Simon Hewitt Jones, Violinist Hello! I'm Simon. I play the violin. I also monetize soundwaves, wave my arms about, bend genres, blather at cameras, transcend souls, moan about apartheid walls, and create musical microeconomies. If you really need a list of all the famous people and organizations I've worked with, then yes, you can find one here. But if like me you get far more excited by music and original ideas, you should start with my blog, or by clicking here. - About Simon - Digital Press Kit - Personal Violin Tuition

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I’ve finally upgraded my blog. You can find it at http://simonhewittjones.typepad.com/

As soon as the posts from this old version of the blog have been merged into the new one, the new one will replace this old one at my main address, http://www.simonhewittjones.com/blog/ . That could take a week or two.

In the meantime, all new blog posts will be at the new one: http://simonhewittjones.typepad.com/

So we started the MusBook push last week. In all honesty, it’s still slightly inadequate (but getting BETTER!), but we finally have the right people asking the right questions, which gives me more confidence than ever that at some point we’ll find some of the right answers, and that by the end of the year it will be really quite respectable and exciting.

[I’m taking a month or two out to work on MusBook, and then will be back with another tour of Palestine in December - Autumn from Four Seasons (3rd of 4 year cycle!), then a full program of MP3s and concerts from January onwards. I’m also about to properly upgrade this blog.]

One luxury (necessity?) is that I’m getting to talk with - and more importantly to listen to - lots and lots of music people about what they need from digital media, and indeed how they suffer from digital media, either the lack or surfeit thereof!

A fundamental question, one of the ones that comes up most frequently, is the question of TIME .

We’ve barely scratched the surface of technical possibility, and yet we’ve already reached saturation point for each individual. We don’t have any more hours in the day.

(I was worried that I hadn’t blogged for a week, when I meant to be writing every two days. Yet the calendar says it’s been two weeks! The time just got sucked away…)

I’m as passionate an advocate as anyone for the new possibilites that digital technology brings to human endeavours. But anything that keeps me from practicing the violin, frankly, is a nuisance (unless it’s really really interesting!).

So why on earth am I involved in launching a social network for ‘Classical’ (etc.) music?

**

The best questions I think social media can ask are how to create new experiences, or improve existing experiences, by improving the connections between people. And it does this incredibly well, because the structure of a network means that it’s not long before an infinite number of possibilities exists.

But how can you fulfil an infinite number of possibilities?

Well, obviously you can’t. And many of us are dying trying!

The alternative - embracing ludditism - doesn’t seem any better either. I can think of several people who have run away from Facebook in terror, or never ‘given in’ to joining it. But that doesn’t seem sensible either - it’s more like a repressive fear- or ignorance-based action to keep at bay a set of possibilities that are completely unpredictable. But it’s totally understandable, and I have a lot of sympathy for people who have made that decision because they don’t want to be overwhelmed.

In fact, that itself does highlight the problem: there is no way of handling an exponential increase in possibility when we don’t have any increase in available time. Technology has caused this problem.

Technology also needs to solve this problem.

As well as providing us with extraordinary possibilities that we never could have dreamed of, technology also needs to a) tell us how many of those possibilities we should pursue and how, and b) pursue them for us as much as is feasible, thus limiting the actual number of actions that we need to do to make the most of the possibilities worth pursuing.

There is a balance point. But it’s so individual, that it’s probably impossible to reach. However, we can at least aspire to it through the technology that we use, and how that technology responds to us.

In the meantime, all we can do is triage .

Earlier in the summer, we performed as part of the Medici Quartet’s project around ‘Towards Silence’, a work written by Sir John Tavener for four string quartets and a tibetan bowl.

The premiere concert, at Winchester Cathedral, was recorded for broadcast on Radio 3 and it’s finally available (for a very limited time!) on the ‘Composer of the Week’ programme.

