The Great and First Object
This work was commissioned by The Linen Hall Library in Belfast to mark its 225th year in existence.
Further Shore
The late poet Seamus Heaney was a close friend for twenty-five years and a great inspiration.
Exsultet
For this choral commission, I was keen to explore the use of macaronic verse, and choose Irish and Latin. The sounds that come off the two languages are very different and yet feel natural and comfortable side by side.
Agnus Dei
This began life as a short section of incidental music for a BBC tv series that I later then developed into a stand-alone choral piece for a Belfast school choir.
Lacrimae Rerum
These immortal words, meaning literally ‘the tears of things’ are borrowed from Virgil’s Aeneid, where he uses them to underpin the futility of war.
OSSA
The 48-minute choral symphony was a massive undertaking – in all sorts of ways. It marked the 400th anniversary of The Flight of the Earls, an epic event in Ireland’s history.
No tongue can tell
A commission to open the Belfast Festival at Queen’s in 2004, this concerto was written to commemorate my maternal grandparents and their love for each other.
Hell’s Pavement
Andy Kemp’s feature film deals with injustices in social care. In scoring this very emotive subject matter, I was keen to find colours that would be empathetic, understated and intimate.
Food For Ravens
The iconic writer and director, Trevor Griffiths, made this feature-length drama for BBC on the life of Nye Bevin, the labour health minister in late 1940s Britain.
Neither Either
Choreographer Liz Roche’s premise for the piece was this Seamus Heaney quote.
