Leon Lewington
As a composer and guitarist Leon has his feet firmly
placed in the post-modernist camp, drawing on a diverse
range of musical styles and subject material for inspiration.
Areas of interest to Leon range from the ancient Greek
tragedy's of Sophocles and Euripides through to the 20th
Century writings of Hakim Bey and Marshall McLuhan, from
the music of Bach to that of Iannis Xenakis. The style
of his compositions is uncompromising, sometimes extremely
angry and aggressive, experimental in nature, with an awareness
of the capabilities of individual instruments whether that
may be a guitar, saxophone or flute.
History
Leon was born in Redditch in 1970 and started playing
guitar in 1989.
In 1999 he entered the BA music degree course at Bath Spa
University, where he specialised in composition: studying
with Phil Cashian, Deirdre Gribben and Alastair King, as
well as having tutorials with Howard Skempton and Graham
Fitkin. Leon has studied with guitarists: Tom
Kerstens,Kevin Byrne, James
Woodrow and Eric Roche. Eric Roche
has been an invaluable teacher, expanding Leon's knowledge
of altered tunings and the percussive qualities of the
acoustic guitar. While studying at Bath Spa University
Leon became involved with the Bath International Guitar
Festival where he has been employed as summer school supervisor,
and more recently as a teacher for their guitar circus
outreach programme.
The degree gave Leon the opportunity to experiment with
different forms of musical expression, utilising graphic
and proportional notation as well as standard notation.
The basis of Leon's compositional style is a fusion of
the emotional qualities of modality and the more intellectual
aspect of atonal composition. His final 'commissioned'
piece for his degree was Zoetrope for saxophone quartet
and percussion, performed by the Delta Saxophone Quartet
and Jeremy Little (percussion).
Now
Since finishing his degree in the summer of 2002 Leon
has been concentrating on composing solo guitar music,
aiming towards recording a CD in the summer of 2003. He
has recently completed the first part of the solo guitar
piece 'Madetto Balletto' for Graham
Sims and is also looking for opportunities to compose
for larger ensembles and solo instruments. Leon is currently
writing the Acoustic fingerstyle section of theguitarcircle.com's
tutorial site.
Works
A sample of Leon's work can be found below. Select your
preferred format and size:
Zoetrope
Click on a link to view a sample of the score:
Dance
of the Daddy Long Legs
Reflections
Zoetrope
You will need Adobe Acrobat to read the
score. Click here to
get a free copy if needed or click on the icon below.
|