I came across Peter Cox’s music blog via a Yahoo egroup which I’m a member of which probably deserves a blog post in itself as its a valuable musicians resource – its a place where muso’s across the world hang out to exchange ideas and tips and music chat called Music Thoughts – and theyre a really friendly bunch of people.

Your Music Blog is a new enterprise and well worth checking out, particularly for rock music which is Peter’s own specialty (he’s in established rock group Chinawhite).

He’s given Valentine Court an interesting review too.  He starts with some kind words about the music and then goes on to do what many reviewers shy away from and gives some interesting critical feedback.  He suggests that I might consider experimenting with some pieces with fewer notes in the future, or putting it the other way around, with more silence and space.

This I found an interesting comment – composer/pianists I enjoy such as Satie (as Peter states) and also Ludovico Einaudi are able to produce much simpler and sparser arrangements than I and I wonder if this is partly me compensating for a lack of confidence by keeping things busy.  Or perhaps to put it another way, one’s music reflects one’s state of mind and to date I’ve had to work quite hard (in a way) to achieve space in my mind and I think thats reflected in my music – there are moments of relative stillness – particularly in the climax of Jewel and Namaste, but these tend to be hard won, coming as the result of a build up towards that moment.

Mind you, Satie was an absolute master of tonality and Einaudi has a remarkable ear for melody, so perhaps the relative simplicity they sometimes achieve is hung on those particular gifts.

One of the many musical ideas I have saved on my digital piano is a very still and simple piece with only two chords, so perhaps I will be exploring that territory more in the future.  Time will tell of course, but in the meantime, thought provoking comments from Peter.

If you like my piano music, or you have an interest in contemporary piano music, or just fancy something nice in the background when youre chilling or working, can I suggest giving my online radio station a try?

OK, to be fair, I should explain that I havent gone to a lot of painstaking effort to create my own station – this is a feature of the excellent LastFM.com.  If you dont know Last FM, I’d strongly recommend trying it out – its a superb music resource – bit like Myspace for grown ups if you dont mind me saying so!

Antway, one of Last FMs features if that you can listen to tons of music – streamed and for free – and one of the ways you can approach that is to click on the “play artist radio” button, clearly shown beneath the picture on each artists’ page.  The radio feature then launches, first playing one track from the particular artist you have selected and then, using Last FM’s clever software, continuing with selections from other similar artists.

Very clever and very effective – you can skip any track you dont like and theres no adverts – check out my station here if you fancy it – happy listening!

My first gig for top Birmingham music promoters Capsule was a great pleasure yesterday.

For my set, I was a little taken aback at first by how quiet the audience were – very attentive and polite.  Probably because it was in a pub – albeit in the venue room of what is certainly one of Birmingham’s very bext music pubs – I suppose I expected it to be more lively – but actually the gentle mood suited the line up very well.

If the Capsule ladies ask me back, I may well with what was my first thought for this gig – since attendees at a Capsule gig are likely to be fairly seriously into music -  and take the chance to do a fully instrumental set, but instead I played what is currently my established set for acoustic nights and such – mostly my songs, with just a couple of my instrumentals.

Next Up – Friendly Fire built on the chilled mood, with moments of intensity and neat combination of modern, geekdom and classic 70s American folk rock.

Finally Phosphorescent took the stage – not totally at their ease for several songs, perhaps in part due to having travelled down from Glasgow in the day and arriving a bit late – but their relationship with the crowd progressed as the night went on.   Some superb musicianship was on display from all six members, comprising piano, soulful lead guitar, beautiful and haunting pedal steel as well as bass, drums and rhythm.

The sound was amazing – a great PA in there with Bartram ably and assuredly handling the controls as always.

Here’s a good review of the show, with pics by Katya Ogrin (one of which Ive borrowed for this post) over on brumlive.com

Ive received a great albumn review today from the good guys of Bearded Magazine. In case you dont know Bearded already, these guys are very passionate supporters of independent music – well worth checking out in there current online incarnation.

Some highlights from the review by Simon Harper include:

“Quietly building melody and atmosphere, Batsford appears to excel at gently shaping moods and it’s with the beautifully haunting ‘Namaste’ which the album really comes into its own, mining a seam of melancholy which unites the most arresting tracks here.”

“winding repeated melody patterns into heartbreaking shapes, packing an emotive punch”

and finally “frequently thrilling … this is a marvellous introduction.”

Please read the whole review here and if you have a minute, do peruse the rest of Bearded’s lovely new site.
Xx

I really enjoyed my week in Brighton playing piano for a theatre show.

We were based in Grand Central – see photo – right by the train station.  It could hardly have been better in terms of access – we were accomodated in rooms on the top floor, with the theatre space being on the middle floor and the ground floor being a really nice pub. Happy Days!  Also, as Brighton afficionados will know – the “laines” are great streets to go for a wander in either browsing shops during the day, or for a tipple of an evening.

The shows went really well – we performed around 100 in all – (remember each is only 5 munites long, we’re not superhuman) and audience reaction was very gratifying.

We got several reviews too – all four stars out of five – one of them even going so far as to give me a nice mention “The pianist, in particular, plays out a delightful low-key cameo, all wild-eyed enthusiasm as he hammers the ivories discordantly in the background.” (I hasten to add the particular piece that reviewer chose was called “the discovery of fear in the stomache” – a somewhat grizzly tale,  so the dischordant notes were (mostly) intentional.

