Knock About

Item details

• Description +

  • Duration: 9 min.
    
    Preface:
    Knock About was commissioned by O Duo and was first performed by them in 2004. The title is a play on words: a 'Kick About' is a phrase used to mean a group of people kicking a ball to each other for fun. In this piece two people come together to play, but pass ideas back and forth on percussion instruments instead of kicking a ball. One of the rhythmic ideas used is also often clapped during football matches. This is a Knock About and a Kick About at the same time.
    
    Edmund Jolliffe

• Instrumentation +

  • Required Instruments
    
    Player 1:
    Marimba
    Wood Block
    Cow Bell
    Cow Bell (ped.)
    
    Player 2:
    Marimba
    Wood Block
    Cow Bell
    Bass Drum (ped.) 
    Optional: Tom-tom (low)
    
    

• About the composer +

  • Edmund’s music draws on a huge range of styles and influences. He writes music for film and television and is also an award-winning concert composer.
    
    Recent commissions include pieces for the ABRSM, the Pink Singers, the Royal Academy of Music, the London Chinese Children’s Ensemble, and Oxford University Press Collections. His choral music is available from OUP, Stainer and Bell, and Banks Music. Many of his pieces are set works on the ABRSM syllabus (initial grade piano and clarinet).
    
    First Prizes include: Orpheus Academy Chamber Music Competition, Austin, Texas, USA (first and second prize); Eastern Michigan University Choral Competition, USA; Kantos Chamber Choir Carol Competition; Freudig Singers Choral Composition Competition, USA; Ithaca College Choral Composition Competition, USA; Amadeus Choir Songwriting Competition, Canada; Ely Consort Advent Composing Competition; Hendrix Candlelight Carol Competition, USA; Renée B. Fisher Composer Award, USA.
    
    He has been writing music to picture for over twenty years. Major series he has composed music for include The Traitors, Who Do You Think You Are? (BBC1), Homestead Rescue (Discovery), Sort Your Life Out (BBC1), Grand Designs: The Street (C4), Crazy Delicious (C4/Netflix), Long Lost Family (ITV1), and Unreported World (C4). He was nominated for an RTS Craft and Design Award for his score for the BBC film Elizabeth at 90.
    
    He taught composition for many years at the Royal Academy of Music and Trinity College of Music (Junior Departments) and also lectured in Composing for the Moving Image at City University.
    
    In 2021, Odense Percussion, led by Søren Monrad, commissioned a new ensemble piece by Edmund called The Game, which was world-premiered at the Danish National Academy of Music, Denmark on November 15, 2021.
    
    More information about him can be found at: www.edmundjolliffe.com

    Information current to August 2025 

• Credits +

  • Front Cover graphics and layout: Ronni Kot Wenzell
    Engraving: CPH Engraving
    Printed in Copenhagen, Denmark
    Copyright © Edition SVITZER
    www.editionsvitzer.com

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