Lucky Dip is my first album. I wrote it for 2012’s RPM Challenge, a project to create an album (10 tracks, or 35 minutes of music) in one month, February 2012.
At the heart of Lucky Dip is a rather wild idea I had at the start of the month. I offered to write a piece for any instrument for up to nine people. Anyone who wanted to could sign up – amateur or professional, expert or beginner – and the first nine to raise their hand would get a piece. To my amazement, the whole project was subscribed, via the power of social media, less than 24 hours after I first announced it. My final list of instruments was:
- flute
- oboe
- piano
- harp
- slide guitar
- bass guitar
- treble recorder
- bass-baritone voice
- trombone
Over the course of the month I sent a piece off to every one of my performers. With the addition of the first piece I made for the project, a recording-only work involving improvised flute played by me and field recordings I had made in Zurich and Brussels, this gave me my ten tracks.
All the performers were true to their word, and everyone turned in excellent performances, especially given the very limited time they had to prepare for them.
And the result is Lucky Dip, a free album you can download (with the scores too) from BandCamp
Tracks
- Watching the Streets of Zurich and Brussels – Caitlin Rowley, flute
- Nest – Jenni Pinnock, oboe
- Pieces of Eight – Shana Norton, pedal harp
- To Fortune – Charles Turner, bass-baritone, and Nancy Rexford, piano
- Flit – Kim Hickey, flute
- Egg the Eleventh – Francis Western-Smith, piano
- I Want It To Kill People – Sam Grinsell, slide guitar
- Triptych for One – Jennifer Mackerras, treble recorder
- A Tiny Tango – Alun Vaughan, 6-string bass guitar
- Solitary Fanfare – Robert MacMillan, trombone
The initial call for ‘commissioners’ appeared on this site’s blog, and I maintained a project diary at One Creative Thing
- Let me write you a piece! (4 February 2012)
- RPM 2012 Project Diary on One Creative Thing
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