April 2024: yet another version of Divertissements is in the offing, this time for harpsichord and vintage synthesisers courtesy of the University of West London’s Townshend Studio.
This iteration of the piece involves a three-way collaboration between myself, Jane Chapman and Simon Zagorski-Thomas, indeed Divertissements has, to some extent, now evolved into a trio – not only the synths but the recording studio itself is set to play a major role in shaping the sound of the music. The studio is, of course, very audible in most pop recordings but far less so in the production of classical music. Simon’s research, as articulated in his book The Musicology of Record Production and his AHRC project in Classical Music Hyper-Production, pays considerable attention to ways in which classical music might profitably interact with a creative approach to the recording studio.
At this stage, though, we are simply trying to get our ears round the vast resources of the Townshend synths. It looks likely we will only focus on a fraction of the collection but, even with this restriction, the possibilities are vast – and exciting!
