The point of distraction: A musically illustrated lecture on composition

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Free entry. No registration required.

This event comprises a talk by the novelist Will Eaves  about the inception and creation of his piano suite 'Four Diptychs', the score of which is reproduced in the recently published The Point of Distraction (TLS Books), and a piano recital by Richard Uttley, who will play the whole of the suite and short excerpts from other works discussed in the course of the book.

Will Eaves is a novelist, poet, screenwriter and musician. He has been Arts Editor of the TLS (1997-2011) and Associate Professor in the English department at the University of Warwick. In 2019, his novel Murmur won the Wellcome Book Prize and the Republic of Consciousness Prize for Fiction. He co-hosts The Neuromantics podcast with Professor Sophie Scott of the Institute for Cognitive Neuroscience.

Richard Uttley is a pianist and composer. He has given major solo recitals at Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival and world premieres of work by composers including Francisco Coll and Kate Whitley. Highlights this season include duo recitals at Lucerne Festival and Wigmore Hall with horn player Ben Goldscheider and (in trio with violinist Callum Smart) on tour in Sweden. Richard is a piano professor at the Royal College of Music and a Professor of Academic Studies at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama.