I am a music analyst, composer and percussionist. I’m a Senior Lecturer in Music at the University of Lincoln and Artistic Director of contemporary music group Dark Inventions.
My approach to research combines musical analysis and composition as I explore how we perceive and conceive time in contemporary classical music. This underpinned my 2015 PhD thesis, Conceptions of Time and Form in Twentieth and Twenty-First Century Music, funded by the AHRC and completed at the University of York. As a composer my work spans different forms. I specialise in working closely with performers to create bespoke projects. As a musical curator, I develop project with my own group that include new commissions, recordings and innovative performance events across the UK.
Full Biography
I am a music analyst, musicologist and composer working as a Lecturer in Music at the University of Lincoln. I take an inter-disciplinary approach to research, combining musical analysis and composition, exploring notions of time and brevity in music. My current research is expanding on areas of my PhD thesis with a more extensive study of the music of George Benjamin. His research into issues of temporality continue to develop, with current work focussing on approaches to musical stasis in analysis and composition.
I completed a PhD at the University of York in 2015, funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council and supervised by Professor Tim Howell and Dr Thomas Simaku.
Recent work has seen him work in areas of public engagement, as he brings together his expertise as a scholar and ensemble director to investigate new ways of effectively presenting contemporary music, in concerts, events, online and in recordings. The AHRC-funded ‘From Score to Sound’ project introduced audiences to contemporary British music through presentations, performances and interviews, and with written and recorded material.
Conference presentations have taken Martin across the UK and abroad, including recent papers at ISCM World Music Days, Wroclaw; CeReNeM, University of Huddersfield; Institute of Musicology at the Hungarian Academy of Sciences, Budapest; and the Orpheus Institute, Ghent. His music has been performed in the UK, Australia, Hong Kong, Germany and Holland, and in 2015 a new work was premiered at the Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival, supported by Sound and Music. His music has been recorded by Dark Inventions and Percussing, and published by University of York Music Press.
As the first Composer-in-Residence at theBritish Music Collection (2014-15; supported by Sound and Music), I worked with contemporary music group CHROMA to curate concerts in London and as part of Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival. Martin is also a Sound and Music New Voice composer and co-directs contemporary music group Dark Inventions.
I was recipient of the 2012 Lyons Celebration Award and was commissioned to write a work for the University of York Chamber Orchestra. Do not keep silent for solo piano and chamber orchestra was premiered in June 2013. I have studied composition with Roger Marsh, Ambrose Field and Thomas Simaku, and taken lessons with Richard Ayres, Carola Bauckholt, Dimitri Kourliandski, Martijn Padding and others. Having also worked with a wide variety of musicians, Martin enjoys exploring how his music can work in a variety of contexts, from solo recitals settings to theatrical works.
Black Swans is featured on Dark Inventions’ debut EP Hinterland (2013), and in 2014 the group premiered The Four Last Things as part of a UK tour. In 2015 they recorded The Four Last Things and Death and the Lady for their second CD, ‘Firewheel’ (2016). A work for clarinet and percussion was recorded by Jonathan Sage and Delia Stevens in 2015.
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