![Picture](/uploads/9/9/7/5/997508/published/screenshot-2024-07-02-at-15-21-19.png?1720128673)
COMING UP FOR AIR
SET LIST: 5.07.2024
SET 1: THE ROOFTOP
Eleanor Cully Make a wish: fairy dust
Scott McLaughlin Like skipping stones on a lake
Lauren Marshall SUCK/BLOW
Cee Haines DOOO
Callie O’Brien The Little Leviathan
Ed Cooper For Kathryn Williams
Laila Arafah Passive Living (WP)
SET 2: THE SCREEN
Megan Grace Beugger Asthmatic Inhalation and Exhalation
Ewan Campbell Polar Vortex
Newton Armstrong Two canons for Kathryn
Nina Whiteman Thread
Lavender Rodriguez I didn't say that he did
Matilda Hoberman Evers Equation for respiration
Lucy Hale When we breathe
Max Erwin Inventory
Samuel Loveless Ballalalooon (WP)
Stephen Chase Feet. Can’t. Fail. (slight return)
SET 3: THE STAGE
Oliver Coates + chrysanthemum bear Leif
Patrick Ellis Breath. Patterns. Bends.
Bea Hubble Provocation Penned on a Penguin Postcard
Larry Goves Air pressure 1 after Bruce Nauman
Mark Dyer Memento for Kathryn
Paul Zaba Like each tucked string tells each hung bell’s bow swung finds tongue to fling out broad its name (each mortal thing does one thing and the same)
Oskar Baldyga Scherzo for piccolo (WP)
James McIlwrath My pillow is made of nettles
Jack Sheen (it’s really you strolling by)
Amber Priestley It involves beautiful tightropes of logic on which one must walk
Eleanor Cully Make a wish: birthday candle
Sarah Hennies Packing it in
Coming Up for Air began in 2017 by inviting submissions of flute pieces limited to a single breath: one inhale and exhale. Initially, it showcased 14 composers' responses to my story of creatively overcoming chronic respiratory conditions. Since then, the project has grown into a multidimensional platform encompassing performance, education, art installation, and recording. The collection of over 150 pieces runs a whole gamut of artistic expression—virtuosic, whimsical, sincere, challenging, banal, surreal—each peppered with their own eccentricities.
Coming Up for Air benefits from ultimate flexibility and versatility. From a 25-minute solo set at Café OTO to a 3-hour public hybrid art/performance installation at Poulton Library, it fits seamlessly into diverse environments. The extensive repertoire is carefully curated for each engagement, ensuring a fresh and unique experience every time.
The collection is currently being transformed into a concerto for solo flute and orchestra, where each breath has been selected from the existing collection, by composer Larry Goves. The world premiere will take place with the Luxembourg Philharmonie in November 2024.
Upcoming Performances:
5 July 2024 AżTak Festival, Warsaw
13-21 July 2024 Waterfoot Wakes Festival, Rossendale
18 October 2024 Royal Antwerp Conservatoire, Belgium
21 November 2024 Rainy Days Festival, Luxembourg
Coming Up for Air benefits from ultimate flexibility and versatility. From a 25-minute solo set at Café OTO to a 3-hour public hybrid art/performance installation at Poulton Library, it fits seamlessly into diverse environments. The extensive repertoire is carefully curated for each engagement, ensuring a fresh and unique experience every time.
The collection is currently being transformed into a concerto for solo flute and orchestra, where each breath has been selected from the existing collection, by composer Larry Goves. The world premiere will take place with the Luxembourg Philharmonie in November 2024.
Upcoming Performances:
5 July 2024 AżTak Festival, Warsaw
13-21 July 2024 Waterfoot Wakes Festival, Rossendale
18 October 2024 Royal Antwerp Conservatoire, Belgium
21 November 2024 Rainy Days Festival, Luxembourg
![Picture](/uploads/9/9/7/5/997508/editor/original-cufa-prog.jpeg?1719328520)
"Breath, imagined mostly as a musical parameter combining duration and intensity, suddenly became spatial, theatrical and social."
