First performance by Sprung Percussion, Stephanie McCallum, Robert Curry, James Rydge and Tamara Anna Cislowska, conducted by Daryl Pratt; Sydney Spring International Festival, Eugene Goossens Hall, Sydney, 29 August 1998
Program note
Andrew Ford: Tattoo (1998)
In Tattoo, six drummers playing 12 timpani beat a ceremonial dirge for some imagined passing. The four pianos are silent for the first third of the piece, then play only on their sustaining pedals, creating resonating chambers for the drums. Just before the end of the piece they also erupt into activity.
Tattoo was commissioned by Roger Woodward for the Ninth Sydney Spring International Festival of New Music in 1998, and was made possible by the award to the composer of a Peggy Glanville-Hicks Fellowship. It was given it first performance by Sprung Percussion, conducted by Daryl Pratt and was awarded the Marienberg – Sydney Spring Prize for the most outstanding original work of the 1998 festival.
© Andrew Ford