I also got to exercise my rusty comedy skills, as we improvised a short passage in one of the pieces were I had a pretend strop and had to be enticed back into finishing the piece – great fun.  We played it like somewhere in the territory between Cooke and Moore and Morecambe and Wise!

The main performer Jake Oldershaw was very impressive, his presence comfortably dominating the space and enthralling the audience – given we were performing up to six hours per day and he had Mollie, his toddler daughter with us ensuring he didnt sleep in, the energy he put in was quite remarkable.

Jack our technical guy was very able and great company and Steven and everyone at the Nightingale Theatre were very warm and generous so combined with the enjoyment of being a professional pianist for a whole week, it was a great experience.

I recently sent a copy of my album Valentine Court to a lady in the US called Rebecca Johnson, who writes regularly on a website called Seasoned with Love.  She is also a key player in the growing army of people with an interest in music, books etc who contribute to our growing global cultural wealth my regularly reviewing music on Amazon.

Its very hard for indie artists to get coverage in papers and magazines, so its very important both for the artists themselves and all those who are interested in discovering new art that might appeal, that people like Rebecca give their time and make their voices heard.

Rebecca’s certainly been hard at work, writing no less than 3,795 reviews on Amazon so far, placing her as one of Amazon’s  “Top 10  Reviewers”.

So what did Rebecca make of my magnum opus?  Happily, she has entitled her review Exquisite and Magical and goes on to write:

“Rich Batsford has created a relaxing and at times a profoundly beautiful moment in time for the listener. His timing is impeccable and his melodies are original and compelling. The entire time I was listening to this stunning album I felt a sense of happiness.

“Valentine Court” also awakens delicate emotions that enliven the soul. Rich Batsford seems to be completely absorbed in the moment as he plays. His music also has meditative qualities at times and can awaken the heart to beauty. If you love solo piano then this should be in your collection.”

Rather a wonderful review – I found it quite moving in fact – it means a lot to get this kind of comment and Im proud of Rebecca and everyone else getting on Amazon to make some critical comments which in her case at least, are undoubtedly seasoned with a little love.
Xx

I am now available to hire as a pianist for your Wedding, or for your business or corporate occasion – playing sets of up to two hours of beautiful, contemporary, classical, chilled piano to create a relaxed, warm, sophisticated and, where appropriate, romantic atmosphere.

I play a number of my own uplifting and beautiful compositions ( listen here) alongside selections from Classic FM favourite Ludovico Einaudi and sundry others chosen to best fit the occasion.

For weddings or civil ceremonies, I can play during the ceremony itself or as your party are arriving, dining, or enjoying light drinks.

Im based in the Midlands but can travel beyond. Dont worry about whether there’s a piano at the venue – I play a stylish and portable Roland stage piano – for most rooms, no additional amplification is needed. If you are interested in hiring me, or talking it over – please contact me by email and we can take it from there.

I mentioned my cousin, successful jazz pianist Martin Litton in a recent blog post. He’s been kind enough to share some of his reactions to my album Valentine Court (which you can listen to on the music page of this site.

Its interesting in terms of a critical analysis of my music, and later he later presents contrasting takes on what we are each trying to achieve with our music:

“I liked your piece Lyndall and the Debussyan intro to the Cello Song and the major-minor shift towards the end of Gudonya. This last, like So Steve has a perpetuum mobile effect, of which you seem fond. Sensawunda does what it says on the tin and Just Sitting could be your tribute to John Cage.

Beyond this I don’t feel qualified to comment because my aims appear the polar opposite of yours. You achieve a trance-like ambience through a harmonically static medium with motivic repetition, whereas I follow the jazz dictum “the sound of surprise,” where I try to challenge the listener within a swinging framework. My heroes are people like Earl Hines, teddy Wilson, Willie “The Lion” Smith etc whereas your points of reference are just names to me.”

Its interesting to note that two of the composers mentioned in the wikipedia entry for perpetuum mobile (defined as “pieces of music, or parts of pieces, characterised by a continuous steady stream of notes, usually at a rapid tempo”) are Beethoven and Schubert, two composers close to my heart, although I often to credit the minimalism of Steve Reich as having had an effect on my penchant for fast, repetitive rhythm.

I played a lovely little gig in Bristol last weekend which deserves a special mention for being the only time I can recall a classical music night in a pub.

Now many people might find this a bit strange (there being classical in a club) tho conversely Ive always found it strange that so many people who are really into music never listen to anything recorded before 1960, when some fantastic music was being written in the 1860s and even better stuff in the 100 years before that.

In fact, I absolutely adore the music of Thomas Tallis – possibly the first great English composer – who was hard at work producing sublime music (recently sampled by super-hot Electronia artist Jon Hopkins) way back in the 1560s.

Anyways, it was a lovely gig – in a pleasantly cosy bar, nestled between two massage parlours (offering me the ideal opportunity to continue the noble tradition of composers contracting syphilis!), so if you find yourself in that area, do check it out (and Id strongly recommend grabbing some food in The Canteen which is nearby.

Pls click on image left for an interview with the organisers of Club Parnassus, taken from Venue Magazine.