Biography

Sam Gillespie is a Sydney based composer and researcher writing a broad range of music for performers through to generative algorithmic works. He creates music which engages with technology and human perception, combined with an engagement with theory, drawing a connection with western classical music tradition. His influences include Guillaume Dufay, Paul Hindemith, Luigi Nono, Olivier Messiaen, Alvin Lucier, Paul Lansky, Luciano Berio and Igor Stravinsky to name a few.

Sam became involved with music from a young age, congregational singing at church, playing piano, flute and later choral singing and synthesizers, he has always enjoyed improvising which naturally led to an interest in music composition, taking him on a winding path through technical and aesthetic studies in recording, mixing, improvisation, acoustics, theory, sound design and software design. Sam is a graduate of the Sydney Conservatorium of Music and is currently a research student at UNSW exploring composer led approaches to adaptive music for games.

Composer website:  www.samgillespie.com

Featured Works

Requiem… for those lost in cyberspace, for Electronic Wind Instrument (EWI) and tape.

This piece was inspired by some of my close friends in my teenage years. It seemed that we slowly drifted apart as they spent an increasing amount of time playing multiplayer games online. I saw less and less of them as they became “Lost in Cyberspace”. So as the EWI plays it’s mournful, wandering melody, remember those lost in cyberspace and let us be hopeful that they may return.

Featured in Space Waves – June 2017, curated by Marlene Radice.