Chris Swithinbank

Down­load a PDF of the let­ter with a full list of sig­na­to­ries

On 27 March, two open let­ters [1, 2] to Sound and Music and Arts Coun­cil Eng­land were made pub­lic, crit­i­cis­ing both or­gan­i­sa­tions for their ac­tiv­i­ties since the for­mer of these was founded from a merger of the So­ci­ety for the Pro­mo­tion of New Music, the British Music In­for­ma­tion Cen­tre, Sonic Arts Net­work and the Con­tem­po­rary Music Net­work in 2008. The let­ters, signed by var­i­ous re­spected com­posers and mu­si­cians at var­i­ous stages in their ca­reers, have pro­voked lively de­bate, but the un­der­signed are con­cerned both by its tone and by cer­tain as­sump­tions made by the let­ters’ sig­na­to­ries. It has also been alarm­ing to see well-known mem­bers of SAM staff and board, whose own work cov­ers no­tated in­stru­men­tal music as well as elec­tronic and elec­troa­coustic mu­sics, per­son­ally de­scribed in deroga­tory terms in the en­su­ing de­bate.

Both let­ters crit­i­cise Sound and Music’s pro­mo­tion of sound art and other music, de­scrib­ing these areas as ‘fringe ac­tiv­i­ties which have lit­tle or no con­nec­tion with the main­stream’. In so doing, the sig­na­to­ries ap­pear to as­sert that no­tated, con­tem­po­rary com­po­si­tion should re­ceive a spe­cially priv­i­leged sta­tus within Sound and Music’s ac­tiv­i­ties, whilst at the same time fail­ing to ac­knowl­edge the con­sid­er­able amount of work the or­gan­i­sa­tion has in any case un­der­taken in this field. In a time when mu­si­cians and com­posers in­creas­ingly work across gen­res and media and defy sim­plis­tic cat­e­gori­sa­tion, it is di­vi­sive and un­help­ful to seek to sep­a­rate any one strand of con­tem­po­rary music and sound from oth­ers or to plead for spe­cial treat­ment. In­deed, no­tated con­tem­po­rary com­po­si­tion is it­self a ‘fringe ac­tiv­ity’, in the sense of being a small mi­nor­ity pur­suit. But mi­nor­ity pur­suits per­ceived to have wider sig­nif­i­cance and po­ten­tial should be en­cour­aged and sup­ported; part of the pur­pose of pub­lic sub­sidy is surely to do this, whether for no­tated con­tem­po­rary music, sound art, or any other forms of music.

As Sound and Music them­selves recog­nised in their re­sponse to the re­cent de­bate, the tran­si­tional pe­riod since the merger has been a dif­fi­cult one and in many ways the or­gan­i­sa­tion is still find­ing its feet, a task made more chal­leng­ing by the 42% fund­ing cut from Arts Coun­cil Eng­land last year. In dis­cussing how to se­cure a pos­i­tive fu­ture for and greater aware­ness of British music both at home and abroad — a task in which Sound and Music has an un­doubt­edly vital role — the mu­si­cal com­mu­nity should be as open-minded and sup­port­ive as pos­si­ble of all their col­leagues, and be pre­pared to em­brace pos­si­bil­i­ties for widen­ing the range of cre­ative work pro­duced, rather than re­strict­ing it to that al­ready firmly es­tab­lished. It is by work­ing to­gether and in­ter­act­ing with each other, rather than ghet­toi­sa­tion or jeal­ous guard­ing of lim­ited con­cep­tions of new music, that we will build a stronger and more suc­cess­ful com­mu­nity, and make pos­si­ble that which is gen­uinely ‘new’.

Mar­tin But­ler, com­poser, Pro­fes­sor of Music, Uni­ver­sity of Sus­sex; for­mer Chair, SPNM
Rolf Hind, pi­anist, com­poser, Pro­fes­sor of Piano, Guild­hall School of Music and Drama; for­mer Artis­tic Di­rec­tor, SPNM
An­drew Hugill, com­poser, Pro­fes­sor of Music, De Mont­fort Uni­ver­sity, As­so­ci­ate Re­searcher, Uni­ver­sité de la Sor­bonne
Ian Pace, pi­anist, writer, Lec­turer in Music, City Uni­ver­sity Lon­don
Mariam Rezaei, com­poser, im­pro­viser, per­former
Chris Swith­in­bank, com­poser