Listen to it here:http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/console/b00mrybm

There’s more about the project here: http://www.towardssilence.org.uk/

There is one final concert that takes place in the UK in Guildford Cathedral on October 9th. We’ll also be playing Vivaldi’s Four Seasons (I play ‘Summer’).

It’s an amazing exploration of life and death, this work. Be sure to read Paul Robertson’s very moving essay about how he and Tavener were both deeply affected by terrible events - it’s quite remarkable that this project happened at all…

Do you know people who tape the grand prix and avoid looking at the results, then get home and watch it in one go? I do. But they’re significantly outnumbered.

There’s something about knowing that something is happening right now that gives the possibility that, ultimately, anything could happen. I think that that knowledge makes something more exciting, and more engaging. It’s a subtle difference, because if know that you’re watching it not in real time, but still don’t know what actually is about to happen, then anything can still appear to happen.

Yet, at the back of your mind, there’s the thought that whatever has happened has already happened. Maybe it’s my imagination? (Well, it is without a doubt my imagination, that’s the point!.) But I think there is a noticeable difference in your state of awareness if you genuinely believe that something is happening in real time. I admit therefore that it is purely psychological. But I do think that there is a future of web broadcasting every bit as exciting as live TV of old, for this very reason. Either way, I’d love to hear from fans of live sports who have experienced a definite difference in the way they consume sports TV in real time to when viewing a retransmission or highlights programme.

Train of thought: I’m watching Matthew Barley live on the Plushmusic website . They’re amazing and have webcast production really right, I think. Webcasting will be de rigeur in a year or two, mark my words. It’s a massive part of the future of music.

I’m tremendously excited that Greg Sandow has reignited his book-to-be, ‘The Future of Music’.

It’s brave to birth a book in public, and he’s been doing just that on his ArtsJournal blog. After a couple of (quite necessary) false starts, he’s come up with a structure that is exciting a lot of people.

I’m excited, because it’s potentially the first academic-yet-populist work that really gets to the heart of the post-1990s reality of the Classical Music tradition, in the same way that, say, Alex Ross really got to the heart of the contextual meaning of 20th Century classical traditions in The Rest is Noise.

Sandow has published the draft of the index here: http://www.artsjournal.com/sandow/2009/09/unveilng_the_book.html

And I will now proceed to replicate and rip it apart here

**

My comments in bold italics, addressed directly to the author…

I — The Crisis

Chapter I –Rebirth and Resistance

Classical music is changing. The changes can lead to its rebirth. One reason for change is the classical music crisis - the fear that classical music is receding from our culture, and that its audience might disappear.

Yes, and yes! But of course that fear of losing the traditions is a proxy for a fear of change. Because inherant value of traditions keeps them relevant, therefore they will survive even if they have to adapt. Should this be made clear from the beginning, or later on?

But there’s resistance to change, and some people don’t even believe that the crisis is real.

Though this becomes less true by the day, because reality bites fast.

Chapter II - Dire Data

Why the crisis is real.

Proof that the audience really is aging. How dramatically younger it used to be. How its aging signals a very large cultural shift.

This seems very USA-centric to me. The USA is only part of the picture, because it was especially susceptible to the age of the ‘music-as-a-product’ recording industry, which is now declining to levels which will be mostly irrelevant compared to the new free-at-point-of-use music economy.

Tangible evidence that this shift really happened. The decline in classical music ticket sales. Recent data from the National Endowment for the Arts, and how it shows that the classical music audience will almost certainly shrink.

See above. Have you researched Freemium (Chris Anderson), and considered how that might relate to the pre- and post- recording industry ecosystem?

Chapter III — Falling Behind (The Problem of Funding)

Why money for classical music will become harder to raise.

Classical music in what form? I can’t wait to read this chapter

Chapter IV — Renegade Culture

The central problem — our changing culture. The world has changed, but classical music (mostly) hasn’t. Which explains why people — of all ages — have lost interest in it.

The central problem?… or the central opportunity?!?! From whose perspective are you presenting this issue………….????????

