Art of Noises VII (2022) - A Journey Through the Rainforest

EMPREs (Oxford Electronic Music Practice and Research Group) x Modern Art Oxford sound installation project, with a condensed c.a. 4' recorded solo version: A Journey Through the Rainforest.

Inspiration 1. David Tudor’s original work Rainforest (1968-72)
“Tudor fed electronic oscillator signals into various objects that he could mount in the pit ... The electronic tones were fed into the objects using transducers, causing each to act as a loudspeaker, naturally modulating the sound in a way that was unique to the material composition of each object.”
I found my loudspeaker instrument in a pile of abandoned furniture – a broken metal hand dryer case. I set up the electric circuit using a modified version of the schematic score produced by Tudor.

Inspiration 2. Jesse Darling’s Gravity Road
The EMPREs installation was also based on an interaction with Jesse Darling’s sculpture Gravity Road, exhibited in the performance space. Initial interaction with the sculptural piece using contact microphones provided sound samples for the composition. The tension between ‘construction of leisure’ and ‘social and political conflict’ from Darling's interview extract inspired the structure of my composition to reflect a journey between the natural Rainforest and an artificial ‘Rainforest’ – the human-constructed society.

EMPRes x Modern Art Oxford (2024) - 'Alternative Futures'

EMPREs (Oxford Electronic Music Practice and Research Group) x Modern Art Oxford presents an evening of experimental electronic music sound art.

✍️The sonic 'clock' constructed in the octophonic speaker system walks proportionately according to the dream cycle. The field recordings are arranged, edited, and manipulated to encourage the audience to experience an alternative mode of space and time. The dream contents played through the cassette recorder/players explore the different consciousness states that store our memories and constitute our identity. As the composer's original dream contents are gradually washed away by the audience-recorded dream contents, this installation performs a live degradation of the composer's individual identity and a gradual emergence of an alternative 'collective communal identity'.

Water Speaks (2023)

Finalist piece in the 6th Annual Henfrey Prize for Composition (2023) For flute and percussion.

⬅️scroll for full score & programme notes

This composition reflects the moulding and re-moulding process of one’s identity that is more or less present and unique to every individual. Inspiration from two pieces of folk heritage represents the two “forces” moulding my identity.

The first is a folk poem from the Spring and Autumn Annals (770 BC – 476 BC.) China – The Reeds. It uses water metaphors to express the anonymous poet’s opinions towards politics and affection.

The second piece is an English folksong, ‘Lovely on the Water’, once collected by the English composer Ralph Vaughan Williams by transcription.

Fragmented motifs inspired by both sources were used as a starting point of this piece to create the transition between different tonal worlds, intending to reflect the tension that I felt when my heritage and identity were being continuously shaped and re-shaped.

Tears of Sicilia (2023)

For Cornetts and Sackbuts (ATB)

This piece was inspired by the famous madrigal tune from the Spanish "Golden Age" -- Ayo visto lo mapamundi (Tears of Sicilia). Sicilia in the 15th to 17th century had been both a place of refuge -- for the Albanians escaping persecution after the Ottoman conquest and a place of expulsion -- the onset of the Spanish Inquisition led to the expulsion of Jews from Sicily in 1492.

In Tear of Sicilia, the cornett and sackbut ensemble constitutes a choir of 'worldless voices'. The variation in texture is used to demonstrate a fragmented evolution of the Albanian iso-polyphony tradition.

The juxtaposition and counterpoint between the Jewish Horah dance rhythm and Albanian isopolyphinic rhythm showcase the paradoxical identity of the geographical place Sicily.

Time Slip of the Dynasties: story of the star river (2022)

The lyrics of this song consist of words from two ancient Chinese poems written in different dynasties, sharing a common scenic theme of the ‘star river’ (the night sky) and a common nostalgic narrative theme. Musical decisions in this piece are based on the interwoven narratives, perspectives and sexualities of the poets.

The Wall & Táng (2022)

The group composed songs in the Silk Roads project, publicly performed at the Sheldonian Theater Oxford.