Xi­mena Alarcón, New Media artist, Re­search Fel­low, CRiSAP
New­ton Arm­strong, com­poser, im­pro­viser, Lec­turer in Music, City Uni­ver­sity Lon­don
Simon Atkin­son, com­poser, aca­d­e­mic
Bren­dan Ball, trum­peter, mem­ber of En­sem­ble 10.10
Richard Bar­rett, com­poser, per­former
An­drew Bowie, Pro­fes­sor of Phi­los­o­phy and Ger­man, Royal Hol­loway, Uni­ver­sity of Lon­don, jazz sax­o­phon­ist
Neil Boyn­ton, com­poser, artist, aca­d­e­mic
John Butcher, im­pro­viser, com­poser
Michael Casey, com­poser, com­puter sci­en­tist
Philip Clark, mu­si­cian, writer
Tansy Davies, com­poser
Julio d’Es­crivan, com­poser
John Lev­ack Dr­ever, com­poser, aca­d­e­mic
Tim Ewers, com­poser, Di­rec­tor of Stud­ies for Music, Kingston Uni­ver­sity
Nick Fells, Head of Music, Uni­ver­sity of Glas­gow
Jerry Fishen­den, com­poser, tech­nol­o­gist, aca­d­e­mic
Ian Gar­diner, com­poser, Lec­turer in Music, Gold­smith’s Col­lege
Mark Gasser, pi­anist, Lec­turer in Piano and PhD Can­di­date, West­ern Aus­tralian Acad­emy of Per­form­ing Arts
Dan Goren, com­poser, per­former, di­rec­tor of Source Music Ser­vices
Or­lando Gough, com­poser
Tom Haines, com­poser
Tom Hall, com­poser, Se­nior Lec­turer in Cre­ative Music Tech­nol­ogy, An­glia Ruskin Uni­ver­sity
Phil Hal­lett, for­mer Di­rec­tor, Sonic Arts Net­work
Louise Har­ris, com­poser, Lec­turer in Music, Kingston Uni­ver­sity
Roddy Hawkins, Early Ca­reer Re­search As­so­ci­ate, In­sti­tute of Mu­si­cal Re­search
Björn Heile, Se­nior Lec­turer in Music, Uni­ver­sity of Glas­gow
Ron Her­rema, com­poser
Kathy Hinde, au­dio-vi­sual artist
Ben­nett Hogg, Lec­turer in Music, New­cas­tle Uni­ver­sity
John Ki­ef­fer, writer, cu­ra­tor, for­mer Cre­ative Di­rec­tor, Sound and Music
Josh Kopeček, mu­si­cian
Leigh Landy, com­poser, ed­u­ca­tor
Becca Lau­rence, free­lance pro­ject man­ager and cre­ative ed­u­ca­tion­al­ist
Anton Lukosze­vieze, cel­list, di­rec­tor, artist
John Lunn, com­poser
Nigel McBride, com­poser
Eliza Mc­Carthy, pi­anist
Scott McLaugh­lin, com­poser
An­nelie Neder­berg, com­poser
Car­ola Nielinger-Vakil, flautist, mu­si­col­o­gist
Katharine Nor­man, com­poser, writer, sound artist, Hon­orary Re­search Fel­low, De Mont­fort Uni­ver­sity
Aki Pa­soulas, com­poser, ed­u­ca­tor
Je­remy Pey­ton Jones, com­poser, aca­d­e­mic
Eleri Ang­harad Pound, com­poser, harpist
Amber Priest­ley, com­poser, sound de­signer
David Prior, com­poser, sound artist, As­so­ci­ate Pro­fes­sor, Uni­ver­sity Col­lege Fal­mouth
Lau­ren Red­head, com­poser
John Richards, mu­si­cian
Sam Richards, im­pro­viser, pi­anist, com­poser, writer, Lec­turer in Music, Ply­mouth Uni­ver­sity
Robin Rim­baud scan­ner, com­poser, artist
Samuel Rodgers, sound artist, im­pro­viser
Lee Scott, com­poser, PhD stu­dent
Stacey Sewell, PhD stu­dent, Uni­ver­sity Col­lege Fal­mouth
Andre Shlimon, com­poser, per­former
Jack Ryan Smith, mu­si­col­o­gist
Michael Spencer, com­poser, Lec­turer in Music, Uni­ver­sity of Leeds
Neal Spowage, artist, mu­si­cian
Tim Steiner, com­poser
Mar­cel Swi­boda, Lec­turer in Cul­tural Stud­ies, Uni­ver­sity of Leeds
Philip Thomas, pi­anist, Reader in Music, Uni­ver­sity of Hud­der­s­field
Pierre Alexan­dre Trem­blay, Reader in Com­po­si­tion and Stu­dio Di­rec­tor, Uni­ver­sity of Hud­der­s­field
Craig Vear, com­poser, re­searcher
Oliver Vessey, com­poser, per­former
Nina White­man, com­poser, singer, co-di­rec­tor, Trio Atem
Jerry Wigens, com­poser, im­pro­viser, per­former
Ian Will­cock, artist, aca­d­e­mic
Marc Yeats, com­poser
Al­is­tair Zal­dua, com­poser

