Genevieve Murphy
Genevieve Murphy has a fascination for psychology and disability, integrating this into her compositions and performances. Her research is focused on the physical and sonic link between sound and performance in a way that one cannot exist without the other. The composer’s musical influences cross between contemporary classical, electronic pop, punk and free improvisation. Creating and performing solo productions as well as composing herself into her ensemble works as a performer, musician and writer, her work is often autobiographical, and performed internationally between concert halls, galleries and theatre spaces
Genevieve Murphy: “My residency will be focussed on taking the highland bagpipes out of context and developing material for them with instruments that would not usually be associated with this instrument. I have always felt that other instruments need to meet the bagpipes rather than the other way around. They are incredibly loud, microtonal and limited in pitch. I usually take an approach that is improvised and shaped in rehearsal through experimentation whereas now I’d like to make the bagpipes fit into fixed compositions. Therefore, I plan on making a song and bringing the bagpipes into it. I’d then like to bring in one or two musicians to collaborate with separately, on the material to see how the music varies depending on the type of musician joining me. I plan to have three versions of one song by the end of my residency period, one solo, one with a percussionist from Asko|Schönberg and the other – an electric guitarist I work with, Andy Moor. This is part of a larger research trajectory where I plan on creating an album for highland bagpipes and unlikely combinations.”