- Tim Rutherford Johnson
- Tim Rutherford Johnson
Composers' workshops
I have delivered workshops where I present the project, give the brief to composers, assist and workshop new pieces, and organise the premiere and recordings of new pieces to these settings:
Pre-tertiary: Aldeburgh Young Musicians, Bristol Pre-Conservatoire, Chetham's School of Music, Junior Royal Northern College of Music, National Youth Orchestra of Great Britain, The Purcell School.
Higher Education: Birmingham Conservatoire, Cambridge University, Carnegie Mellon University, University of Huddersfield, Leeds University, Royal Northern College of Music, York University.
Courses: Britten-Pears Young Artist Programme: Composition, Alternative Performance and Performance Art (CAPPA), Dartington Summer Music School Advanced Composition Course, Sound and Music Skills Session.
I have delivered workshops where I present the project, give the brief to composers, assist and workshop new pieces, and organise the premiere and recordings of new pieces to these settings:
Pre-tertiary: Aldeburgh Young Musicians, Bristol Pre-Conservatoire, Chetham's School of Music, Junior Royal Northern College of Music, National Youth Orchestra of Great Britain, The Purcell School.
Higher Education: Birmingham Conservatoire, Cambridge University, Carnegie Mellon University, University of Huddersfield, Leeds University, Royal Northern College of Music, York University.
Courses: Britten-Pears Young Artist Programme: Composition, Alternative Performance and Performance Art (CAPPA), Dartington Summer Music School Advanced Composition Course, Sound and Music Skills Session.
![Picture](/uploads/9/9/7/5/997508/published/fe592cf4-918c-4b77-8ae6-5fea9cec76f1.jpeg?1719331411)
Coming Up for Air features on the BBC Radio 3 The Listening Service with Tom Service: Music and Breathing episode.
"How is the rhythm and physicality of our breathing reflected in music? From operatic breath control to circular breathing techniques to a flautist inspired by the relearning of her technique after sinus and asthma problems, Tom looks at a fundamental element of music making."
Includes performances of single-breath works by Brian Ferneyhough, Cee Haines, and Oliver Coates, plus interview.
"How is the rhythm and physicality of our breathing reflected in music? From operatic breath control to circular breathing techniques to a flautist inspired by the relearning of her technique after sinus and asthma problems, Tom looks at a fundamental element of music making."
Includes performances of single-breath works by Brian Ferneyhough, Cee Haines, and Oliver Coates, plus interview.
![Picture](/uploads/9/9/7/5/997508/editor/hcr22cdcover4000rgb-smaller-720x.jpg?1719327338)
This album collects 40 different responses to one straightforward question: what can be communicated in a single breath? This limitation has inspired a wide range of approaches—some composers have contributed a melody, some have foregrounded a physiological challenge, others have offered a single sound, and others still have created their own playful exceptions to the prompt. The contributions are from composers of all ages, backgrounds and levels of experience. The youngest composer represented is just eight years old, and the album brings together aesthetically diverse artists including Chaya Czernowin, Oliver Coates, Amber Priestley, Andy Ingamells, Larry Goves, Annie Hui-Hsin Hsieh, Newton Armstrong, Mary Bellamy, Stephen Chase, Sarah Hennies, Mauricio Pauly, and Brian Ferneyhough, who is represented here by the brief excerpt from Unity Capsule that provided the original inspiration for the project.
- Extract from liner notes by Tim Rutherford Johnson.
"Strangely fascinating" (BBC Music Magazine)
- Extract from liner notes by Tim Rutherford Johnson.
"Strangely fascinating" (BBC Music Magazine)
|
|
|
The call for scores is open to all!
Pieces must be limited to the performance of one single cycle of breath. Instructions must be included for the inhalation. All flutes available (piccolo, C flute, alto, bass) Voice/electronics/speaking/physical movement/objects/tape - all welcome! I will workshop and record all completed pieces, and will notify you every time I perform your piece in public. Please write to me with any questions; pieces do not need to be completed to get in touch in the first instance. |