Sup­ple­men­tary Sig­na­to­ries

Panos Amelides, com­poser
Kerry An­drew, com­poser, per­former
Iain Arm­strong, com­poser, sound artist, im­pro­viser, co-di­rec­tor SOUND­kitchen
Peter Ash­ton, teacher, com­poser, per­former
Adam Asnan, com­poser, per­former
Jo­vana Back­ovic, com­poser/per­former
Michael Bas­sett, Cre­ative Pro­ducer for Music & Sound Art, ICIA Uni­ver­sity of Bath
Sam Be­lin­fante, artist
Mike Blow, artist and re­searcher, Sonic Art Re­search Unit, Ox­ford Brookes Uni­ver­sity
James Bul­ley, com­poser, sound artist
Dun­can Chap­man, com­poser, sound artist
Stephen Chase, com­poser, per­former
Li-Chuan Chong, com­poser, sonic artist, im­pro­viser
Yian­nis Christofides, com­poser, sound artist and re­searcher
Jonathan Cole, com­poser and teacher
Sarah Dacey, singer, com­poser, teacher
An­drew Deakin, com­poser, Co-di­rec­tor of Oc­to­pus Col­lec­tive, Cum­bria
Daz Dis­ley, sound en­gi­neer, fa­cil­i­ta­tor, soft­ware de­vel­oper
Jason Dixon, com­poser
Gra­ham Dow­dall, mu­si­cian, com­poser tutor at Gold­smiths
Lawrence Dunn, com­poser
Kevin Flana­gan, com­poser, im­pro­viser
Philip Flood, for­mer trustee, spnm
Owen Green, com­poser, im­pro­viser
An­drew Hall, com­poser, per­former
Damien Har­ron, Se­nior Lec­turer, Leeds Col­lege of Music
An­drew Hill, com­poser, re­searcher
Joseph Hyde, com­poser, media artist, aca­d­e­mic
Simon Katan, au­dio­vi­sual com­poser/per­former
Peiman Khos­ravi, com­poser
Visa Kuop­pala, com­poser, im­pro­viser
Dun­can MacLeod, com­poser, Lec­turer in Music, Trin­ity Laban Con­ser­va­toire of Music and Dance
Paul Mann, con­duc­tor
Ru­aidhri Man­nion, com­poser
Will Mont­gomery, mu­si­cian, jour­nal­ist, aca­d­e­mic
Hi­lary Mul­laney, com­poser, aca­d­e­mic
Peter Nagle, com­poser
Ed Perkins, au­dio­vi­sual com­poser/per­former
Xenia Pestova, pi­anist, Lec­turer and Head of Per­for­mance, Ban­gor Uni­ver­sity School of Music
Mark Pilk­ing­ton, com­poser, PhD stu­dent
Jee­van Rai, com­poser, sound artist, im­pro­viser
Colin Riley, com­poser, for­mer trustee of spnm, Se­nior Lec­turer, Brunel Uni­ver­sity
Jez Riley French, com­poser, mu­si­cian, artist
Stu­art Rus­sell, com­poser, per­former, sonic artist, co-di­rec­tor of Colch­ester new Music
Tim Ruther­ford-John­son, writer, mu­si­col­o­gist
Matthew Sheeran, com­poser
Josh Spear, com­poser, mu­si­cian
Ian Stone­house, Head of the Elec­tronic Music Stu­dios, Gold­smiths, Univ. of Lon­don
Jamie Telford, com­poser, per­former
Richard Thomas, cel­list, sound recordist, for­mer Bmic and SAM staff mem­ber
Peter Todd, new media artist, pro­gram­mer, re­searcher
David Toop, com­poser, writer, cu­ra­tor, Se­nior Re­search Fel­low at Lon­don Col­lege of Com­mu­ni­ca­tion
Bill Vine, com­poser, per­former, sonic artist
Lisa Whistle­croft, com­poser, sound artist, for­mer elected Di­rec­tor and Com­pany Sec­re­tary of Sonic Arts Net­work
Tony White­head, sound artist
Paul Whitty, com­poser, Pro­fes­sor of Com­po­si­tion, Ox­ford Brookes Uni­ver­sity
Trevor Wig­gins, mu­si­cian, re­searcher, ed­i­tor
Sean Williams, music maker, sound artist
Daniel Wil­son, com­poser
Mark Peter Wright, artist
Rey­naldo Young, com­poser, im­pro­viser, di­rec­tor of the Card­board Cit­i­zens New Music En­sem­ble