Composing

Commissions as a composer include the London Symphony Orchestra, La Monnaie, La Folia, the Scottish Chamber Orchestra, Salisbury International Arts Festival, Southern Cathedrals Festival, English National Opera, Childrens Music Workshop, Bangladesh Festival, Station House Opera, Jack De Johnette, The National Forest Project, and the Anvil. He has written a Requiem with the flamenco guitarist Paco Peña, performed at an opening concert of the newly re-furbished Royal Festival Hall.

Compositions

  • Gold Mountain (London Symphony Orchestra, June 2011)
  • Where Two Worlds Touch (Salisbury International Arts Festival, May 2011): see reviews below
  • Via Perdix (La Folia, April 2011)
  • The Brussels Requiem (for performance at La Monnaie, November 2010): see reviews below
  • Variations on Madness for the London Symphony Orchestra and groups of improvising musicians
  • Music for As You Like It for the Derby Playhouse
  • Nonino! (premiered in the 2008 Salisbury International Arts Festival)
  • Moving Music (for the Scottish Chamber Orchestra 2008)
  • Watching it Spin and Turning Stones (arr. David Jackson, used as film music)
  • Weigh me the Fire (double choir motet for the Southern Cathedrals Festival)
  • Salisbury Proverbs (music theatre piece for Station House Opera/Salisbury Festival)
  • Snapshots (theatre piece, partly devised with young people for the Anvil)
  • Requiem (Children’s Music Workshop/ENO Bayliss project)
  • String quintet (John Surman String Project)
  • Suite for a Better World (brass, percussion and sax for Jack de Johnette/London Brass)
  • All Change (musical for the Anvil with writer Ian McMillan)
  • Dhabi (devised musical for the Bangladesh Festival, dir. Stephen Langridge)
  • Songs of the Forest (Oratorio for Lichfield Festival 2005, CMW/Viva)
  • Requiem Flamenco (written with Paco Peña)

Recent Reviews

Where Two Worlds Touch

Hebrew, Urdu, Farsi, Arabic and Sanskrit all combined. On stage, in front of massed choirs Ziya Azazi, a dervish, began to whirl, his white robes flying up into a disc….the music had the same diverse hinterland : Moody’s setting of “Bemirid” had a Weimar vamp; his “Birdsong” set off a Messiainic marimba pattern with whistling from the choirs; in “Labbeyk” the marimba was more of a hubble-bubble, rounded off with a gospel exhalation….

David Honigmann, Financial Times (25 May 2011)

Many of the text settings, shared between the composers Helen Chadwick and Howard moody, equally rejoiced in the dramatic. The pieces by Moody (also the concert’s alert conductor) supplied the boldest sounds, with jazzy syncopations, crunched vocal harmonies, juicy brass playing from the ensemble La Folia and shuddering gongs and xylophone embroidery….

Geoff Brown, The Times (24 May 2011)

This journey was articulated by musical patterning as colourful and varied as the stained glass window above our heads…Moody’s contributions were ingeniously coloured by a brass quintet and percussion, and included jazzy and Spanish-flavoured numbers….

Ivan Hewett, Daily Telegraph (24 May 2011)

The Brussels Requiem

...on se trouve ici devant tout autre chose : non plus un “projet educatif” mais une production aboutie, d’une force musicale et artistique comparable a celle de nombre d’autres productions professionelles….

Martine D. Mergeay, La Libre (22 November 2010)