John Young (Professor of Composition) will launch two new compact discs at the 2024 DMU Cultural Exchanges Festival, in PACE Studio 1, 28 February, 2024 at 5-6pm.
The discs are published by the Montréal publisher Empreintes DIGITALes and will be available in CD and high definition download.
The first disc, Histoires de soldats (Soldiers' Stories), incorporates two works based on oral history recordings. An Angel at Mons contains John Ewings's eye witness account of an angel on the battlefield at Mons, Belgium, in August 1914. Ewings gave an interview about his life to the BBC Northern Ireland in 1980 at the age of 101, and sections of that interview are incorporated into the work with the BBC's kind permission. Once He was Gunner is a more extended work (56 minutes) based on interviews John made with his father about war experiences as an 8th Army soldier in Italy 1943-45.
The second disc, Espaces lointains (Faraway Spaces), presents six works composed between 2017 and 2023, Three Spaces in Mid-Air, Sweet Anticipation, Hidden Spaces, Arioso, Le chant en dehors and Filaments and Phases. Filaments and Phases is a collaborative work with DMU Professor of Poetic Practice Simon Perril and in 2022 Le chant en dehors was awarded the inaugural Prix Francis-Dhomont at the AKOUSMA Festival in Montréal.
Information and booking at https://www.culturalexchanges.co.uk/2024-lineup/professor-john-young
The full Cultural Exchanges programme for 2024 is at https://www.culturalexchanges.co.uk/2024-lineup