Part II –The Nature of Classical Music

Chapter V — Defining Classical Music

What classical music really is, and why we should save it. Its great tradition.

Maaaaaaaaaaaaarvelous.

Chapter VI — The Myth of Classical Music Superiority

Why classical music isn’t better than music of other kinds. Why it’s harmful to think that it is.

Too right. Hope the responses to the inevitable objections to this are watertight and comprehensive. I can’t begin to imagine how to debate the quality of, say, a moderately boring 1700s European composer against a moderately boring late 20th Century indie rock band… glad you’re writing this book not me…

Chapter VII — World Gone Wrong: The Failure of Classical Music

Why classical music - in the ways it’s presented today - no longer makes sense. Why it functions now as a refuge from contemporary life.

Yes, yes, yes, yes and yes. Did I say yes? Yes!

Part III — Alternatives

Chapter VIII — Pop Music and Popular Culture

Why popular culture is smart and valuable. What it can teach classical music. Why classical music has to coexist with it.

Yes again. But to what extent does the distinction need to exist? It’s been useful up until now, but does that mean it will be useful in the future? How will people see musical genres in 20, 50, 100, 200 years’ time?

Chapter IX — Classical Music in the Past

How classical music used to be freer, and more expressive. How this can inspire us now.

Totally. Does improvisation have a place in this chapter? It’s a big and worthy subject, with many Classical links. How did people extemporize concerto cadenzas 300 years ago?

Part IV — The Rebirth of Classical Music

Chapter X — What Should We Do?

How classical music has already changed. Problems we still have to solve, and recommendations for further change.

Technology is the medium not the message. For a start, musicians should get a grip, stop moaning about ‘having’ to use the Interwebs, get used to the idea that spending a couple of hours a day using electronic media is not a bind, but an extraordinary privilege that allows for untold creative and communicative opportunites, then go and use the rest of the day to play music and to do some practice!

People should also learn how to use social media properly, recognize that the time they used to spend watching TV is increasingly being replaced by online interactions, and understand that a decade or so from now, we won’t be thinking of ‘offline’ and ‘online’ in the same way as we do today… just that we’ll all be participants in a world that in today’s terminology could be described as an ‘offline’ world, enabled by ‘online’ technology. Internet everywhere, via Wimax technologies, interactive surfaces across every type of building, object, personal and public area, etc., will offer untold possibility to everyone.

Timelessly valuable performances, recordings and compositions will automatically retain a relevance. All the rest will sink in a morass of infinite information… much like most of our blog posts [side note - that’s why books will never die!]

Chapter XI — Rebirth for Real

The future. What classical music might look like, after it reconnects with current culture, and becomes a truly contemporary art.

This could be really exciting… but how easy to predict?

But what’s clear is that this change is enabled by technology. Which means it will probably happen much more quickly than people anticipate. Get this book out soon!

Also, somebody - somewhere, somehow - needs to start a full debate on the term ‘Classical Music’. In the present ecosystem, it’s a necessary and indispensible term, and therefore any attempt to replace it won’t work. But once the entire nature of how Classical Music connects with contemporary culture changes, the true meaning of that term may need to be re-evaluated.

##

There are already a lot of great comments on Sandow’s blog post that address some of the above, and music education is something that is also mentioned.

Critical to this whole issue is the upside-down teaching of music that goes on across the world almost everywhere; most often musicians who go into teaching as a secondary choice, and don’t give it the committment and sense of responsibilty it deserves.

Music teaching at its worst is about drilling information into people about how to play, rather than nurturing creativity. It’s yet another post-industrial response to a 20th Century problem. Again, I refer you to the legendary Ken Robinson video, which explains everything.

Really, Classical Music cannot be fixed until Music Education is fixed. Because the future of both is irrefutably intertwined.

Which also gets to the heart of why musical traditions are so important for society in our newly globalized world. And therefore why Classical Music NEEDS to change.

