(2021) for solo cello
Duration: 7 minutes
World Premiere: 25.11.21, Royal Academy of Music, London, UK, performed by Sheku Kanneh-Mason
Preludes were composed for the ‘200 Pieces’ project, marking the bicentary of the Royal Academy of Music.
“Spherical, exceedingly inspiring and intoxicating.” Klassik begeistert“The real standout was Edmund Finnis’s five Preludes for solo cello, which made the instrument sing, speak, trace shapes in the air, growl in the depths and reach up into the ether. ” The Times
(2021) For solo piano
Duration: 16 minutes
World Premiere: 24.9.22, Purcell Room, Southbank Centre, London: Víkingur Ólafsson
Commissioned by the Southbank Centre
“[Finnis’s] new pieces are exquisitely crafted, rather Ravel-like at times, but also full of gorgeous overtone effects as well as some thrillingly virtuosic requirements.”
★★★★★
The Times“Finely judged and beautifully refined… each piece a perfect miniature yet the whole creating a seductive sequence.”
Planet Hugill“This music is pure sound magic.”
oper aktuell
(2020) For soprano saxophone with reverb
Duration: 7 minutes
World Premiere: 30.9.20, Concertgebouw, Amsterdam: Jess Gillam
Commissioned by Sage Gateshead and the European Concert Hall Organisation.
“[Jess Gillam’s] performance of Edmund Finnis’s diaphanous solo piece A Spiral Ascending was a miracle of breath control, with tiny tendrils of sound peeling away from, and then back to, silence.”★★★★ The Telegraph
A Spiral Ascending
This meditative piece for soprano saxophone with reverb was composed for Jess Gillam. The soloist traces flowing lines that rise and fall in wavelike motions. Lightly amplified reverb holds these revolving patterns of sound suspended briefly in the air, altering our perspective of the music and the space that it occupies. The words of the title are from a poem by Alice Oswald called ‘Birdsong for Two Voices’.
© Edmund Finnis
(2020) For solo cello
Duration: 6 minutes
World Premiere: 25.3.20, London, UK: Tim Gill (London Sinfonietta)
Three Solos was commissioned by the London Sinfonietta
(2018) For solo piano
Duration: 90 seconds
piano
World Premiere: 7.7.18, Ely Cathedral: Clare Hammond
For Emmeline was commissioned by Clare Hammond and Peter Inglesby on the occasion of their second daughter’s birth
(2017) Ten pieces for piano
Duration: 14 minutes
piano
World Premiere: 12.3.18, Milton Court, Barbican, London: Clare Hammond
Youth was commissioned by Clare Hammond with generous financial assistance from the John S Cohen Foundation, Hinrichsen Foundation and RVW Trust
Youth
Ten pieces for solo piano
I Bloom
II Spin
III Frankenthaler
IV Stream of Days
V Serried Ridges
VI Coenties Slip
VII Hammershøi Windows
VIII Buren
IX Heath
X Helsinki Patterns
These are the first pieces I have composed for solo piano. Many of the sounds, patterns and ideas within them have been in my mind and under my hands for a long time. The brief pieces variously include performance directions like ‘intimate’, ‘spacious’, ‘with childlike simplicity’, ‘as if improvising’. Each one seems to me now like a specific memory of an image, a sensation of place, a significant encounter, or a moment of vivid perception. I wanted above all to convey each musical image as clearly and directly as possible, and to write for the piano in a focused, uncluttered, personal way.
Youth is dedicated to my nieces and nephews.
© Edmund Finnis
(2016) For violin with reverb
Duration: 9 minutes
World Premiere: 26.6.16, St John's Smith Square, London: Daniel Pioro
Commissioned by Daniel Pioro
“absolutely remarkable”
Mary Anne Hobbs, BBC 6 Music
Cyclical patterns of sound move in and out of focus, as if approaching from a distance before receding into haze. The tone of the violin is periodically transformed from white noise via drifting pitch into glistening harmonics and back again, forming arcs. Lightly amplified reverb is used to extend the sounding space that the music inhabits. Our perspective on the music is altered. What we hear is simultaneously both in the room and seemingly elsewhere. Ephemeral sounds are briefly held suspended in the air, heightening our perception of details within them before they disperse.
© Edmund Finnis
(2014) For cello with reverb
Duration: 10 minutes
cello and electronics (reverb)
World Premiere: 23.6.14, Holy Trinity Sloane Square, London: Oliver Coates
(2014) For bass viol
Duration: 6 minutes
World Premiere: 5.2.14, Cross Linx Festival, Rotterdam: Liam Byrne
Commissioned by Cross Linx Festival
Lines Curved Rivers Mirrored was written for Liam Byrne. When writing the piece I thought a lot about the construction of the bass viol, its rich and particular sonority, the precision and speed that the fretted fingerboard allow, the tuning and resonance of its open strings and their natural harmonics, and the kinds of harmony these could create. The idea of flowing lines is also integral to the music, along with the mental image of rivers forming.
(2011) Solo Viola with live electronics (reverb)
Duration: 6 minutes
World Premiere: 5.4.11, Queen Elizabeth Hall, London: Paul Silverthorne/London Sinfonietta
Commissioned by the London Sinfonietta as part of Writing the Future, which is generously supported by The Boltini Trust, The John S Cohen Foundation, Anthony Mackintosh and Michael & Patricia McLaren-Turner.
” Edmund Finnis’ Veneer stirred magical cries from Paul Silverthorne’s reverberating viola. ”
The Times (Geoff Brown)“a bracing study in natural harmonics”
Gramophone (Richard Whitehouse)
The character of the viola is subtly denatured for this piece by changing the tuning of its strings. This alters the resonant qualities of the instrument, making it speak with a different voice. As the piece takes shape, patterns are formed out of natural harmonics, unisons are pulled apart and open strings are made to ring out. Variable reverberation is used to heighten the listener’s perception of the surface details of sounds left hanging in the air.
This piece was written for Paul Silverthorne.
© Edmund Finnis