Andy Thorburn
Highland musician and composer
Tuath
gu Deas - notes from the composer
The audience and critics' response to the first performance of Tuath gu Deas was mighty and unexpected. Although the piece was very carefully researched and constructed, with fundamentally strong lyrics from Aonghas MacNeacail, neither Aonghas nor myself had anticipated such an overwhelming and enthusiastic support for both the piece as a musical whole, and the topical and cultural elements which are portrayed. The circumstances of its commissioning, its rehearsal and performance all bear testimony to the powerful community of musicians and their commitment to musical progress, and I am delighted that the meaning(s) of the piece have come through loud and clear.
New Voices, as part of the Celtic Connections Festival in Glasgow, is a program of newly commissioned music combining contemporary writing with traditional Scottish and Celtic references. The title Tuath gu Deas translates roughly North to South, and depicts movements globally and tribally, and conjures the essence of Scotland as a northern nation with a distinct cultural identity.
It is a full length work for twelve unaccompanied voices, and represents quite an undertaking for the singers and the audience. Aonghas' text spans the centuries of Scottish and Celtic settlement and migration to the present day, with stanzas from Tacitus about the Roman colonisation, and from the 9th century Welsh saga of the Gododdin warriors telling of expeditions south from Dyneiddyn (Edinburgh).
Religious, cultural and stylistic devices abound, but overall a magical story is told, in Gaelic, Scots, Welsh, Latin and English. Gaelic in particular has a great power to emote and evoke with the beauty of its sound both sung and spoken.
The compositional style and the style of performance in a concert oriented festival gave me the most difficulty initially. To bridge the acknowledged gap between written (classical?), developmental music, and traditional song and tune is something which many composers attempt on a regular basis, and few succeed.
My aim is to use the familiar formats of the traditional song - that is, intros, verses, choruses, singalong, call and response, as well as crowd styles, chants and religious singing. There is also narrative and drone to give extra colour and dimension. There are twenty three sections, mostly contiguous, varying in texture and pace from double choir and soloists to duos and trios. To accord with the nature of traditional music I have avoided any lengthy polyphony, and there is no complexity longer than sixteen bars. Many of the repetitive phrases are two bars only but juxtaposed and layered to create atmosphere.
The melodic content is likewise simple, relying on the old-fashioned but still ubiquitous modes - dorian, aeolian, mixolydian, ionian. The combination of several modes allows for plenty of chromaticism if desired. Some of the sections are translations or paraphrases of previous sections, usually with a parallel melodic theme or rhythm. The lyric describes movement, and there is movement on stage as the subgroups form and reform and soloists emerge, section by section. Each singer has a principal song or narration, and the whole is to depict through music and text the development of community and sociability.
The evolution of the piece has followed the same path of social growth as I have worked with singers and players of Celtic music over the past ten years. As such it has a strong collective feel to it, and I would hope that it draws the audience into that same social and musical community.
Enjoy the music!
Andy Thorburn
Evanton, January 1999