Dear NAME,

I hope this finds you well.

I am writing to invite you to be part of a new orchestra I am launching called ‘International Orchestra of Me & Friends’, which is a vibrant ensemble of award-winning musicians with a unique mission of bringing innovative programming to the world concert scene through dynamic musicianship, hallmarked by collaborative partnerships that transform communities by creating dialogues with individuals and diverse organizations over the long term, and through the promotion of transformational experiences by way of live events that feature the top young musicians of London, second to none, and rapidly developing a brilliant reputation as some of the most imaginative, energetic performers of today’s Classical music scene, who engage audiences through our award-winning conceptual programmes, resulting in the creation of extraordinary synergy with every person that we touch through music, as demonstrated by our uncommonly expressive, critically acclaimed prize winning events that showcase our distinguished and successful young artists, the stars of tomorrow, hand selected graduates of the finest conservatoires, who in partnership of some of the most brilliant cultural figures of our time, display a passionate understanding and interpretative brilliance that only our wealth of new talent can provide, and because of whom we are already having some interest from agents, sponsors and record companies, all talking to us about possibilities for planning about some potential concerts, in the world, bringing joy and transcendence to hundreds of thousands of souls across the globe.

I would love to hear from you if you would be interested in being a part of International Orchestra of Me & Friends, and although at the moment we are still looking for a sponsor so we cannot offer you a fee, I’m sure you will see that it is a really prestigious project and great for your CV, and also I hope you will like to be part of a new and exciting top innovative group of the most vibrant musicians like yourself. Please do get in touch with me at monkey@chides.net and we can discuss further!

Best wishes,

Simon Hewitt Jones

PS - the real tragedy? I barely made more than 10% of this up. 90% of it is a word for word amalgam of the publicity material of the unique dynamic websites of the top young new ensembles of London, passionate and engaging, second to none…

Brilliant article by Matthew Barley in the Guardian re next week’s things (hmm… Guardian?… Kings Place?… that’s convenient…) that touches on the irrelevance of genre.

“It has never worried me at all that different genres of music – classical, jazz, pop – are supposed to be separate: if I like the sound of it, I’ll find a way to play it. I always feel that putting labels on music rather misses the point. It seems more interesting to think in terms of music that dances, or that sings or weeps – these are categories that we all understand in our hearts, and which exclude nobody.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/2009/sep/17/extreme-cello-matthew-barley

As my work in Germany comes to a close, I’m transitioning back into the new season in London. First port of call: the wonderful Kings Place concert hall for a concert created by cellist Matthew Barley, who has a two day residency there next week.

Although Kings Place (in King’s Cross, near the Eurostar terminal) has now been open for a year, I’ve only just visited it for the first time. It’s very impressive; not just architecturally, but also for it’s great mix of contemporary programming, places to eat, office buildings, and general everything-mixed-together-in-a-good-way-ness. It’s actually the home of the Guardian newspaper, who live in the top of the building, along with various other companies. The arts centre, including a gallery, concert halls, conference and music facilities, etc., is in the basement. A great public atrium fills the centre of the building.

This mush-everything-together-organically approach is totally reflected in the programming, and here’s where the venue is groundbreaking: there’s no distinction between types of genre as in other arts centers. No ‘Classical’, ‘Jazz’, ‘World’, ‘Great Orchestras’, ‘Chamber Music Classics’ type series here… there are only the deliniations music, visual arts, spoken word, and the all-important food and drink!

Artists are invited to ‘curate’ the building for a couple of days at a time. The result is an environment that is constantly changing, highly fragmented from week to week, always engaging and exciting, never looking back, always looking forward. It’s an arts centre for the Facebook generation!

In fact, Kings Place is so exactly what I always hoped concert halls would turn into, that I’m shocked how good it is… and I can’t believe that I’ve only discovered it a whole year after it opened! (Then again, I’ve been away).

We’ll be performing in the main hall, which is underground. I’ve yet to try out the acoustics but people have raved about them to me, so I’m hoping it’s going to be an amazing experience.

Matthew Barley’s work is amazing and well worth checking out at his blog, MatthewBarley.com. He’s one of these people who can’t resist grabbing traditional ideas and thrusting them into new narratives, some of which can be very compelling. Here he is talking about another event he’s doing as part of his residency next week. Cybercellist? Perhaps!…

The concert I’m playing in isn’t webcast, sadly (though do come along - Friday 25th at 7.45pm), but all Matthew’s concerts on the Saturday are, including the crazy ‘Virtual Cello’ concert (using the things in the video above) at 9pm (UK time). Exciting stuff, worth checking out if you’re online then.

A friend from the Philharmonia got me a ticket to see Nigel Kennedy at the Tower of London festival.

It’s funny; if you think of Kennedy as a Classical artist, he was way ahead of his time — his cross-genre approach to programming has been there since the 1980s. He was way, way ahead of anyone else - Classical or crossover - when it came to reaching outside the traditional box of classical concert programs - in terms of presentation, programming, stylistic mashups… you name it.

But if you view Kennedy as a rock star, he is in fact quite a traditionalist. His musical heritage draws mainly from the fine masters from the violin and jazz traditions, and he is firmly in the populist, crowd-pleasing camp. He is a masterful act, effortlessly charming (and funny) on and off stage, and it’s great that the rest of the world has finally begun to catch up with him. But violinistically, he has led change like noone else.

Music and the City is back! The only event connecting amateur and professional musicians who love playing chamber music… Next event 10th October. As usual, I’ll be conducting the orchestra. Repertoire will include Brahms: Hungarian Dance No.5, and of course there will be the usual opportunities for drinking wine, playing chamber music and drinking wine. And wine tasting for non-playing guests! And did I mention there’s a wine bar?

http://www.musicandthecity.org/ - you can now book tickets online, too!

Hello

Colourful around here, isn’t it?!

I think it is time for a complete website overhaul. Give me a few months.

In the meantime, For Your Viewing Pleasure:

I imagine that most of my regular readers have disappeared, seeing as I have not written for so long!

But no matter. I am deeply committed to blogging, and I will start again in September.

Why the silence?

I have been working on many things - mostly new incarnations of the same things that I’ve been working on since 2005. The last four years (and the next 6 months) were/are the development period. The next 12 months will see all these things fly out into the real world.

It’s all big and proper now - my ideas finally have backing of either real money, or people with the resources to make them happen, or people who can get them in the places where they will really create change.

Give me a couple more months. I’ll write again before Christmas, and in 2010 the music will start pouring out. End of the beginning etc.

Thanks for sticking with me. Seriously. It’ll all be worth it. Nearly there now.

http://science.howstuffworks.com/calm-before-storm.htm

Today’s concert starts at 1.10pm UK Time! Click ‘full screen’ to see a bigger picture.

<sorry, tv no longer available>

Programme:

Stravinsky: Duo Concertant

Kreisler: Three Pieces in the Style of Couperin

Poulenc: Sonata

Piano: Daniel Swain - http://www.danielswain.com/

Love it? Hate it? Something wrong? Send a message (can’t help with tech stuff sorry… I’m playing a concert!)

<a href=”http://courtlanemusic.wufoo.com/forms/z7×4m1/” mce_href=”http://courtlanemusic.wufoo.com/forms/z7×4m1/” title=”Contact Form”>Fill out my Wufoo form!</a>

The future has arrived!

When I was blogging back in 2004, I was dreaming of a time when ‘all-you-can-eat’ music was available. Well, so long as you’re connected to the internet whilst listening, that time has come! A kind of hybrid of Last.fm and a torrent site, Spotify is a massive free-to-stream ad supported music service, which you can also pay a very modest fee to subscribe to if you don’t like the ads.

