The Year Round: Seasonal and Circadian Songs

Music and films by Colin Riley I Part of Soundscapes Festival

6–8 May | 10.00am–12.30pm | Benjamin Zephaniah Marquee

Step into a calm, reflective space and experience The Year Round, an immersive sound and film installation presented as part of Soundscapes within the Brunel Creates Arts Festival. In a world filled with noise and distraction, this installation invites you to slow down and reconnect with the quieter rhythms of the natural world. Across a series of screens in a comfortable, informal setting, visitors are encouraged to sit, pause and immerse themselves in a cycle of music and moving image inspired by the seasons.

The work began on the Winter Solstice 2024, with a new song and film released each month, responding to shifting light, weather, place and time. Rooted in poetry and observation, the project explores our relationship with nature and the passing of the year. The films, captured close to the artist’s home, offer an intimate visual counterpoint to the music, creating a gentle, meditative experience. At the heart of the work is vocalist Melanie Pappenheim, alongside composer Colin Riley (piano, cello and electronics), with contributions from a collective of musicians including Jeremy Avis, Mandhira de Saram, Nic Pendlebury, Gareth Davis, Kate Halsall and Agnese Toniutti.

Dr Colin Riley’s research is as a composer. His work often explores how integration takes place between artforms to foster new ways of constructing and listening to music. The Year Round is one of these projects featuring song-settings of poetry with film about particular times of the turning year. Since the winter solstice of 2024 these ‘visual-music-poems‘ have become available online, unravelling as the year progresses. For the first time The Year Round is being presented as a complete body of work as the songs loop continuously through the day. Come and experience their beauty and intensity. Sit and take time out from your daily timetable routine. 

No registration required, just drop in anytime and stay as long as you like and let the sounds and images carry you through the year.