Simeonovo’s source materials are personal ‘acoustic memorabilia’, recorded in 1991 on a hand-held analog cassette recorder, during a composers’ workshop in the mountains outside Sofia (Bulgaria). There, we heard sophisticated arrangements of traditional music performed by a renowned professional ensemble — and a friendly evening of amateur vocals in a little bar named Disco City in the village cultural centre. The piece celebrates memories of that remarkable week.

Simeonovo is the 6th in a series of works concerned with the interplay between memory and imagination where the pieces merge soundscape, radiophonic, and acousmatic elements into abstracted musical portraits of times and places.

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Simeonovo was commissioned by the Acadia New Music Society (ANMS) for Shattering The Silence festival, funded by Nova Scotia Tourism, Culture & Heritage.

Premiere

• January 22, 2011, Shattering the Silence 2011: Electroacoustic Evening, Denton Hall Auditorium — School of Music — Acadia University, Wolfville (Nova Scotia, Canada)