The best thing (from my point of view as a musician) is that it’s all legal, and proportionate revenues will flow back to musicians. Court Lane Music’s catalogue will be available on Spotify (Imogen Holst should be there soon!).

All that’s needed now a) is every single published track in the world to be available, and b) an upgradable subscription that allows you to download tracks to a handheld digital player (even if that’s on a basis whereby the tracks expire after a certain time, or once your subscription expires).

I’m hooked. Bravo, Spotify!

If there was a list of the worst possible businesses to start in the middle of a recession, I suspect that a record company would be one of them. And of all the sectors in which to start a record label, there can’t be many more unpromising than Classical Music!

But that’s what Tommy and I are going to do!

Following on from the Imogen Holst CD, it’s clear that there is a very healthy appetite for the styles and genres of music that we know best. What isn’t clear is whether or not there is a way to produce recordings of this music on a sustainable basis, now that the traditional record label model has totally collapsed.

My hunch is that there is, and that the answer lies somewhere between the words ‘relationship’, ‘experience’, ‘multimedia’, ‘digital download’, and ‘licensing’. Quite where, I just don’t know yet.

So we’ll be turning Court Lane Music into a proper record label in April. We have just secured UK distribution for physical discs, and the existing Imo disc should be available in HMV and on Amazon (and indeed any other UK record store) imminently. More projects will materialize soon. I’ll update you again in a month or two…

I’m very excited about the year ahead. Two major things loom. It would have been three, but a major commission from the Spitalfields festival has sadly fallen through at the last minute for boring administrative reasons!

Debut recital tour - Culminating in a lunchtime recital on 1 April at the Bridgewater Hall in Manchester, Daniel Swain and I will be performing a neo-classical programme of Poulenc and Stravinsky. Details here.

John Tavener Premiere with the Medici Quartet - Paul Robertson, the leader of the Medici Quartet (which disbanded a few years ago, but is reforming for this project), is a fascinating man, and we’re going to be working with him on a great project called Towards Silence.

He writes very movingly about near-death experience on the ‘Towards Silence’ page of his website, the Music Mind Spirit trust. It’s a fascinating resource, and I highly recommend anything and everything on there! http://www.musicmindspirit.org/

Can you consider a politician – without considerations that could be said to be political?

In the case of Barack Obama, Yes You Can!, not least for his book Dreams From My Father, which I have just finished reading, for it was written long before his ascent to current political heights (if not before a time of such ambitions being harnessed.)

We route (root? In British English they are pronounced the same!) back to identity and belonging.

Obama’s masterful writing, and in my opinion it is masterful, speaks of the feeling of being of something, yet not of something; being the outsider, yet having a tacitly unique connection with the inside; understanding a great deal of something through deeply close indirect experience (such as the experience of a parent, or a sibling, or a lover), yet not actually being of the same.

The more you read into individual histories, of people, of nations, of cultures, the more you can see this at play. One specific human connection, that magical moment where something happens, leads to a connection that, according to established social or national or cultural norms, wouldn’t otherwise have been there. This is the moment where boundaries – national, cultural, generational, personal – are crossed. (The American dream owes so much to this.)

[Digression 1: This is where the Barack Obamas, the Daniel Barenboims, the Ramzi Aburedwans are in their element… they connect the dots that noone else can, using a unique understanding of the relationship between certain places (or things, or people) that noone else has…]

[Digression 2: Thrice, in separate years, I spent extended time in a strange place, somewhere in continental Europe, that profoundly changed me. One of the people I met during that time was an older lady of uncommon insight; one of those who dabbles with ‘new age’ ideas that can ‘freak out’ those of a more domestic nature. I didn’t get to know her well, but I grant this: she knew as well as any layman what made a good performance. Every night, she would return to the house and present me with a concert programme. She’d point at each piece on the printed page. “Something happened”. “Nothing happened”. “Something Happened.” “Nothing Happened”. And I am convinced that not only was she right, but that most of everyone else would have disagreed with her. Such happenings are no reflection on ability or potential… or even on unsubjective reality, for there is no such thing. They are the subjective moments of personal connection. Great performers, like great gamblers, make this happen often enough to turn it into a profession. 20% of people transcended over a long period works as a Return On Investment. But one thing is guaranteed; nothing will reach everyone, and anything will reach someone. As Hugh Macleod says: the market for something to believe in is infinite. Statistics and probability work their magic, what happens happens, and the world moves on.]

