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"Scully" (2022) is a 6-movement, 28-minute work for solo percussion where each movement responds to one of the six paintings in the Hugh Lane Gallery Dublin's Scully Room. This, like Tate Modern's Rothko Room, is one of my favourite and most visited art spaces, and I was delighted to be asked to respond musically to these fantastic paintings.
Indeed, my work is a series of responses rather than a set of interpretations or even "translations" into music. I looked at various aspects of each painting to feed my responses, including form, warmth/coolness, repetition, drama, and of course colour. Between my two most recent preparatory visits to the Scully Room a small painting called "Sanda" appeared near the entrance, and so I added a short introductory movement to my compositional scheme.
One of the central conceits of the first performances is that the percussionist - Alex Petcu, with whom I have collaborated many times now - has a different instrumental set-up for each movement. The different set-ups are placed near the relevant paintings so that the musical journey, inspired by the six paintings in order, was reflected in Alex's physical journey around the room. The audience participated in this unusual voyage, experiencing a conversation between the two art forms for the period in which the paintings and the music occupy the same time and space.
"Scully" was commissioned by the Sundays at Noon concert series with funding from the Hugh Lane Gallery and the Arts Council of Ireland.
The six movements are:
'Sanda' - 0'00"
'Wall of Light, Alba' - 2'33"
'John Anthony' - 7'11"
'Yellow Yellow' - 13'49"