Gordon Monro

This page contains an overview of my work in sound and music.

There is a separate list of pieces, with links to program notes and so on for each piece.

Overview of musical work

Until fairly recently my artistic endeavours were predominantly in music. A few years ago I became involved in making abstract videos, and images have become increasingly important in my work.

As noted in my biographical notes, my entry to music composition was essentially through computer sound synthesis, though I had sung in choirs for many years. In fact I began by writing more or less conventional music, with some use of synthesisers. Initially I felt that creating purely abstract computer music was very difficult, aesthetically as much as technically. My first pure computer music composition was Parabolic Monody (Solo for Heebiephone). This was an algorithmic piece; the use of algorithms has been important in my compositions from early on.

With hindsight I can see four strands or tendencies in my musical work.

The first and strongest is the use of algorithms or generative procedures. In 2000 I wrote an article about my experiences with these up to that time. My recent work is strongly generative in character.

The second strand is writing for live performers, often with a tape part as well. I had a connection to the classical music world through singing in choirs, and my association with the University of Sydney Music Department strengthened this, and gave me the opportunity to collaborate with a number of musicians. My studies for the Diploma in Composition were predominantly about instrumental writing. My pieces for instrumentalists have been largely intuitively composed, though sometimes there has been an algorithmic element at one level or another.

A third, minor, strand is the construction of tape collages of recorded sounds, usually with an element of humour. All three of the strands mentioned so far came together in my piece Many Worlds Theory for harpsichord and tape.

The fourth strand, which is now most imporant for me, is the use of abstract images strongly connected to sound; my images have been computer-generated (or mechanically generated in the case of Red Grains). This work falls to some extent in the category "visual music". My comments on work with images are on another page.

Overview of musical work

To list of pieces