Raga - a concerto for Zane Banks and the Adelaide Symphony Orchestra

June 2016. Andrew Ford came up with the first ideas for his electric guitar concerto in 1998, and finally it is written. Thanks to a commission from Kim Williams in partnership with the Adelaide Symphony Orchestra and the Adelaide Guitar Festival, Raga will be unveiled on 13 August 2016 at Adelaide Town Hall. It is composed for the virtuoso guitarist, Zane Banks, who will be the soloist, with the ASO conducted by Benjamin Northey.

> More details and tickets from the ASO website.

> Read a program note.

> Update August 2016: reviews of Raga

New album for children
(and their parents & grandparents)
- now also in the UK

May 2016. Andrew Ford's popular new album for children and their parents, There Was a Man Lived in the Moon is now available in the UK, with other countries to follow. Although only released in late November, the album , on ABC Classics, was one of the highest-selling classical records in Australia in 2015. It comprises 29 songs, mostly traditional nursery rhymes, for a variety of instruments. Jane Sheldon and Teddy Tahu Rhodes, two of Australia's finest classical singers, share the songs between them, while the players are more usually to be found among the ranks of the Sydney Symphony Orchestra, Australian Chamber Orchestra and Australian Opera and Ballet Orchestra.

In addition to the nursery rhymes, there are several original songs, including Little Star (a setting of Jane Taylor's 18th-century poem, 'Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star', and three songs to poems by Edward Lear, collectively known as Nonsense, specially written for the project and for Teddy Tahu Rhodes. The disc is now available for purchase online and in all good record shops.

> Order the album There Was a Man Lived in the Moon (ABC Shop)

> Watch a Youtube video of the recording of 'Have you see the Muffin Man'

Find me
on Twitter

My Twitter handle is @fordwritesmusic, and you can read the feed here.

Earth Dances
- a new book
and a radio series

May 2015. Andrew Ford's new book, Earth Dances: Music in search of the primitive (Black Inc.), shows how composers through history have made their music less sophisticated in order to revive it. From Dunstaple to Bo Diddley, Stravinsky to Scott Walker, Peter Sculthorpe to Pussy Riot, musicians have invoked the demotic and even the barbaric, admitting drones and drums to their work, simplifying (in some cases, infantilising) their techniques. The result has often been renewal.

Threaded through Ford's chapters are new interviews with six composers: Richard Barrett, Martin Bresnick, Brian Eno, Liza Lim, Pauline Oliveros and Karin Rehnqvist. Earth Dances is available from good bookshops and electronically from Amazon, iTunes etc.

> For details and e-purchase links, see: Black Inc.

> Read reviews

> The radio series Earth Dances was broadcast in April on ABC Radio National. The four episodes are now available to download.

The Music Show

The Music Show is two weekly hour-long programs of conversation and music. Gregorian chant or hip hop, k.d. lang or a rookie conductor, all get the attention they deserve.

> The Music Show, on Saturday and Sunday 11am Repeated: Saturday and Sunday 10pm.

> Program website

Subscribe to
a quarterly e-newsletter

> Read the latest newsletter (April 2016)

Three Front Doors and a Paddock

April 2016. Three front doors and a paddock is the distance from Andrew Ford's house to that of his friend, the artist Ben Quilty. In this specially commissioned four-part series, Ben and Andy talk about making music and making art: How does it begin? What is its subject matter? Who pays for it? And what about all that great art from the past?

> Listen now or download.

New work for Katie Noonan
& the Brodsky Quartet

May 2016. After the Visitors, for Katie Noonan and the Brodsky Quartet, is part of With Love and Fury, a collaborative song cycle, by ten composers, to words by Judith Wright. Now out on CD, the cycle was premiered in Brisbane in April, followed a national tour by Noonan and the Brodsky Quartet. The CD is available via Katie Noonan's website - digitally on iTunes and Spotify.

Sometimes I Feel Like a Motherless Child
- a Mass for 4 cathedrals

November 2015. Dedicated 'to all who seek asylum', Andrew Ford's Missa Brevis is based on the Spiritual 'Sometimes I Feel Like a Motherless Child', first sung in the 19th century by African slaves 'a long way from home', In the 21st century the sentiment seems apt for refugees on the run from persecution, terrorism and war. The Missa Brevis was commissioned by St John's Cathedral, Brisbane, St Stephen's Cathedral, Brisbane, St Patrick's Cathedral, Melbourne, St George's Cathedral, Perth and Fr Arthur Bridge for Ars Musica Australis. The Missa Brevis will be sung for the first time at the 9.30 Eucharist on 13 December (the third Sunday in Advent) at St John's Cathedral, Brisbane, with the others cathedrals to follow early in 2016.

Music and books online

A wide selection of CDs with music by Andrew Ford is easily available by mail order from Buywell. CDs and individual tracks can also be bought through the Australian Music Centre and at iTunes.

Andrew Ford's books are available from any good book shop in Australia and New Zealand. They are also available as an ebook from Readings, Amazon and iTunes: Earth Dances (NEW February 2015), Try Whistling This, The Sound of Pictures, Illegal Harmonies.

.For a full list of CDs and books, please see also the CD subpage and the Books subpage.