Piano Concerto: 3 movement composition for piano and orchestra

This first performance of my concerto for piano and chamber orchestra is no ordinary premiere, as this is the first three-movement concerto ever composed specially for someone with severe learning difficulties and autism.

I’ve known Derek Paravacini since we made programme for BBC Radio, nearly a decade ago, called The Inner Voice of Music, during which we improvised together at two pianos, and I realized then that there would be a fascinating compositional challenge in composing for Derek’s unique version of advanced musicality. In 2011 I wrote a piece called Blue which Derek performed with an orchestra in London, and I am very grateful to the Mainly Mozart Festival for commissioning this fully-fledged concerto.

The concerto is cyclical – i.e. all three movements share the same basic melodic material: the first movement begins with a lyrical theme (heard at the start on the piano) which is really the thematic springboard for everything that follows. The second movement is a rather mournful slow Blues in which the piano abandons its normal virtuoso role, and simply accompanies the orchestra with slow chords. The finale is a fast rondo full of propulsive rhythms but with quieter episodes in which themes from earlier movements combine and interact in new ways. No doubt inspired by its San Diego commission, the music has a somewhat American flavor!