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The Guardian, 3rd September 2009

For the choir parts, Watson commissioned composer Marcus Davidson.  First, Davidson spent time listening intensely to Watson's bee recordings - and got a shock: "The bees are full of music.  They 'sing' diatonic notes.  It's astonishing.  In the daytime they are all at A below middle C.  Then, in the evening, the general pitch slips down to G sharp."  But around those central pitches, says Davidson, the bees are also tuneful: "For each mood they have a different set of what I call tune clusters - different songs and little chords."

Bees have also been shown to indicate awareness of toxins and other hazards by subtle changes in pitch.  Mike Harding, co-founder of Touch (who release Watson's CDs), was commissioned to make the hive recordings for the piece.  While Harding was manfully dealing with repeated stings in the service of art, Davidson noticed something.  "About 10 seconds before Mike got stung, they'd all be singing different notes, but then it's as if they've taken a decision: 'Right, we've been invaded enough.'  And then they go back to a unison A.  You hear a distinct change."

For the human singing parts, Davidson has avoided any "buzzing" cliches, finding mouth shapes that create a natural sound.  They branch out, eventually, into more "human" musical territory, but all the shapes, he says, have come from the bees.

Pascal Wyse

[Three excerpts from the performance can be seen in a video of the highlights on YouTube.  (NB: the audio quality is poor.)  Another sound excerpt is on this site's listen page.]

Awakenings

Listen to Marcus talking about Awakenings, a dance theatre production based on the mystical experience of Donald Pass.

Radio 3's Mixing It

Marcus was one of the Spire participants interviewed on Radio 3's Mixing It, 19th May 2006.