Music by Ben.Harper

A ~~small but~~ gradually growing selection of my music for you to rapaciously download and then never quite get around to listening to. Jump to the music! Or hear it all in streaming audio at The Listening Room.

What's new

April 2013: Sonorities 2013. I'll be presenting a new audiotheque mix of Third City: Walking on Red and Blue at the Sonic Lab, Queen’s University, Belfast on Thursday 25 April.

August 2012: My podcast with ABC Classic FM about the Interior Design: Music for the Bionic Ear project is now online.

The Listening Room

Streaming audio of every piece of music on this website - over 75 mp3s to choose from.

Recordings

A list of CDs, even a few cassettes... basically, obsolete technology containing music, which may or may not be readily available for money or exchange.

Descriptive Catalogue of Musical Works (incomplete)

Symphony

The second sequel to String Quartet No.2 (Canon in Beta), with three fewer notes but 120 more instruments. Streaming video available now.

Spectral Shadow of String Quartet No.2 (Canon in Beta)

The first sequel to String Quartet No.2 (Canon in Beta), turning music into visual art and then back into music again.

This Is All I Need: Music for the Bionic Ear

Composed with assistance from the Bionic Ear Institute, this music was made specifically for people with cochlear implants but it can be enjoyed by everyone!

NSTNT HPSCHD PCKT MX, RMX1, RMX2, RDX

Composed as a memorial to the tenth anniversary of John Cage's death. Fourteen out-of-tune harpsichords with missing strings attempt to play different baroque sonatas simultaneously, in a Cheap Imitation of Cage's HPSCHD.

Callington

5 x 5 choruses for a guitar or something increasingly unlike it. The sound of failure. Where all the buildings look alike, even if they're not.

Real Characters and False Analogues

The long-awaited sequel to Stained Melodies. Five years in the making, because I'm a superb procrastinator. A set of twelve pieces for microtonal piano, with a richer palette of harmonies and textures than its predecessor.

The Old School Is Built On The Ruins Of The New School

Coaxing another performance out of my senile laptop on a return visit to Melbourne. A more sophisticated piece for fake feedback. Includes blurry photos and two studio mp3s because I couldn't record the gig without the hard drive conking out.

The One Who Was Neither Or Nor

I rediscover my hitherto unknown Kiwi roots while touring Melbourne and Brisbane, and learn how to fake a homebrew analogue modular synthesiser on an ageing laptop with a dodgy hard drive. Includes mp3s of two live gigs in their entirety (at least until I use up my bandwidth).

Redundens

How many times can I rewrite Schoenberg’s Three Pieces for Piano, Op.11 into something much less interesting than the original? A work in progress. Redundens 6i for piano is part of Daniel Wolf's A Winter Album. Redundens 1m is part of Melodica!

Sketch for "A"-16

A glimpse into a new work for live analogue electronics, using bi-directional feedback oscillators made from various devices bought at pawn shops. Includes three mp3s for download to give an idea of how it's going so far.

St Paul's Pianos With Real Nightingales

Nearly two years in the making, mainly because I just couldn't get the electronics right. A series of 23 short chorales for piano, combined with digitally simulated feedback and sampled nightingale stops from old pipe organs. Something for everyone. Includes an mp3 sample for your approval.

Hentai-Oto-Ma: Last Pieces for Digital Synthesis

A set of pieces created at home on the computer, using free and shareware programs, ping pong tables, line noise, random splotches, leftovers, and pornography. "The Night We Burned Down Bimbo Deluxe" and "Hentai-Oto-Ma" are now ready for download as mp3s - other tracks may follow soon.

The Slips

A written text to be performed by two speaking voices, playing with the anomalies of plain language, trying to shake meanings loose from the sounds of words, turning speech into music.

String Quartet No.2 (Canon in Beta)

A strict, very fast canon in unison played by 240 string quartets with a remarkably uniform sense of intonation. Its harmonic simplicity and stillness make it a peaceful sonic object for quiet contemplation (he reckons). Full story and mp3s of the 2005 amd 2008 versions available for download.

Magnificent Bastards

23 November 2003: A good day to mess around with tuning programs and I Ching simulators. Eight very short mp3s available for download.

I met Tony Buck with a flashing red bike light stuck in my mouth outside the old Brisbane Museum

Based on a true story.

Baroque Variations

Variations on themes from Stained Melodies, performed by a virtual chamber orchestra of cheap General MIDI samples, with percussion solos, field recordings from various locations around Melbourne, and words of inspiration from Father Gerard Dowling.

Stained Melodies

A series of 24 short, rather cheerful pieces for piano written in 2000. More information here, including mp3s for download of the entire set. The piano is played by the multitalented Miss Cooky La Moo. No, the piano's not out of tune; it's in 'hard' Ptolemaic just intonation.

Dick Without A Hole and The Cure For Headaches

What makes Australians so bloody funny? Talkback radio callers in Adelaide show the world their unique gifts of humour and comic timing. Then the mood's killed by an American who's found God. He was in prison. The American, not God. Comes with two mp3s for you to share the magic.

Disposable Guitar Play Once Throw Away, and Ola-R

A cassette recorded in 1999, produced in a limited edition of six cheap cassettes with handmade covers. The instrument on side A is an electric guitar made with homebrew pickups and a built-in 0.2 watt speaker powered by a 9 volt battery. On side B, lose the guitar and keep the feedback. The B-side was later remixed to become the piece Ola-R. Three mp3s.

* No, not that Ben Harper! Honestly, years ago I used to get misdirected email from slow-witted fans who had trouble using Google. A few of them may still be waiting for that album of trip-hop klezmer I promised them.

Music by Ben.Harper*