May 2020
This project took place in September 2021, postponed from the previous year as a result of the Coronavirus pandemic. It began in the seeds of Towards Light, (see previous entry.) On a train back from a concert in Berkhamsted in April 2019, I had a thought. I suggested it to Claire, the producer and videographer at CHROMA ensemble:
Text message to Claire, 25 April 2019.
Early conversations with Stuart King, CHROMA ’s founder, considered Renaissance polyphony, revisiting a prior CHROMA commission, Rosa Celeste by Deborah Pritchard, premiered in 2018, a piece inspired by Gustav Doré's illustration 'Rose Celeste' of The Empyrean in Dante's The Divine Comedy, and the potential for commissioning a new work. We began fundraising.
CHROMA have a relationship with the island of Fair Isle, having toured creative programmes including art and music workshop elements in the past, and so this became a goal for the programme, together with potential school workshop dates at Omved Gardens in Highgate, London and Norwich schools in the Autumn.
CHROMA wire bird sculpting workshop with Zack McLaughlin, (https://www.paperandwood.co.uk) Fair Isle 2016. Photo: Claire Shovelton