Eleven Conditions of Responsibility

Aim: Recording & releasing 'Eleven Conditions of Responsibility', a major new work by Sinan Savaskan, from his 'Many Stares' cycle (1978-present)

PROJECT OUTLINE

We seek your support towards the remaining costs of a unique recording project: the studio recording of a remarkable large-ensemble work for 18 players by Sinan Carter Savaskan. We have already secured significant funding (£20,140) thanks to generous support from PRS Foundation Composer’s Fund, the Hinrichsen Foundation,  the Vaughan Williams Foundation, and Anthony Cardona. However, the total (minimum) amount needed to cover all core project costs is £25,000. The outstanding £5,000 will enable us to cover final production and record label (release/promotion/dissemination) costs. Any donations over this amount will still be gratefully received, supporting core project management costs which otherwise depend on voluntary fulfilment of key roles.

Octandre rehearsing with Sinan Savaskan

FURTHER DETAILS

The Octandre Ensemble is dedicated to long-term partnerships with composers,  championing works which deserve wider recognition. Savaskan has been a close associate of the ensemble since we began in 2011. Our partnership has led to his winning a British Composer Award (2015) for Many Stares (Module 30), one of many accolades. His Second Symphony, 'The Age of Analysis' (1997-98) was broadcast as one of the ten most memorable pieces of contemporary music to be played in the first 40 years of BBC Radio 3. In 1990 he received an Artists Award from the Foundation for Contemporary Arts, New York.

Sinan Savaskan's epic cycle, Many Stares Through Semi-Nocturnal Zeiss-Blink, is an extraordinary, though as yet little-known, contribution to late 20th- and early 21st-century music. The sheer depth of Savaskan's conception is astonishing. Consisting of 360 ‘modules’ in a wide variety of mediums, and exploring musical structures from the tiny to the immense, the core concept entails viewing diverse musical materials from multiple perspectives or angles. This is music with its own geometry, geography, topography - an imaginary landscape - but it is also decidedly playful and spontaneous, reminding us that Savaskan is an improvising musician with a fantastic imagination and compositional craft in equal measure.

Screen-printed sketch for No.141 (£100 reward)

We are honoured to have been entrusted with so significant a work as 'Eleven Conditions of Responsibility'. The new 33-minute Module, is scored for 18 musicians and it will be the centrepiece of the cycle. We are seeking funding to record and release it on the Métier/Divine Art label. This project will lead to the first commercial release of ensemble music by Savaskan. It will be Co-Produced by Prof. John Croft, a fellow longstanding colleague and collaborator of Savaskan's.

Original 'Nib Cleaning' ink art by Savaskan (£250 reward)

We are grateful for generous support from the PRS Foundation Composer's Fund, the Hinrichsen Foundation  the Vaughan Williams Foundation, and to Anthony Cardona, although we need to raise more funds to cover outstanding recording and record label costs.

We hope you will consider supporting our project. Thank you.

Funding method

Keep what you raise – this project will receive all pledges made by 1st August 2025 at 12:00pm