Wesley Ayres Composer
This years portfolio is written to reflect the struggles I have faced with my mental health and how it can affect my views on the world around me. Pieces like 'Cynicism' and 'Chasing Ghosts' embody how these feelings cause me to act, often feeling that all is unobtainable or viewing everything with a nature of paranoia and distain. Similarly, my piano piece 'Analogue' is a reflection on the 'broken machine' of my life. Tracks such as 'New World' and 'I Hate This City' describe my longing for a fresh start, away from England and the life I have built in it.
Overview
I am a composer, guitarist and singer in my 2nd year of studying Music with an Honours in Composition at The Royal Birmingham Conservatoire. This year I have been pushing to specialize in Brass writing.
Tracks like 'Well, Tell Her Then' and 'Panic' are slightly more 'on the nose' with their motives. 'Well, Tell Her Then' is about unrequited love and the misery of pretending to see someone platonically to retain a friendship and 'Panic' purely describes a sense of paranoia and rapid anxiety, an emotion I often am forced to deal with.
For this solo Piano work, I collaborated with 2nd year Pianist Sarah Potjewijd. This piece is about a faulty mechanical device that slowly begins to break down, gradually employing more and more rhythmic, harmonic and melodic surprises or 'glitches'. We recorded this piece in the studio with Engineer and Producer Callum Lawrence.
I Hate This City is a piece I wrote for Tenor Saxophone and Piano during a particularly bitter part of my year. The piece once again describes my longing for a new city to restart my life in and many of the descending chord progressions and dotted rhythms embody the sense of feeling dragged down and defeated by staying in the miserable city of Birmingham. I collaborated with Sarah and Callum again for this piece and co-produced the final recording. The Tenor [art was performed by 2nd year Saxophonist Amy Hunt.
Cynicism is a short piece for Brass Quintet that reflects on feelings of paranoia, anger, distain and a general 'cynical' mindset when reflecting upon one's surroundings, almost to humorous degree. the piece revolves around a few short and catchy melodies that suggestive of a Faux-1920s-Swing, especially the likes of the Brass Quintet versions of 'Putting On The Ritz'. This was recorded at a BNM concert with Epsilon Brass.
Chasing Ghosts is a Post-Punk and Mid-West-Emo inspired acoustic song for guitar and vocals which reflects on one's feelings of isolation and abandonment. It focuses around a repetitive 3 chord progression, utilising Major 9th harmonies and vocals inspired by the likes of The killers and Editors.
Well, Tell Her Then is a piece for a somewhat peculiar grouping of brass instruments: Flugelhorn, 4 Tenor Horn and a Baritone. I was requested to write for this group during a short two weeks of the Christmas Holiday for a brass competition at the Conservatoire. The piece is inspired by the sounds of The Incredibles Pixar animation soundtrack by composer Michael Giacchino.
New World is a pop-folk piece for classical guitar and vocals. The song describes wanting to leave a failing relationship and/or situation and escape to another city to star afresh. The guitar part revolves around often dissonant chords and folkish finger picking melodies, the guitar being in a very alternative tuning of:
F G# C G# A# c.
Panic is a synth piece that employs popular presets and drum loops/break beats, as well as a sample from The Smiths song 'How Soon Is Now?' to accomplish a sort of pastiche-library music for a late 90s-early 2000s sci-fi thriller. This all acts a sort of metaphor for one's own paranoia and feelings of anxiety. This was all created in a DAW program.