Will Fergusson

A live bootleg recording of the debut performance of TENTH has surfaced and is available to stream or download for a price of your choice.

All proceeds go to the artists. 

WILLIAM FERGUSSON – ‘TENTH’ – PIANO CONCERT 17th OCTOBER 2021

It must surely be impossible to create a great work which cannot exist, yet this was the awesome ambition of ‘Tenth’ by Will Fergusson, commissioned by the Norfolk Hostry Festival at the Music Centre, UEA, in a passionate collaboration of piano and AI, encapsulating the idea of Beethoven’s unfinished Tenth symphony as well as celebration of the festival’s first decade.  

Immersing Beethoven’s unassailable Ninth with the fragmentary sketches for his incomplete final work, the recital opening performance of bagatelles set as prelude the composers’ late high-register flowing into a quest traversing peripheries of sound through phenomenal live tech composition by performer-programmer Ed Perkins.  

Commission of new piano counterpoint work by composer-pianist Will Fergusson for festival premiere

Playing on the enigma of a great work which cannot exist, this awesome ambitious project has engaged composer-pianist Will Fergusson to improvise on the myth and paradox from the tantalising fragments of Beethoven's unfinished symphony - exploring technological and electronic sound with performer-programmer Ed Perkins, and reaching from archaic choral roots to the digital era for a work of profound originality. 

This powerful contemporary commission is committed for premiere performance at a festival in Norfolk at the end of October and will form the musical theme for their central production of Peter Ustinov's play of the same title. 

Donations will fund research and composition and performance honorariums towards studio recording of the completed work - a reclamation of living sound from silence and lasting testament to the inspiration and challenge of Beethoven's legacy.

Find out more...