robert curgenven
Pipe Organ Repertoire 2025

Total runtime: 54mins - additional pieces available for longer runtime, some pieces can also be omitted for shorter runtime.

A.. Unstable Steady States (A/B/C)
Duration: 13mins
for live pipe organ & 4.2 channel soundsystem
Composed in even temperament, meantone 1/4 comma & Neidhardt Große Stadt tunings
Richard Thomas Foundation (RTF) commission (UK/EU)

B. Bronze Lands (Tailte Cré-Umha) Part 1
Duration: 11mins
for live pipe organ & 4.2 channel soundsystem
Developed for Cork Midsummer Festival 2018 (Ireland)

C. Aria 3 (Open Form Pavilion of Air series)
Duration: 17mins
for live pipe organ + recorded meantone pipe organ + 8 channel electronics (can be realised as live pipe organ & 4.2 channel soundsystem)
New commission for UQ Art Museum (QLD), Newcastle Conservatorium of Music (NSW) & RMIT Spatial Information Architecture Laboratory (SIAL) sound studios (Australia)

D. Unstable Steady States (C/D/F)
Duration: 13mins
for live pipe organ & 4.2 channel soundsystem
Composed in even temperament, Neidhardt Große Stadt & open tunings
Richard Thomas Foundation (RTF) commission (UK/EU)

UNSTABLE STEADY STATES (A/B/C) - Richard Thomas Foundation (RTF) commission (2021-23)
With the support of the Arts Council of Ireland through the Music Commission Award and the APRA Arts Music Fund, the Richard Thomas Foundation has commissioned Robert Curgenven to create the third in the series of New Organ Works, following commissions for Kali Malone and Claire M Singer. Curgenven's compositions had their premieres for live pipe organ with soundsystem in 2023. In addition a 33.4 channel presentation was given at 4DSound showcase in London (UK) on the 4DSound system and a 48.9channel presentation will be given in 2025 at MONOM (DE). The live presentations included: the world premiere for New Music Dublin (IRL) at All That Is Solid Melts Into...; Danish premiere at Struer Tracks Festival; Norwegian premiere at Stavanger Konserthus' Orgelnatt; and at Copenhagen's Organ Sound Art Festival. The three parts comprising three different tuning systems create vivid interference patterns and beating frequencies within the concert hall and a starkly physical experience for audiences. 

Audio & video extract: USS A/B/C Danish concert premiere performed by Robert Curgenven – Struer Tracks Festival, Struer kirke, Denmark, 23 August 2023 – filmed by Jacob Erikson, Director Struer Tracks Festival and Sound Art Lab, DK. Piece A & Piece B (from quadraphonic PA) & Piece C (live on Bruno Christensen & Sønner 16ft pipe organ). Piece A (recorded: 2021); tuning: Neidhardt Grosse Stadt; Studio Acusticum, Piteå, Norrbotten, Sweden - built by Woehl Orgelbau (2012). Piece B (recorded: 2023); tuning: meantone quarter comma (tracker action); Norrfjärden Church, Norrbotten, Sweden - built by Grönlund (1997), reconstruction of northern German Müller organ (1651, tracker action). Piece C - live even temperament - 16ft pipe organ, built by Bruno Christensen & Sønner (1970).

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TAILTE CRÉ-UMHA (BRONZE LANDS) PART 1 - Developed for Cork Midsummer Festival (2018)
Tailte Cré-Umha (Bronze Lands) is a solo performance for pipe organ & soundsystem developed during two months exclusive after-hours access to Ireland's largest pipe organ in St Fin Barre's Cathedral Cork, along with a range of turn-of-the-century unmodernised pipe organs across Cork and Cornwall in a different tuning. The world premiere was in 2018 at St Fin Barre's Cathedral over two nights for Cork Midsummer Festival with accompanying lightshow. In 2020 the Australian premiere saw a sold-out performance at Sydney Festival on Sydney Town Hall’s 64ft grand pipe organ. Concert recordings were released in 2021 as "Tailte Cré-Umha - Live at Cork Midsummer Festival" (EP) and "Bronze Lands - Live at Sydney Festival 2020" (full 50min concert, CD, as part of the Beyond Enclosures 3CD set).

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ARIA 3 (OPEN FORM PAVILION OF AIR SERIES)- UQ Art Museum / Newcastle Conservatorium of Music / RMIT SIAL co-commission (2025)
This new work is in development for first presentations in August 2025. Comprising live pipe organ, recorded meantone mechanical action pipe organ plus electronics drawn from the Dublin Open Form Pavilion of Air geo-located audiowork, "Aria 3" follows "Aria 1" & "Aria 2" commissioned by New Music Dublin for its 2023 festival. The specific material qualities of air continue to inform this series of commissioned works for pipe organ and electronics which follow the Open Form Pavilion of Air series. Fluctuations and disturbances in the air’s behaviour and movement, not only as a medium for sound but as the fundamental source for and from the pipe organ, underscore the acoustic architectures into which audiences are absorbed and within which they can physically sense a specific and tactile apprehension of sound and air. Combining the elecronics and live even-tempered pipe organ with recorded meantone pipe organ heightens these frissons as the three different tuning systems create beating frequencies for audiences as each tuning system works with and against one another.

The Dublin Open Form Pavilion of Air audiowork's electronics form and frame processional movements of angles, gradients, curves and hyperbolic paraboloids – each and together described by the heterogeneous, gentle glissandi of sine-tones which moiré with and against one another – together suggesting a suspension of gravity and impossible architectural forms. These electronics are rendered via a multichannel diffusion which, within the audible fluttering of the pipe organ’s sculpting of air, micro-sound melds into macro-movements, creating a pellucid, harmonic centre pervading a microtonal vortex of turbulences, singing overtones and architectural resonances.

Aria 3 will have multichannel presentations in 2025 at: RMIT SIAL (VIC, AU), Sonic Arts Research Centre (Belfast, UK), Falmouth University (UK), Tonarium (Katowice, PL), Phonurgia festival series (Ireland). Live pipe organ + soundsystem performances will be announced soon.

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UNSTABLE STEADY STATES (C/D/F)
A further suite of two pieces in the Unstable Steady States series (D & F) was developed alongside the Richard Thomas Foundation commission with the support of the Arts Council of Ireland through the Music Commission Award and the APRA Arts Music Fund, Composed in even temperament, Neidhardt Große Stadt & an open harmonic tuning, this further composition formed from three simultaneous parts has also been performed alongside Unstable Steady States A/B/C as part of presentations in UK, Denmark, Norway and Ireland with more to follow.

Unstable Steady States – support:
Richard Thomas Foundation (UK); Arts Council of Ireland Commission Award (IRL);  APRA Art Music Fund (AU); Culture Moves Europe (EU & Goethe Institute (BE); I-Portunus (EU); Studio Acusticum & Luleå Tekniske Universitat, Piteå (SE); Nyksund Kooperativet (NO);  Øsknes Kommune / Kyrke (NO);  Berlevåg Kyrk / Kommune & Kvitbrakka AIR (NO); Sirius Arts Centre (IRL);  Folldal Kunstverket, Folldal Kommune & Folldal Gruver (NO); KH Messen (NO); Aras Eanna Arts Centre (IRL); Dublin City Council Arts Office (IRL); New Music Dublin (IRL); St Michael's Church, Dun Laoghaire (IRL); Greywood Artist Residency (IRL); BUA (NO); Beast Bornholm (DK); Sound Art Lab (DK); MONOM (DE).