Organically Grown Poems, Nothing Wasted

THE BALANCING DANCE includes the lyrics of the green cantata, FIVE SEASONS, written with Cecilia McDowall in 2006, for the Bournemouth Sinfonietta Choir, sponsored by Respect Organics with logistical support from the Soil Association. The rest of these poems grew from the rich compost heap of material that could not be contained in a 25 minute musical work.

about this compost heap

"In May 2006, the composer Cecilia McDowall and I set off with rucksacks and boots on a series of visits to five organic farms: Becklands in Dorset, Low Luckens in Cumbria, Ardalanish on Mull, Woodlands in Lincolnshire, and Blaen y Nant in North Wales. We were gathering material for a commission from the Bournemouth Sinfonietta Choir for a piece of choral music to ‘celebrate the organic landscape in the twenty-first century’.
But how do you go about writing a cantata about the organic landscape? There were no rules, no precedent for us or for the farmers we visited. ‘Is this it?’ they asked. ‘Is this what you need?’ All we could say was, ‘Yes! Everything is still possible. Everything is vital.’
We listened. We talked, over tea, coffee and wine. And over long delightful meals of slow food – organic meat, salads from gardens and wild verges. We talked while walking, while scratching behind dogs’ ears, while gazing at sheep, while resisting sleep. We took notes and photographs. We just sat and watched the cows, turkeys, hills, fields, the sea. We sang and listened to others sing.
Visit by visit, our heaped-up riches grew. Slowly, step by step, farm by farm, they were distilled back down into Five Seasons. These poems are an overflow from all that was given to us by the twelve people to whom I have dedicated this book. They made generous gifts of time and of talk – about their animals, weather, flowers, the seasons, the organic movement and its struggles and rewards. They educated us and showed us places of intense beauty – all of them very different. For me as a writer, it was a unique experience to have so many creative collaborators and so much input from others from the very beginning.
But as with a farmer’s work, there was also too much. We could have written a cantata for each farm. The commissioned twenty-minute piece of music was not long enough. Too much rich material was going unused. I have collected up and recycled a bit of it here, but the list of poems hasn’t finished growing yet. Five Seasons was the first crop. These poems are the second."

Type: Poetry

Commissioned by the Bournemouth Sinfonietta Choir with funding from Respect Organics and logistical support from the Soil Association. The World Premiere was on 18 November, 2006 at Sherborne Abbey, Dorset, with a second performance at the Soil Association Annual Conference in Cardiff in January 2007. FIVE SEASONS grew out of their residencies at five different organic farms across Britain, in Dorset, Cumbria, Lincolnshire, North Wales and on the Isle of Mull. The result is an exciting and innovative cantata for 34 voices and string quintet plus oboe and harp, which takes a refreshing look at the pastoral tradition.

Type: Cantata,Choral,Orchestral

A setting of Christie's poem 'Messengers', written as a Christmas song for the Canterbury Chamber Choir. It has now been performed many times.

Type: Choral,Songs

A choral song commissioned by West Hampstead Girls High School to take to the Eisteddfod in 2006 (where they placed 9th), is a light-hearted, non-pastoral take on the seasons.

Type: Children,Choral,Songs

A series of musical performance pieces for very young children (age 3-5), written with teacher, Rosie Wolf, and composer, Avril Crosland. All have been performed in schools.

Type: Children,Performance-Piece,Choral,Rap

is a setting of three of Christie’s poems, each offering a different view of being alone. The first song, 'Autumn Migration', describes the flight of a flock of birds across the sky pursued by a ‘single late flyer’ stitching ‘together earth and sky’. The second song, 'Night Garden', evokes the delicate fragrance of a still summer’s evening in which ‘lives too small to risk the light’ bravely begin to stir. The final song, 'Would Like To Meet', presents a ‘Lonely Hearts’ column, with a comic difference. Commissioned by the Canterbury Chamber Choir and first performed in 2005.

Type: Choral,Songs

This was specially written for Paul Goodey (oboe) and Linda Hirst (voice) and recorded by them for a CD which was released in 2003 by the Oboe Classics label (New Ground CC 2003) White Fox Woman is a dark mini-opera for middle to low voice and oboe, inspired by an Oriental myth.

Type: Solo,Instrumental,Songs

A darkly comic opera that makes an ecological point, commissioned and performed by W11 Children’s Opera, as their millennium production. First performed at St. James Norlands, London in 2000. DEEP WATERS was specially written for a cast of over 80 children of widely-varied musical experience. The action begins with a wild, raging storm. Four children fall overboard to the bottom of the sea. In this supernatural, aquatic world, where the fish play havoc with each other in a bid to survive, the children find that they can now breathe. With a ghastly sense of impending doom, they realize that it was no accident that brought them here. They have a dangerous task to perform. An opera that is witty but with a dark edge, it has a serious issue at its heart – over-fishing. Later performed elsewhere.

Type: Children,Opera,Orchestral

For countertenor, trumpet and percussion, commissioned by the Fibonacci Sequence and first performed at St John’s, Smith Square, 1999, with Paul Archibald on trumpet. INFERNO is a dramatic musical piece for orchestra and male soprano, based on writings of Dante and Rimbaud. It has been performed at St. John’s, Smith Square, and elsewhere.

Type: Solo,Instrumental,Songs

For orchestra, 7 narrators, countertenor/mime, rap artist and children’s voices, based on children’s playground rhymes. Commissioned by London Musici and HAPA (adventure play for children with disabilities and special needs). First performed at St. John’s, Smith Square, 1999, PLAY GROUND is a chanted-not-sung cantata. At its first performance, the narrators were played by Humphrey Burton, Susannah Simons, Edward Petherbridge, and Lady Solti, among others.

Type: Cantata,Orchestral,Solo,Rap

Inspired by sections of the RAMAYANA. Written for a Dutch director and an improvisational theatre company, performed at the Odeon, Amsterdam. Written each night in London from the director’s faxed notes on that day’s work. The new script was then faxed back before rehearsal began at 10:00 am the next day. Collaboration at a distance!

Type: Performance-Piece

Collected poems, both serious and playful, including the ones written late at night in casualty ward, which kick-started the writing self again after a long, long silence.

Copies of these books can be ordered from The Ollerton Press
(hayward ollerton@yahoo.co.uk)

Type: Poetry

A non-fiction account of the New Theatre Workshops commissioned by The Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation and the Arts Council of Great Britain

Type: Non-Fiction Book