Last year I was commissioned to write a piece for the Kapten Trio by Chamber Music Scotland. It was a fantastic experience from start to finish, with lots of discussions and rehearsals with the Kapten Trio throughout the creative process, and two amazing Creative Scotland residencies at Hospitalfield in Arbroath. My piece, called Bowheads, is based on songs of the Bowhead Whale. (Thanks to biologists Catherine Berchok and Stephanie Grassia for sharing recordings with me!) The Kapten Trio took Boweads (along with pieces by Shiori Usui, Mozart, Debussy, and Brahms) on a 6-concert tour of Scotland. This video (made by Anne Milne) is from the premiere, at the Barn in Banchory, as part of the Sound Festival.
I’m pleased to share my most recent article for New Music Box, on why “but surely you don’t want your music performed just because you’re a woman, surely you want it performed because it’s good” is not the devastating critique that those who resist gender balanced programming think it is!
I’m pleased to share not one, but two wonderful recent performances of Social sounds from whales at night, one by clarinettist and whale researcher Alex South, and one by violist Katherine Wren. This is my only piece (so far) which includes electronics, and can be performed by any solo instrument or voice. It includes a lengthy improvisatory section, and I’ve really enjoyed hearing different performers interpretations of it over the years!
Thank you to Anthony Lanman for inviting me to talk on his podcast 1 Track about my piece Woodwings. Woodwings was commissioned by the Fifth Wind Quintet in Halifax, Nova Scotia, as part of their Forecasting the Canadian Wind Project, funded by a Canada Council New Chapters grant, and premiered by Fifth Wind, Mistral 5, Choros, Blythwood Winds, and Ventos in September 2018. It’s based on the songs of 9 birds found across Canada, including the bobolink, the hermit thrush, the winter wren, snow geese, and five species of owls! If you’re interested in obtaining a score, you can do so by taking out a (free) membership in Wind Quintet International.
I was delighted to hear this beautiful concert recording of my Three Summer Wassails, based on poetry by composer/poet Forrest Pierce, by the new Halifax-based new music choir Eastern Horizons, co-directed by Jack Bennet, Christina Murray, and Lynette Wahlstrom. Please let me know if you’d like a perusal copy of these pieces to consider for your choir!
THREE SUMMER WASSAILS
Music by Emily Doolittle
Poetry by Forrest Pierce
Blackberry Wassail
I set a berry in my mouth,
the rose of sweet September,
I set a berry in my mouth,
so sweet and tart and tender.
I bit the berry with my teeth,
the rose of sweet October,
I bit the berry with my teeth,
and felt the juice spill over.
I drank the berry down my throat,
the rose of sweet November,
I drank the berry down my throat,
and felt my heart remember.
I felt a thorn stick in my hand,
the rose of fading Autumn,
I felt a thorn stick in my hand,
the pain of friends forgotten.
Oh bramble, briar, and thorny thicket,
fruit of canes and fragile flower.
You wound my hands each time I pick it,
you melt my heart sweet, tart, and sour.
Potato Wassail
Come, little spud,
Little Baldy Underhill,
Balloon of the mud,
Jacket-wrapped against the chill.
Send us some green,
Wink your eyes and sprout a shoot,
Don’t be too mean
With your cuddlebellies underfoot.
Come, little spud,
Greeny leaves to catch the sun,
Swelling in the mud
Chilly-safe ‘til summer’s done.
In russet, in gold,
In pan or in pot,
In bland or in bold,
We’ll eat what you’ve got!
Mushroom Wassail
Mushroom plate! Mushroom plate!
The forager wants a mushroom plate!
Chant we now for the chanterelle, its fronds and gills and frills
Pine we now for the fat Penny Bun ,its heft and chubby-necked thrills.
Flee from the stick of the Fly Agaric whose toadstool hat brings pain.
Deft and apt is the round Death Cap whose name is self and same.
More we yell for the wrinkly Morel its oak and sulphur scent.
Chuffed and full, sing the Summer Truffle, whose warts are black and bent.
Don’t dare dandle the Destroying Angel, it’s white and short and kills.
A shy ballerina is the Deadly Galerina who slays with her tutu frills.
Cheery Words for the Chicken of the Woods that tastes like a little orange hen.
Shave a snap of the Shaggy ink cap whose flesh makes ink for your pen.
There is no heaven like the rotten earth’s leaven when it fruits in shoots and shrooms.
There is no hell like the rotten earth’s bell that peals the meals of dooms.
Mushroom plate! Mushroom plate!
The forager wants a Mushroom plate!
I’m really looking forward to the premiere of Reedbird by the Vancouver Symphony on January 19 as part of their New Music Festival. Reedbird is based on the song of the bobolink, a bird which is widespread across North America, and sings lively, bubbly, and ever-varying song. More info can be found here.
I’ve long had a hunch that even small differentials in the likelihood of having pieces performed between women and men composers can have a huge cumulative effect over the long-term. My partner Neil Banas is a computer modeller, and he made me an interactive model for this article (published on New Music Box), which indeed bears out my theory. Drag the blue sliders to see how gender (or other) inequality may affect composers over the course of their careers.
I’m listening to a lot of bobolink song, as research for the new piece I’m writing for the Vancouver Symphony (to be premiered at the Vancouver Symphony New Music Festival in January 2019). Bobolink song sounds incredible when you hear it live (or on a full speed recording) — shiny, bubbly, almost metallic. But to me, it’s even more incredible when you slow it down so you can really hear the intricate interactions between the notes. Here is one example that you really should listen to right now! I’ve taken a fragment of a song and presented it at 1/8 speed, 1/4 speed, 1/2 speed, full speed, and finally the entire song at full speed. (The recording of this song was made by Andrew Spencer, and can be found on the Xeno-Canto website.)
I’m so excited to announce that my chamber opera Jan Tait and the Bear is going to be a part of the Made in Scotland Showcase at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe this summer! The cast includes Cath Backhouse as Jan Tait, Brian McBride as the tax collector, guard, king, and bear, and Alan McHugh as narrator, with Ensemble Thing, conducted by Tom Butler, directed by Stasi Schaeffer, and with costumes by Vicki Brown. Follow the link above for more info, or to book tickets!
I’m just back from a wonderful week of rehearsals and a public workshop of my newest piece, Woodwings, with the Fifth Wind Quintet in Halifax, NS. They’ll be co-premiering it in September, along with Blythwood Winds, Ventos, Choros, and Mistral 5, in programs which include works by Cris Derksen, Carmen Braden, Daniel Janke, and Cameron Wilson, in five cities across Canada. But if you want to hear a preview of it, you can watch the workshop here!
