Composer of the Month: Charlie Barber

Composer of the Month

Charlie Barber

In the month that Charlie Barber celebrates his 75th birthday, we look back on a multi-layered career which defies categorisation. A musical chameleon, Barber’s extensive work for film, dance, the stage and concert platform, reimagines influences from across global traditions and historical eras and marks him out as a truly original creative force.

Collaboration

Throughout his career Barber has worked closely with colleagues across a range of practices to produce a vast catalogue of large-scale productions. Dance – a field in which he had been immersed since playing piano for dance classes and UK-wide festivals in the 1970s – provided an ideal environment for his early ventures into this territory.

Having had an early interest in theatre design, and after studying it at art college, Barber transitioned to a music career – his combined interests already stimulated by the theatrical collaborations of Brecht and Weill. A pivotal moment in his career was his attendance at the Gulbenkian International Summer School for Choreographers and Composers at Surrey University in 1979. Here, he met and worked with many dance artists, collaborating daily with choreographers and musicians to create works performed each evening. This experience ignited his passion for collaboration.

Since then, many of Barber’s scores have originated from dance projects, ranging from his 1991 Concertino to pieces like Indian Loop from 2006 – one of several based on music written for his BreakBeats project.

Based on the life of Japan’s celebrated novelist Yukio Mishima, Punishment by Roses, created in 1981, was a multimedia performance event.

In 2010 Afrodisiac was extensively reworked and feature two highly respected artists of traditional African instruments, Seckou Keita (kora) and Chartwell Dutiro (mbira), playing alongside seven classical musicians.

Theatre Projects

Theatre, being a natural partner of dance and music, has also seen Barber’s skills as a composer well-represented, writing music for Orson Welles’s Moby Dick Rehearsed (1985) and collaborating with Moving Being Theatre Company on several productions. But perhaps a pinnacle of his work on stage was the music-theatre piece Michelangelo Drawing Blood.

This project which received a score of performances across the UK in 2013 and 2014 was a dramatic reflection of Michelangelo’s genius through the use of movement and music. The two male performances at the centre of the production formed the visual centrepiece around which Charlie Barber’s music – for an ensemble of renaissance-period instruments and counter-tenor – set the pace and tone. The work’s success was another feather in the cap for the legacy of Sound Affairs.

Sound Affairs production of Salomé (2009). Barber's music for the opulent 1923 silent film was inspired by traditional Arabic ensembles and performed by musicians playing from two towers flanking each side of a giant silver screen.

Kantilan Karangan (1993) - An early minimalist piece inspired by Balinese gamelan music.

In a generous and forward-thinking gesture, Charlie Barber has made all his musical scores freely accessible to the public. These scores are available on his personal website as well as on the International Music Score Library Project (IMSLP), allowing performers to access his music for years to come.

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Charlie Barber’s music was extraordinarily haunting, barbed, darkly beautiful and at times a little chilling.

Swansea Evening Post, February 2009

BreakBeats (2006) is a dynamic fusion of live music, breakdancing, DJing and digital video. Devised by Charlie Barber, it unites musicians from Raw Goods with breakdancers from Urban Crew and turntablist DJ Jaffa.

Charlie Barber + Band (1991)

Creative Development and Legacy

Barber’s compositional work has always gone hand-in-hand with significant development as a creative artist and producer. Organisations which he’s founded include New Arts Consort – a touring ensemble in the late ’70s and ’80s that premiered several multimedia new music works – and his eclectic Charlie Barber + Band, which performed a wide range of music, including works by John Cage, Chick Corea, Guillame de Machaut, and The Velvet Underground. The band also premiered works by composers such as Graham Fitkin, John Hardy, and David Lang and were invited to take part in Voices of a Nation, the gala concert in Cardiff Bay to celebrate the inauguration of the Welsh Assembly.

Barber’s longest-running organization, Sound Affairs, was formed in 1989 to stage and promote concerts, tours, and events featuring new music. Often, these events were juxtaposed with visual arts, including cinema, theatre, dance, or video. Sound Affairs celebrated its 30th anniversary in 2019.

Composer Charlie Barber's natural instinct is that of a magpie, not so much thieving but filtering off material and giving it a contemporary resonance.

The Guardian, 2010

Michelangelo Drawing Blood (2013) - a music-theatre work in one act for countertenor, bass recorder, theorbo, percussion (timpani, dulcimer and tubular bells) and viola da gamba

Working across boundaries

Exploring the cross-pollination between music, movement, and visuals has led to innovative projects for Barber, such as creating new live soundtracks for old films. These soundtracks are more than straightforward live accompaniments; they are true extensions and elevations of the on-screen images. This is particularly evident in his 2009 Salomé production, revived in 2018, where towers of percussion flanked the screen.

Barber’s interests extend broadly in many directions. Embracing a universal and global outlook, he has studied Japanese theatre music, Balinese gamelan, African drumming techniques, Indian ragas, and Arabic rhythmic structures. Some pursuits were driven by curiosity, while others were related to research for current projects.

Selected listening

STAGE

Michelangelo Drawing Blood (2013)

Punishment by Roses (1981)

Boulevard of Broken Dreams (2009)

FILM

Salomé (2009)

The Fall of the House of Usher (2002)

Blood of a Poet (2006)

CONCERT

Ludwig (2006/07)

Shut up and Dance (1994)