDI (2012-14) for solo bassoon Commissioned by Ensemble musikFabrik through Kunststiftung NRW. Dedicated to Alban Wesly. **** Images came to me in a dream: I saw a dead tree with dessicated bark and as I watched, the cracks and hollows filled with insects and larvae. Birds began feeding and breeding until the whole tree ...
Liza Lim 