There’s a chain of events at play. The flap of a butterfly’s wing… One cross-cultural connection can create a chain reaction that causes a synthesis between a greater number of people than the original connection. That’s too powerful to ignore. A fraction of a fraction of a fraction of a relationship between two separate cultural or national identities comes a step closer through two individuals, but it’s magnified many times as more people come into the equation. Repeat the same through the evolutionary process; you have the recipe for human social evolution… it will only take a million zillion billion years…

Back to our own time… as we reach a point where globalization becomes the norm [seriously… next 20 years… watch out…], it will increasingly become usual for minor connections, random associations, human interactions… things that owe nothing to anything but themselves… to become drivers for disproportionately large social changes.

Not least is this thanks to the never-before-surpassed leverage enabling the individual, via technology, to effect change.

Something happens. It appears to work. It becomes a meme in a community. It becomes a meme in the broader community. It gathers pace… it crosses national boundaries… it becomes the norm.

This could never have happened, at least not with this speed and fluency, before the age of digitalization.

But now the age of digitalization is upon us, it can.

Our age is the transition period.

I’m excited.

Finally, everything I’ve been working towards for the last decade looks like it’s starting to happen. I think I’m a few months (everything crossed - things always turn out harder in hindsight!) from the point where lots of initiatives will start to go off into the big wide world, become much bigger than me, and cause some well needed change. And they’ll be run (and owned, and devised) by people who really know what they’re doing.

That’s the best thing, actually, the absolute best thing about my job. Getting to interact with some of the most incredible, incredible people. Several of them. And they’re beginning to take control, and it’s great. But I’m looking for more. Loads more.

Please, if you are exceptional at something, you know what good music is, and you want to get involved with some brilliant projects that will transform the music industry, then get in touch. Send me a link to your blog, or email me your CV. I desperately need you!

I’m looking for so many different types of people (and I don’t care where in the world you are - Europe, UK, USA and AUS are easiest, but Middle east and Asia will follow). I do however care very much who you are, and what you are, and what makes you tick.

You’ll need to be passionately motivated by change, see money only as a consequence, and have the perseverance and creativity to excel in whatever area you’re looking for.

[For a start, I’m looking for great musicians for performance projects. London, NY or Berlin work the best. It would be an honour to collaborate with you.]

But I’m also looking for non-performers: admin people initially in the UK (prob London) and in Australia (prob Melbourne) and eventually elsewhere (working remotely) who are exceptionally stable people with an attention to detail and a real sense of dedication and committment.

I’m looking for tech people (anywhere - you can work virtually)… inquisitive souls who when presented with a problem throw themselves at it entirely until it gets solved. People who understand the profound significance of the technological transitions we’re going through right now, and realize the depth of creativity needed to manipulate technology meaningfully.

I’m looking for creatives… writers, visual artists, animators, designers, graphic designers, web designers, and perhaps others that I haven’t thought of.

I’m looking for mentor figures - directors, investors, musical mentors - who can take an interest and leverage their experience to create change through others.

I’m looking for sales people, management people, customer service people, who are really creative in their own spheres… it’s so easy to do these kinds of roles badly; but it’s incredibly rewarding to do them well.

We [me, ensemble, court lane, musbook, etc] are also looking to hear from partners: companies or individuals whose individual visions we may be able to assist. We have the tools, we’re almost ready, and I am very happy to hear from you.

Thanks again for reading. It will be a privilege to work with you.