Nigel Deacon - music
Nigel Deacon is a pianist and composer and has written for the piano since 1975, when he was an undergraduate at St. Catharine's College, Cambridge. He has published over a hundred piano pieces with his imprint "Sutton Elms Publications", and has brought out several CDs.
Much of the music is based on English folktune, which is infinitely varied and beautiful. The piano writing shows respect for melody; and the pieces are reminiscent of Delius, Vaughan Williams, Ivor Gurney and John Ireland. Many of them have been broadcast by the BBC.
There are non-folktune pieces, too; he writes piano reductions of violin music and engaging little fugues with Bach-like tunes. Some of his work is being orchestrated.
Nigel writes..."it's important in music not to alienate the audience. It's only a few years since Radio 3 was wasting the BBC's licence fee in supporting composers of cacophony and driving listeners away in huge numbers. But melody, harmony and structure are important - it doesn't take a genius to work that out - just look at Haydn, Bach, Scarlatti... ".
So, if you want avant-garde items for your programmes, he's definitely not your man. But if you want carefully-crafted music which will interest your audience, it may be worthwhile finding out more.
Nigel has an interest in early Czech and Iberian music. His CDs contain a mixture of his own work alongside pieces by Kozeluch, Benda, Scarlatti, Albero, Freixanet, Espona and their contemporaries.
Inquiries to ND.
Details of CDs: see main MUSIC page (click above left).
