Lydia Ayers (1952-2022) was a composer, flutist, educator, and puppeteer. Starting in 1996, she permanently resided in Hong Kong, where she taught at the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology.

Predominantly working in Csound on the NeXT computer, Lydia Ayers composed computer music with unlimited just intonation, re-creating numerous Indonesian, Native American, Australian, and Chinese instruments digitally. She also wrote acoustic music, including over 30 solo and ensemble works for flutes. Ayers performed on a wide range of flutes from various cultural traditions, utilizing extended vocal and woodwind techniques: quarter tones, multiphonics, buzz tones, and other unusual flute timbres.
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21 to 30 of 60 Results
Ombres des Étoiles
Oct 9, 2024
Ayers, Lydia, 2024, "Ombres des Étoiles", https://doi.org/10.14711/dataset/NLLSUW, DataSpace@HKUST, V1
Percussion duet performed by Mona Kim and Duane Livingston in Valencia, California in 1977.
Ombres des Nuages
Oct 9, 2024
Ayers, Lydia, 2024, "Ombres des Nuages", https://doi.org/10.14711/dataset/O8IE6D, DataSpace@HKUST, V1
Very slow, trancelike Faster, agitated Slow, trancelike Very sweetly, a little slow, but not too much A little bit slower The contrasting clarinet colors used in Ombres des nuages (Shadows of Clouds) suggest different types of clouds, such as the thin cirrus clouds or the darker...
Ombres des Feuilles, Ombres des Fleurs
Oct 9, 2024
Ayers, Lydia, 2024, "Ombres des Feuilles, Ombres des Fleurs", https://doi.org/10.14711/dataset/BAS4V1, DataSpace@HKUST, V1
Modal, performed by Neil Charak, Andy Radford, Jim Snodgrass and Marlow Fisher in Valencia, California in 1977.
Ombres de la Pluie et de la Neige
Oct 9, 2024
Ayers, Lydia, 2024, "Ombres de la Pluie et de la Neige", https://doi.org/10.14711/dataset/TZGF8L, DataSpace@HKUST, V1
Ombres de la pluie et de la neige (Shadows of the Rain and Snow) is a solo piece for piccolo and alto flute. The fast first section on piccolo is atonal and suggests the sporadic pattering of the Rain. The slow second section on alto flute is modal and suggests the slow drifting...
Ombres de la Lune
Oct 9, 2024
Ayers, Lydia, 2024, "Ombres de la Lune", https://doi.org/10.14711/dataset/WFVYEW, DataSpace@HKUST, V1
Helix Song (The Helix Song is a microtonal percussion instrument invented by Erv Wilson, made of tuned electrical pipes). Performed by Todd Manley in Velencia, California in 1977; computer-generated version in 1998.
Ombres Chinoises
Oct 9, 2024
Ayers, Lydia, 2024, "Ombres Chinoises", https://doi.org/10.14711/dataset/3AMHJC, DataSpace@HKUST, V1
Ombres Chinoises is dedicated to my father, and was inspired by his shadow puppets. The special puppet techniques that he used in his most impressive show, Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, resembled animation that is now done on computers, but which he performed in real time usin...
Nostalgia Strata
Oct 9, 2024
Ayers, Lydia, 2024, "Nostalgia Strata", https://doi.org/10.14711/dataset/AKXISN, DataSpace@HKUST, V1
Microtonal; algorithmically composed adding multi-effect processing to veil the quotations from Bach, Berlioz, Debussy, Dukas, Dvorak, Mahler, Strauss and Stravinsky which illustrate the woodwind and brass designs in Cooking with Csound.
Nineteen
Oct 9, 2024
Ayers, Lydia, 2024, "Nineteen", https://doi.org/10.14711/dataset/Y28OCC, DataSpace@HKUST, V1
Nineteen is an algorithmically-composed piece using a 19-tone-per-octave scale in just intonation, starting with 37/37 as 1/1. The scale continues to 37/36, 37/35, etc and up to 37/1, forming a utonality series (an inversion of an overtone series). The algorithm randomly chooses...
Mountain of the Fire Wind
Oct 9, 2024
Ayers, Lydia, 2024, "Mountain of the Fire Wind", https://doi.org/10.14711/dataset/QFSUM6, DataSpace@HKUST, V1
Mountain of the Fire Wind was inspired by Indian music, my life-long love affair with the flute (which is my instrument) and the wind whistling through the holes in a rusty metal sign at Mono Pass, Yosemite National Park, California after a long, chilly but breathtaking hike. On...
Merapi
Oct 9, 2024
Ayers, Lydia, 2024, "Merapi", https://doi.org/10.14711/dataset/NFPFCW, DataSpace@HKUST, V1
Microtonal; algorithmically-generated; the computer uses and inflects the slendro and pelog tunings of the live gamelan, if the tuning information is available.
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