George W. Welch

George W. Welch was an ensemble that I founded in 1981 and which also had a distinctive visual identity created by Mark Thomson. An account of its origins is given in the video below and in this longer article. From 1983 and for many years I co-directed the ensemble with Ian Gardiner, until my academic life forced me to withdraw in the late 1980s. Ian then became the sole director until the band ceased its activities in the mid 1990s. This web page concerns itself only with my contribution to George W. Welch. It should be viewed in conjunction with Ian's George W. Welch site which gives a full account of the band as a whole.

My compositions for GWW reflected both my special interests at the time and my approach to systems and found materials, aspects that I have come to realise were the products of autism. My compositions are as follows (click links for full information, scores and recordings):

  • A.SC.H. (1981)
    Synaesthetic fragments of Scriabin are deconstructed while hidden messages are spelt out using Schumann's ciphers.
  • A Worker Speaks (1981)
    A langeweile (long time) and oneiric reverie using the speaking voice of Mr Alfred Worker and slowed down fragments of his favourite melodies.
  • Perles de l'opéra (1981)
    An evocation of the work of Joseph Cornell that treats one of his boxes as a source score.
  • Bride, teeming with sweet to the Bridegroom (1981)
    A Sapphic exposition of the alchemical rebis using a rigorous system.
  • Phaon (1984)
    An intense statement of mythically hopeless love with layered delays.
  • A Slight List (1984)
    A systematic working through of heptatonic scale patterns and enharmonic cadences.
  • 'Trois Impressions' by Sigfrid Karg-Elert (1984)
    Arrangements of these anfractuous works for harmonium or organ first published in 1909.
  • Simon and Ennoia (1987)
    A delicate filigree of esotericism and buried melodies.
  • Catalogue de grenouilles (1987)
    A herpetological surrealist opera in which frogs and humans interrogate their mutual origins.
  • Eastward Oh (1987)
    A spiriform cello concerto that travels from Westward Ho! to a mechanical music museum.
  • Kodok (1988)
    A meandering gamelan wanders into Erik Satie's placard via some strange fin-de-siecle harmonies.
  • 'Voyeurism' and 'Coach Ride' from EugĂ©nie de Franval (1990)
    Scenes from a proposed opera on a story by the Marquis de Sade that was never made.
  • 'Uspud' by Erik Satie (1992)
    My arrangement of Satie's "Christian ballet", since supplanted by my version for solo harmonium.