Townsend Street

Commission by the Ulster Orchestra to write a new piece in collaboration with local community groups in Townsend Street Belfast, Zeppo Arts and Townsend Enterprise Park. This project was part of Belfast 2024, a programme of events and funding opportunities led by the Culture & Tourism Unit in Belfast City Council. The project featured writing workshops with the local community, and input from the public in the form of reflections, recollections, anecdotes and stories as materials on which to base the composition. Ten-minute work "Townsend Street" for orchestra and electronics was premiered on 20th September 2024 in Belfast.


Programme Note:
It is impossible to capture a street and a community in one type of representation. One can never tell all of the stories or share all of the feelings. But my approach was to try and convey a sense of what I had understood about Townsend Street, after hearing the conversations and descriptions from the workshops and seeing photographs. Some aspects of Townsend street stood out for me:

Community, and elements contributing to the strength of communities. Moments of joy, lightness alongside the dark, contrasts and dichotomies. Heartbeat. Band practice. Brief sunshine above. Language, accents, hidden meanings and unwritten rules. Tension beneath the surface. Understanding and respect. Intergenerational learning.

Everyday normality, neighbourhood characters, rush hour and journeys to work. Interruptions to daily routines - motorways and events carving through. Parallel lives, parallel happenings. The pulse and pace of life. Rhythms of differing lives. The vibrancy of a close community. Organised chaos. Minding your own business. The course of a river. Empathy. Pride. Positivity. Heartbreak. Community division and dissolution. Fierce renewal. Contemplation, dawn, evening, and hope. Children. Street games. Out all day. Busy-ness. Flagstones. Flowering weeds growing determinedly where they can. Making fun. And later, during the Troubles - bombs, the army, segregation and gates.

The piece is in six short sections – each section focusing on a selection of these aspects, mapping them to moods of melody, of rhythm and of instrumentation. You may hear ships horns, represented first by trumpet, horn and trombone. They exchange sound signals, a boat conversation of hidden meaning. These can also reference factory, mill or other industry horns. Towards the end the orchestra pass around a single note accompaniment and melody between them – a community and a life is made up of countless individual contributions and happenings. I see the piece as an amalgamation of many elements, sometimes understood, sometimes obscure, with moments of definite clarity; much like the street, and our lives.

With thanks to the women of the St Stephens Young at Hearts group, whose voices I used in the piece. The last sound is the music of the Westlink – a different, constantly moving, scene.