Robbie Ellis

(This is yet another rush blog post written at Dunedin Airport just before boarding a flight. I have a history of these…)

Sapphire LaNeige, zombie Abby Pigden, Eden Honeypot & Frisky Business. The three burlesque girls are performing in Zomburlesue, 15-17 March.

Tonight the Dunedin Fringe Festival programme was released, along with zombies. There was a big box in the middle of the room, and at the moment of release, zombies broke out, shuffling among the crowd, wielding programme books. It was awesome.

I’ve always felt at home in fringe festivals. I did the Wellington Fringe for many years (generally no fewer than 3 shows per fest), although regrettably I’m not at all involved this year since I’ve moved to Dunedin.

However, Dunedin has a Fringe too, which is running from 15 to 25 March. I’ve wasted no time getting involved, and I’m in two shows that you should totally check out.

Zomburlesque. Somehow this is coming together, with over two dozen performers from both Wellington and Dunedin. Just today I finished arranging all the music for the band (I’m so stoked with who I have: aside from me on horns, there’s Emma Wollum on accordion, composer wunderkind Corwin Newall on keys, and Michelle & Maddy from Hunting Bears on bass & drums). Three-sixths of the Capping Show Sexytet make up a trio of backing vocalists, and there are also some local Dunedin burlesque performers taking part. Some were at the programme release – see them on the right.

Thu 15, Fri 16, Wed 17 March – 9pm – Sammy’s – $30/$20 – Ticket bookings – Fringe Fest details – Facebook event here

Song Sale. The first ever Song Sale in Dunedin took place on Monday just gone, and we had a great-sized crowd in The Church and wrote some fun songs. I have out-of-town guests during Fringe – many Wellington Zomburlesque performers, comedian Sam Smith, and just last night I confirmed the multi-instrumentalist awesomeman Adam Page for the Wednesday show. We promise a great time and it’s free entry.

Mon 19, Wed 21 March – 7:30pm – The Church, Restaurant Bar & Cinema – Free! ($5 to commission a song) – Fringe Fest details – Facebook page here

Signing off so I can board the plane.

I’ve been discovering the joys of SoundCloud. For those of you unfamiliar with the site, it’s a clean, functional host for audio.

Free accounts can upload up to 120 minutes of audio, but I’ve just about hit that limit. I’ve parted with €29.99 for a year’s worth of upgrade.

The first thing I get is another 120 minutes of audio. I can start making a dent in that with such things as a uni electroacoustic work, theatre music from shows I’ve done in Wellington (Young & Hungry 2008, German Play 2008, Two Day Plays 2009), and another composition or two.

Additional to that, I’ve got a few songs from old Song Sales to record properly, including The Cheese Doesn’t Go There.

I can also customise my profile page and highlight certain items – what I’ve done is to sort my items into Sets. I can embed said sets onto webpages in a variety of styles:

Beats & Remixes by Robbie Ellis

Radiophonic and Electroacoustic

Incidental Music for Theatre

Previous Fellow Chris Adams put my name on the door. Ah, bless.

On 1 February 2012 I began my time/term/tenure as Mozart Fellow at the University of Otago.

I ran the numbers a while back looking at the list of all previous Mozart Fellows – at 27 years, 1 month and 19 days, I am the second youngest to take up the position. That’s cool.

Rather awesomely, I get my own office. In contrast to Radio New Zealand House in Wellington, you can actually open the windows and have contact with fresh, outside air. In fact, there are eight such openable windows. Rest assured, I can close them when it gets cold in winter.

My swipe card doesn’t seem to work yet… slightly concerning. That could require repeated phone calls. I hope not.

So what am I going to work on? Gigs and pieces!

Gigs:

- Song Sale. Monthly gigs where a collection of songwriter-performers is on call to compose brand new songs, commissioned by audience members on their chosen themes/topics/genres etc. First gig is Monday 13 February 2012 at The Church, 50 Dundas St. Tomorrow night, we Song Salers have a meeting/test session.

- Zomburlesque. We did the show in Wellington, the Dunedin Fringe saw the review, they offered assistance in doing another production, and it’s happening. The core crew and performers are coming from Wellington; I’m co-ordinating the venue, the tech and the band in Dunedin. The first season was one of the most fun shows I’ve ever done; I anticipate the Dunedin season being the same.

Pieces:

- Reworking the 3rd movement of Three Sibilants for Eb clarinet for violin and beatbox. The violinist is Sarah Claman, the beatboxer is me. This will be performed at a Chamber Vulgarus gig in early March. You can hear the movement from 7:42 in the below SoundCloud embed:

Three Sibilants for Eb clarinet by Robbie Ellis on SoundCloud.

- A 4-5 minuter for the St Peter’s & St Mary’s Sinfonia, the senior orchestra of two Auckland Catholic high schools combined. Their conductor Antun Poljanich arranged to commission me. It’s going to be a bit of a percussion feature – I get three percussionists plus a timps player and a pianist. This’ll be in their 2012 repertoire, including at ASSBOF. (KBB Music has had naming rights on the event since 2002, but old high school habits die hard.)

- Something super secret squirrel which I will blog about in more detail later on.

- Something for Saxcess, New Zealand’s oldest saxophone quartet. Debbie Rawson has been great at getting my name out there as a composer, so I wanted to use the Fellowship to write something for her. Saxcess is doing a tour for their 20th anniversary, under Chamber Music New Zealand’s Encompass series. They’re hitting a motley collection of towns in June & July, including Cromwell (the closest to Dunedin).

- Something for the Estrella Quartet – four players, eight hands, two pianos. They’re all students at the University of Auckland under the tutelage of Stephen De Pledge, who contacted me about a piece. They won the 2011 Royal Overseas League Chamber Music Scholarship, which means they go to the UK in July/August to see a bunch of concerts, play a bunch of gigs (including at the Edinburgh Fringe). I’m thinking of calling my piece The Piano Tuner’s Performance Appraisal.

- A new piece for Auckland Youth Orchestra, an ensemble I played double bass in from 2003 to 2005. I’m currently reading Musicophilia by Oliver Sacks (my neighbour is a Masters student in Psychology and she regards Sacks’ writing as pop psych, but at least I can understand it). There’s a story about what sounds Robert Schumann was hallucinating near the end of his life… there could be something in that. This is for their September & October tour, with rehearsals beginning in early August.

Things to do in Dunedin:

• Call the uni Accommodation Office about accommodation
• Call the Music Department about an office
• Find somewhere to play indoor football. (I grazed two knees and one elbow on astroturf today, but I pulled off some wicked saves as goalie, so it was worth it.)
• Once I’ve moved there, get a crash course in how to set up a line from Radio New Zealand’s Dunedin studios.

Also, I might even prepare something for the 2012 Dunedin Fringe Festival. I’m in talks.

I’ve got to speak to some people about ideas for projects – a couple of playwrights in particular who could be useful collaborators for that music theatre piece I’m so desperate to create. I am in Auckland this weekend so speakings will be spoken. There are also a few application deadlines in the next couple of months which I can’t forget about.

In the meantime, today I got interviewed on Upbeat, a radio programme I have presented, produced, assistant-produced and supplied content for in the past. For associated music, violinist Sarah Claman (Otago Uni Honours student) performed Ha! earlier this year – so far, the only work of mine to have been performed in Dunedin. Webops kept the music in the podcast (with everyone’s permission, mind). Listen below: