MEET THE COMPOSERS

Melo Dy E Tv S 2019 Cybec Composer Participant

Melody Eötvös was born in the Southern Highlands, NSW and studied piano and music theory under her parents’ tutelage from the age of five. Her first experimentations in composition coincided with learning the cello at age eight.

Melody completed her Bachelor of Music in composition with honors at the Queensland Conservatorium of Music, Griffith University. She holds a Doctor of Music from Indiana University Jacobs School of Music USA, and a Master of Music from the Royal Academy of Music, London UK. Melody is a Lecturer in Composition and Aural Studies at the Melbourne Conservatorium of Music.

Melody was awarded the 3MBS National Composers Award, the Seattle Metropolitan Chamber Orchestra International Composition Competition (2016), and the orchestral prize for the Red Note Music Festival (2017, USA). She has participated in numerous international festivals and workshops and was recently Composer in Residence with the Cabrillo Festival of Contemporary Music in Santa Cruz. Past teachers include Simon Bainbridge, David Dzubay, Claude Baker, Stephen Leek and Dr. Gerardo Dirié.

Commissions in 2022 included The Sydney Symphony Orchestra (50 Fanfares Project and a joint commission with the Grand Teton Music Festival), The Tasmanian Symphony Orchestra, the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra, and a major new work for the Flinders Quartet and Ashlyn Tymms (commissioned by John and Irene Garran).

How to Grow Your Own Glacier

Genghis Khan was a conqueror. During his lifetime and after (via his many grandsons) he founded the largest contiguous empire in history. There are stories, however, of certain regions that escaped Khan’s conquest. It is said that the people of these sanctuaries were able to create impassable walls of ice that prevented the armies from accessing their lands. In short, they were able to grow glaciers.

Glaciers are known to be ancient, wild, and slowly transforming geological forces. In present times, across the world the native glaciers that we know of are not doing so well. In light of their peril it is interesting to learn that in response to the advanced warming of our climate, humans have been able to still use the very factual practice of growing glaciers in order to preserve water in environments that wouldn’t normally be

Able To Sustain

vegetation.

In the regions where glacier-growing has been practiced for centuries, it is believed that the glaciers are not only alive, but that they also have different genders. In these places, to ‘breed’ a new glacier you need to graft together (or ‘marry’) a male and female glacial fragment. They are then bound together with variety of local substances such as charcoal and husk, after which point, under accumulating snow, ice, and water, they slowly grow into fully active glaciers.

This piece explores a scenario of controlling and containing something seemingly wild.