Maria Grenfell
Maria Grenfell writes chamber, orchestral and film music shaped by poetry, image and the natural world. Guitar miniatures catch Leunig’s whimsy in colour and gesture; percussion pieces skitter like insects through accents and sudden turns of melody.
Four Leunig Pieces for guitar follow the stories in Michael Leunig cartoons as short, vividly drawn scenes. Di Primavera, for guitar and marimba, grew from a trip to Italy and the sound world of Monteverdi. Stings and Wings came out of her score for the documentary Quoll Farm, its three movements tracking jack jumpers, dragonflies and moths. The writing is compositionally clear and approachable rather than overtly modernist, full of colour, repeated gestures and birdsong-like turns. She has also scored Living With Devils and written extensively for the Tasmanian Symphony Orchestra, letting literary, visual and non-Western sources shape the material.
Compositions by Maria Grenfell appear on
Rhythms of Change
In 2020 Claire Edwardes, often called the wonder woman of percussion, launched Rhythms of Change, a commissioning project for solo percussion that confronts the under-representation of women in classical programming and builds a lasting new repertoire.