Composer Catch-up with David Hamilton

Composer, conductor, and educator, David Hamilton is passionate about New Zealand music. He says:

"I would love to see all community music groups, choirs and orchestras, make a point of including New Zealand music in their programmes. And to consider commissioning new music - or even just asking composers if they’d like to write for them."

As a composer, David Hamilton is best-known for his choral music and is always a popular choice among secondary school choirs at The Big Sing. His contribution to music education in New Zealand has been exceptional. He was Head of Department at Epsom Girls Grammar School between 1981-2001, where he conducted multiple choirs. He currently has two choirs at Auckland Grammar School and works regularly with community choirs, particularly Pakuranga Choral Society.

Sound Lounge wanted to know why he loves what he does...

You are well-known as a choral composer in NZ and abroad. Why do you enjoy composing music for voice?

That comes from singing in choirs and having some of my earliest performances at university for choral pieces. I love setting texts to music.

How has your music gained such a reputation overseas?

It is largely my choral music that has been performed internationally. Part of it has been from SULASOL (The Finnish Amateur Musicians’ Association) taking an interest in my music and beginning to publish it from the mid-1990s. And subsequently other publishers putting pieces out in the UK, USA and Germany. Partly through conductors becoming interested in specific pieces and performing them - and then often being interested in seeing other music. Sometimes also conductors will recommend pieces to other conductors.

Your music is well represented at The Big Sing. What’s it like hearing your music performed by teenagers?

Often, it’s wonderful and sometimes it’s a little less satisfactory! But I do seem to have developed a niche for writing for youth choirs, and I guess my music is widely performed because it’s singable and approachable. Some of the music I write for The Big Sing for choirs can be quite challenging (for the more able choirs) and other pieces are less demanding.

You write a lot of music for schools, why is there such an appetite for new choral music?

The Big Sing has had a lot to do with that. And many conductors have come through NZ Youth Choir and therefore have been exposed to a wide range of repertoire. I think it’s important that young choirs get to sing music by local composers, and where possible to sing works written especially for them.

This year The Kids Sing in Auckland commissioned the test pieces from me - so every school got to sing a New Zealand piece.

How do students respond to New Zealand music?

If it’s well written, and introduced well, then I think they see it no differently to any music from any style or period. But it does need to be ‘singable’. However not many NZ composers write for young performers which is sad. I feel every composer should be able to turn their hand to writing for young performers.

In the Auckland Chamber Orchestra concert three of the four orchestral pieces were written originally for school groups.

Have you ever considered writing an opera?

Yes, some steps have been made towards an opera based on the Air New Zealand crash on Mt Erebus in the Antarctic. So far there have been three pieces done: 'Breaking the Quiet' for solo voice and orchestra, 'The Necessary Rain' for soprano, choir and orchestra, and 'Erebus' which is pretty much Act 1 of the opera. The last of these pieces was written for Auckland Choral and includes “Breaking the Quiet” as the middle movement of three.

I also have a couple of texts for chamber operas which I’d like to find time to write too. But other projects keep getting in the way.

But an opera is a big undertaking and it would mean spending a lot of time on something that might not ever get performed. I keep getting side-tracked by requests for music that IS going to be performed!

Tell us about the early years of New Zealand Youth Choir. You were a founding member?

It was exciting to be there at the start. Something new and untried. It was different sort of repertoire to that which I’d sung in the big university choir. And of course, a chance to get to know other musically inclined young people from all round the country.

You’ve been called New Zealand’s ‘Most Performed Composer’. Why do you think people like performing your music?

Perhaps most performed choral composer! I guess I’m a very “audience-friendly” composer. I’d rather be performed now than discovered fifty years after my death! And I’m happy to turn my hand to whatever is needed - anything from a piece for a primary schools’ festival through to works for choir and orchestra. My choral music works well (on the whole) because I’m a singer and I know what vocal lines are going to sing well. And I’m still active as a performing musician - as a singer and conductor.

Do you find it easier writing instrumental or choral music?

Choral music because you start with a text. And that gives you a firm starting point for the music. With instrumental music it can be a challenge to find that starting point - that germ of an idea that kicks off the whole piece.

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Which of your instrumental works are you most proud of?

‘Hurdy Gurdy’ for flute, clarinet, violin and piano, and ‘The Faraday Cage’ for violin, cello and piano are good chamber pieces. ‘Elysian Fields’ written for Auckland Youth orchestra’s 50th anniversary is a popular work with people, and I think it’s a good piece. I’ve been doing some writing for concert band the past few years, and my piece for piano and concert band ‘Paper Cut’ is a fun and exciting piece.

Of all the compositions in the world, from any era, what’s the one you wish you'd written yourself?

From New Zealand: Jack Body’s 'Carol to St Stephen' - one of this country’s absolutely best works in any medium.

From elsewhere: that’s really hard. Let’s say Charles Ives’ 'The Unanswered Question' - a stunning miniature composed so ahead of its time. But I could easily list a dozen or more pieces I marvel at.

What are you working on now?

I’ve just completed new works for Auckland Boys Choir, and for Nota Bella - one of the choirs at Westlake Girls High school. Currently I’m writing a piece for Euphony from Kristin School - one of David Squire’s school choirs.

Ahead of me are a couple more choral works for Westlake Girls, a piece for the number 2 orchestra of Westlake Girls and Boys, a concert band work for Auckland Grammar School, and an orchestral piece for Avondale College.