The Spinning World
2016 Tree of Codes How Forests Think An ocean beyond earth the turning dance of the bee ~ Ronda – The Spinning World ~ ** ** **** just finished: the last piece for the year, Ronda – The Spinning World, premieres on 25 February 2017 in Frankfurt, performed by Ensemble Modern with a big trumpet part ...
My exhale is your inhale
It’s been a lovely harvest September with two premieres of my music. What a privilege to hear and see Séverine Ballon weave her magic in An ocean beyond earth and to work with the equally magical Wu Wei and ELISION on How Forests think. I’m hearing a music which I think has a different approach to form than in ...
Travels in hyper-reality
I have criss-crossed multiple time zones in the last 6 weeks: Melbourne-Shanghai-Melbourne-Beijing-Melbourne-Salvador da Bahia-Melbourne – the constant bead in this roaming necklace is home in Australia, with each contrasting pendant ever more distant, strange and colourful. It’s a privilege to be invited to travel for one’s work and if there’s one thing I’ve learnt as ...
Tree of Codes trailer, images, press
[photos (c) Paul Leclaire] Also see previous post for detailed information about the opera, libretto etc. * Articles Corinna da Fonseca-Wollheim, Vanishing Languages, Reincarnated as Music The New York Times, March 30, 2016. [+ related teaching & learning resource + radio broadcast] Raoul Mörchen, Wie bleibt von der Strasse der Krokodile, Kölnischer Rundschau, 6.04.16 [pdf scan] Programme book_Tree-of-Codes_2016 ...
Tree of Codes, ‘cut-outs in time’ an opera
Tree of Codes (2013-15), ‘cut-outs in time’, an opera Premiere season: 9, 12, 14, 18, 20 April, 2016, Staatenhaus, Cologne Opera Liza Lim – Tree of Codes information and libretto (read-only downloadable doc) new info: Tree of Codes – programme notes Field recordings as ‘cut-outs of the real’ in Tree of Codes Text about the opera: Michael ...
my desk, several worlds
My desk today I’m sitting at a fulcrum between several large projects – I finally printed out the compiled score of my opera, Tree of Codes (2013-15) which will be premiered on 9th April 2016 at the Staatenhaus Cologne, performed by MusikFabrik & Numero23.Prod with singers from Oper Koeln conducted by Clement Power, directed by Massimo ...
revisiting ‘Moon Spirit Feasting’
Yuè Ling Jié (Moon Spirit Feasting), a Chinese ritual street opera This trailer is from the 2000 Adelaide Festival premiere when the opera was performed outdoors on a barge floating on the Torrens River. One of my many collaborations with, and fabulous productions of, the ELISION Ensemble. Music by Liza Lim Libretto by Beth Yahp ...
Winding bodies: 3 knots shortlisted for 2015 BASCA Award
Winding Bodies: 3 knots has been shortlisted in the large chamber music category of this year’s BASCA awards. Here’s what I wrote about the piece: A knot is the magical image of time turned back on itself – think of a knot and you start thinking of the actions and process of tying it! The ...
memento mori – assemblage #1
Svetlana Boym – on Nostalgia [Adaptation and elaboration from Svetlana Boym, The Future of Nostalgia, Basic Books, New York 2001.] the wandering scales at the end of this… …the breathing of a stone rubbed on a granite tile I played part 14, [stone-on-stone], as one of 100 percussionists in Speak Percussion’s production of Michael Pisaro’s A wave ...
September: 2 CDs and a premiere
I’m excited about September. It brings the launch of two CDs embodying the fruit of special collaborations with the musicians of the Cikada Ensemble and with the ‘cellist Séverine Ballon. Cikada will launch their disc, which was recorded live at last year’s Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival, on 12 September at the Ultima Festival in Oslo. ...
the averted gaze
I was recently given a list of interview questions and was quite unable to answer them. At first I felt that this was a reluctance on my part because I would be giving too much away. Then realised that actually, I am unable to know the answers. Whatever they might be, they don’t cohere into ...
Speak, Be Silent (2015)
Just remember, when you’re in union, you don’t have to fear that you’ll be drained. The command comes to speak, and you feel the ocean moving through you. Then comes, Be silent, as when the rain stops, and the trees in the orchard begin to draw moisture up into themselves. – Jalaluddin Rumi, excerpt fr. Mathnawi V: ...
Rug Music (2015) for solo harp
I had a lot of fun writing a short harp solo for the wonderful harpist Marshall McGuire to celebrate his birthday. There’s a short video of us chatting in a rehearsal break before the premiere in April at the Melbourne Recital Centre.
5* recommendation for HatArt disc in NZM
Dietrich Heißenbüttel, Empfehlung: Liza Lim Orchestral Works, Neue Zeitschrift für Musik, 2/2015 or online link A chant provides the pitch; an invocation. Merely a short sequence of four descending notes, yet highly unusual for a CD of orchestral works: it is neither the sound of European art music nor one defined by the tempered chromatic scale. Liza ...
Concentrated energy maps. Reviews of HatArt Orchestral Works CD
Updates (other reviews) 1/3/15. Gordon Kerry has a few things to say about Australian politics & cultural insularity as well the CD. Liza Lim: Orchestral Works, The Music Trust 9/2/15. Another review of the HatArt CD: ambitious, eruptive orchestral works. Andrew Clements, The Guardian, 6 Feb 2015. Liza Lim, Orchestral Works, Hat[now]Art CD review Julian ...
Music from hcmf// on BBC3 + reviews
A live concert recording of Winding Bodies: 3 knots performed by the Cikada Ensemble at the Huddersfield Festival of Contemporary music on November 23rd is available online on BBC3 iplayer for the next month: http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b04sv2lv Cikada’s performance of The Heart’s Ear is also online until end of Jan 2015 at http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b04vdfs4 I recently did an interview with ...
Hat Art Orchestral Works CD
The CD of my orchestral works is finally officially out on Hat Art and offers perhaps a less well-known view of my work. It includes The Compass for orchestra with solo parts for flute and didgeridoo, co-commissioned by the Sydney Symphony and the Bavarian Radio Orchestra; Pearl, Ochre, Hair String for orchestra which features a ...
Liza Lim 