ALTHEA TALBOT-HOWARD
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Byzantion I
​Hagia Sophia

International Double Reed Society ​
50 for 50 
​Commissioning Grant-winner, 2022
Until the completion of Seville Cathedral in the early C16, Hagia Sophia was the world's largest church. Built by the Emperor Justinian in the sixth century AD, it was the centre of Orthodox worship for the Byzantine, eastern Roman Empire until it fell to the Ottoman Empire in the 1400s. 
​Like Troparion, Byzantion I - Hagia Sophia is based upon Greek Orthodox chant:  this time, a Prokeimenon from a C12 
manuscript from Patmos. Like Rievaulx - which features Gregorian chant at the beginning of the piece - it is also a piece about an iconic church building which testifies to the past, even though its function differs today. 
​
​Hagia Sophia has two principal sources of inspiration:  the Icons of Sound virtual acoustic joint project between Stanford University and the choir Cappella Romana; and W.B. Yeats' poem Sailing to Byzantium (from The Tower [1928]). 

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Byzantion I -
Hagia Sophia (2022)


for Cor anglais, Bassoon & Piano

Duration 5'20"

To purchase the score, 
please send a message via the 
​
​
​Contact Page

"As in the gold mosaic of a wall..."
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Performance History
World Premiere
​ 
51st IDRS Conference

Thursday 28 July 2022 - University of Colorado Boulder
with Kathleen Carter Bell, English Horn; Conor Bell, Bassoon;  Stephen Innis, Piano
​Second Performance
Saturday 18 February 2023 - 
Faculty Recital, Performing Arts Centre,
​ Tennessee State University, Nashville, Tennessee, USA

Kathleen Carter Bell, English Horn; Conor Bell, Bassoon; & Tiantian Liang, Piano
Third Performance
​Saturday 1 April 2023 at 1930 CT
​Amelia Johnson, English Horn
Honors Recital, 
The Recital Hall, Voxman Music Building,
The University of Iowa, Iowa City, IA, USA
​
​​Livestreamed on Facebook


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Based in London, England, international prizewinning musician Althea Talbot-Howard is a classical composer who began her professional career in 1992 as a soloist and orchestral guest principal. In 2005, Gramophone Magazine called her “a superb oboist”.  A graduate of Girton College, Cambridge and the Royal Academy of Music; she won Third Prize in the Paris-Ville d'Avray International Oboe Competition in 2007; and was one of twelve equal prizewinners in the Ora Singers Christmas Gift Composition Competition in 2019. 
​​
Of Afro-British ancestry, she is a 12th-generation direct descendant of King Charles II, who formalized Britain’s involvement in the Atlantic slave trade; and therefore a 14th-generation descendant of King James I & VI, who commissioned the Authorized Version of the Bible.  Both anti-slavery and 
Christian themes feature strongly in her compositional output. 
  • Home
  • About
  • Featured Works
    • List of Works
    • Blue Sahara Crossing
    • Byzantion Hagia Sophia
    • The Church at Errislannan
    • Deep River
    • Deep River Sonata
    • The Door of No Return
    • Ego Flos Campi
    • Fantasia Dodecaphonica
    • The New Chevalier Sonata
    • Rievaulx
    • Troparion
    • Two Motets
  • IDRS
    • Programme Notes
    • Images
  • Past Premieres
    • BC 365
  • ABRSM-AMEB
    • ABRSM
    • AMEB
  • Press, Gallery & More
    • Ask Althea
    • Press
    • Publications
    • Gallery
  • Events
  • Oboe CD
  • Score Purchase & Contact
  • IG Archive