ILDIO (2025)
for ensemble
ILDIO — meaning surrender — explores musical emergence through a process of gradual filtration. The piece begins with twelve superimposed layers, which are progressively removed until a single, coherent thread remains. Rather than presenting a fixed argument, the piece invites the listener to witness the difficulty of arriving at clarity: a journey through density, uncertainty, and instability towards something more focused.
The opening texture is intentionally overloaded, with all players active at once. This density reflects a state of excess — competing ideas, simultaneous trajectories — before any hierarchy has been established. As the piece unfolds, the texture thins section by section, allowing space, breath, and direction to emerge. The process of reduction becomes a metaphor for composing itself: listening through noise in order to discover what matters.
Performance / Recording
World premiere performed by Birmingham Contemporary Music Group and L’Instant Donné, conducted by Catherine Larsen-Maguire.
Recorded live at Susan Bradshaw Hall, Birmingham (UK), on 22 June 2025.
This recording presents an extended extract from the BBC Radio 3 New Music Show broadcast. The excerpt is shared for listening and reference purposes only, with the permission of the performers. All material remains the property of the BBC and the performers.