More Sounds, More Personalities: British Postminimalism 1979-97

Ian Gardiner (Goldsmiths) and Tom Armstrong (University of Surrey) are organising this one-day conference focussing on British composers from the 80s to the 90s.

Ian Gardiner (Goldsmiths, University of London) and Tom Armstrong (University of Surrey) are organising a conference focussing on British composers from the 80s to the 90s whose music faced away from modernist styles and techniques and instead embraced minimalism, popular music and experimental music from Britain and the United States. These composers – Orlando Gough, Lawrence Crane, Jeremy Peyton Jones, Jocelyn Pook and Errolyn Warren to name but a few – were often below the radar of mainstream concert activity and institutions in the UK, indeed much of their work actively sought alternative venues and means of dissemination as well as collaborative relationships with artists of all kinds.

These composers, the ensembles they wrote for and the period of their formative work, warrants much further investigation and documentation. Ian and Tom were both composing and performing during this time including with many of its leading musicians; they have organised the conference to begin rectifying the lack of research, scholarship and history about this important time in British music-making.

The day is free to attend and aimed at all those with an interest in or past involvement with the period: postgraduate students, researchers, performers, composers, journalists, producers and so on. The schedule is as follows:

0930 Arrival and refreshments

1000 Session 1 - Beginnings

• Initial Themes and Issues (Ian Gardiner)
• The year 1979 - title tbc (Keith Potter)
• Rhythm and Energy: the Start of 1980s Postminimalism in the UK - Regular Music 1980-86 (Jonathan Parry)

1130 BREAK

1200 Session 2 - Ensembles

• Systems and Special Interests: the Formation of ‘George W. Welch’ in the early 1980s (Andrew Hugill)
• 3 or 4 Composers Grapple with the Notion of English Music (Helen Ottaway)
• Contemporary Music for Amateurs, Contemporary Music for All: Politics and Postminimalism in the Early Years of COMA (George Haggett)

1330 Lunch (NB not provided)

1430 Session 3 - Perspectives

• Electric Weekend(s) and Missing Tape Parts: Minimalism, Complexity and the Invention of Postwar Music in 1980s Britain (Roddy Hawkins)
• Adieu nouveauté! Bryars, Cardew, Hobbs, Jeffes and Nyman as Heard in France, Spring 1983 (Patrick Valiquet)

1600 BREAK

1630 Panel - Chair Sarah Walker (BBC Radio 3) with Jocelyn Pook (composer), Susie Crow (choreographer), Alan Hall (ex-producer BBC Radio 3), Laurence Crane (composer)

1730 Where Next? Plenary session

1800 Performance - Wind and Unwind (Helen Ottaway) with Melanie Pappenheim (voice)

1845 DINNER (Meze Mangal, Lewisham Way)

Image: Regular Music, c. 1983