Output details

Boogie Nights, and other works (including Slippery Music; Extended Play; Music for Parakeets)

Released on Birmingham Record Company in November 2013, this disc includes six works, four of which written in 2008 or later, composed for musicians closely connected with Cutler and the Conservatoire.

Binding these works is an underlying post-minimalist approach, though particularly characteristic of Cutler’s approach is the manner in which fixed and transformative ostinati become the bedrock for musical journeys that tease with their musical and cultural references. Compared with _Bartlebooth_, elements of the vernacular and ‘downtown’ are more overt, in which irony is created through the dialogue between musics not conventionally brought into contact. _Slippery Music_, commissioned by the Schubert Ensemble (ensemble-in-residence), brings country and western into the hallowed halls of the piano quintet. _Boogie Nights_, commissioned by Orgelpark in Amsterdam and written for Orkest de Ereprijs (Cutler’s fifth work for them) and a 1920s mechanical dancehall organ called the ‘Busy Drone’, punning on giant organs and connecting with the Hollywood film of the 1990s of the same name. Entering this world is a dizzying array of musics, ranging from hard-driven post-minimalist rock, 70s funk, elements of Butch Morris-style conduction, twisted waltzes and other musics that tease highbrow concert-hall conventions. _Extended Play_, commissioned by Decibel (ensemble-in-residence), develops Cutler’s interest in exploring the boundary regions between post-minimalism, rock and jazz. But this is not a polystylism based on elements that do not belong, rather a naturally transformative process of materials that have the ability to re-invent themselves. Finally, _Music for Parakeets_, commissioned by cellist Lionel Handy (Conservatoire cello tutor) and pianist Nigel Clayton, is perhaps the most focussed example of how Cutler uses ostinato as a thread to lead the listener through a journey of carefully placed zones, in this case moving from the tentative, to the lyrical, to the pastoral, and finally to the brutal.