SCORES
Coral Fantasy
for piano trio
LISTEN
ABOUT
Created when I was playing the piano for a children’s ballet company in London, a friend suggested I write a ballet set in a coral reef. Recent trips to Hawaii and Australia further fed my imagination with exotic possibilities in tropical waters. Performers will encounter stage instructions, as in any opera or ballet, in the score of Coral Fantasy to stimulate a sense of theatre though the score. Although not intended to be physically danced on stage, the work has the potential for experimentation with audio/visual presentation. A magical blend of live dancers and video would capture subjects such as underwater currents, jellyfish and clown fish, a tropical sunset and the sunlight reflecting off the surface of the water.
Piano trio (violin, cello, piano)
DURATION
8:10
DATE OF COMPOSITION
1993 (with funding from Arts Council England)
PERFORMANCES
6 March 1994 (World Premiere) Triangulus Piano Trio: Alison Kelly violin / Alison Moncrieff Kelly cello / Lyn Garland piano
Norwich Arts Centre, Norwich, UK
The Stables, Milton Keynes, UK
Friends of the Philharmonia, Lambeth Palace, London
1997 (Australian premiere) Carolyn Lam violin / Jonathon Webb cello / Wendy Hiscocks piano
Hills Music Club and Mount Lofty Music Club, South Australia.
1998 Triangulus Piano Trio: Alison Kelly violin / Alison Moncrieff Kelly cello / Lyn Garland piano
Winthrop Hall, University of Western Australia, Festival of Perth
1998 Darling Downs Trio: Andrew Lorenz violin / Matthew Kinmont cello / Wendy Lorenz piano
Good Shepherd Lutheran Centre, Noosa Music Society, Noosa, Queensland, Australia
Arts Theatre, University of Southern Queensland, Toowoomba, Queensland Australia
1998 Carolyn Lam violin / Stephen Buck cello / Wendy Hiscocks piano
The City Temple, London
2000 Carolyn Lam violin / Coral Lancaster cello / Wendy Hiscocks piano
Arnhem Gallery, Fairfield Halls, Croydon Millennium Music Day
Holywell Music Room, Oxford
Australia House, London The Piano Trio Society & The Australian High Commission
2005 Contemporary Consort: Alexandra Wood violin, Sarah Suckling cello, Huw Watkins piano
Town Hall, King’s Lynn, Norfolk King’s Lynn Festival
2006 Miranda Wilson violin / Rickman Godlee cello /Roy Howat piano
Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge.
2011 Madeleine Mitchell violin / Brian Mullan cello / Wendy Hiscocks piano
King’s College, London Arts & Humanities Festival
2020 Jason Tong violin Kirsten Tong cello Maree Kilpatrick piano
Ian Hanger Recital Hall, Brisbane, Australia
RECORDINGS
Chamber Music by Wendy Hiscocks Symposium 1389
REVIEWS
“… elegantly depicts its scenes of marine life within a coral reef against a context of dawn and dusk above the waves” Gramophone
“… a lot to savour in this compelling music” Piano Magazine
“It’s a delight… Hiscocks’s piece has an unpretentious charm and immediacy” The West Australian
“… a welcome and refreshingly different contribution to a recital program” Australian Strings Association
