Solo instrument
The Journey of Mataku Moana
For cello
I wrote The Journey of Matuku Moana in 1992, in response to a commission from the Danish-born Australian-based cellist, Georg Pedersen, who gave its first performance in Sydney in 1993. The commission was funded by the Performing Arts Board of the Australia Council.
About the work
Matuku moana is the Māori name of the white-faced heron. This piece was mostly composed in Sydney while I was receiving treatment for breast cancer. I had a large wooden sculpture of a heron in my room, and I completed the work in New Zealand in an environment where herons fed in the mudflats outside my house.
The Journey of Matuku Moana is based on the idea of the double, where the initial ideas are recycled and condensed, and the call of the Australian currawong and the New Zealand korimako (bellbird) recur during the piece.
The music, recorded by Georg Pedersen, was used in Gaylene Preston’s film Titless wonders.
Scores and recordings
Buy or borrow the score from SOUNZ.
The work has been released on 2 CDs you can buy or borrow from SOUNZ.
Listen online to Alexander Ivashkin’s performance from Under the Southern Cross.
Three improvisations for solo oboe
I wrote these 3 short pieces — which are not really improvisations — while I was an undergraduate at Victoria University of Wellington. They waited 27 years for their first performance which was given by Diana Craig in Katoomba, Australia.
Scores and recordings
Buy or borrow the score from SOUNZ.
A Rattle CD with a performance by Vilém Veverka was released in 2018.
RNZ Concert recorded the work in 2012.
Wet Jacket Arm
For bassoon and spoken voice
Text by Greg O’Brien
The first performance was given by Greg O’Brien (voice), Emma Sayers (piano) and Ben Hoadley (bassoon) at St Paul’s Cathedral during the Otago Arts Festival on 8 October 2008.
About the work
Wet Jacket Arm is one of the 3 settings from Three windows on the weather for voice, bassoon and piano. It was inspired by a visit to Dusky and Doubtful Sounds. The text addresses threats to the biodiversity of Fiordland.
Recording
Listen to and watch a recording from 2018.
Windstreams
For percussion
Windstreams was commissioned and premiered by percussionist, Michael Askill with funding from the Music Board of the Australia Council.
About the work
I wrote Windstreams in Green Valley, south of Sydney, while watching the movement of trees in a strong wind storm.
Instrumentation
Windstreams is scored for: 8 drums (tomtoms and rototoms), bass drum, low timpani, bell tree, 4 suspended cymbals, tamtam, glockenspiel, vibraphone, tubular bells, 5 temple blocks and 2 wood blocks.
Score and recording
Buy or borrow the score from SOUNZ.
RNZ Concert recorded Windstreams in 1994.
Reviews
[Gillian Whitehead] has the ability to focus on the resonance of sounds, giving them an intense aftertaste. She makes you listen to the echo more than the event, a dangerous strategy for anyone without her acute sensitivity to timbre.
— Peter McCallum, Sydney Morning Herald 23 April 1987
Wind stream (sic) is one of those exquisitely fragile soundscapes which could be a disaster in less skilled and sensitive hands than those of Michael Askill. Surrounded by more than a dozen percussion instruments, he built fragments of sound into a kind of aural tapestry that was both varied and delicate.
— Jill Sykes, Sydney Morning Herald