Through my research and practise in the Professional Music Brief 1 module, I have creatively responded to industry briefs and made use of my skills in researching, music composition and music production. My participation as part of the larger groups which responded to the three briefs set has resulted in the development of a portfolio of work.

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Brief 1 - UNFCCC Glasgow Climate Change Conference 2021 (COP26) - It's Not Over Yet

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For Brief 1, I was part of a group with three other MA Music students, tasked with producing an immersive creative work responding to the COP26 Climate Change Conference held in Glasgow between October and November 2021. I found the brief interesting as although I was aware of COP26, I had not been actively following it and therefore much of the research I conducted on it was information that was new to me and to others in my group.

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In response to this brief, my group created an immersive video installation, consisting of four projector screens which would alternate between different parts of the video we had created. My contribution to the brief was through research I conducted into COP26 and music composition for the video. I chose to research COP26 so that I could learn more about climate change and what COP26 aims to do as. I also used the research to convey key information which underpinned my groups response to the brief.

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Early on in our group meetings, we discussed the idea of basing the audiovisual content of our response around the national identity of Scotland. We seeked to convey the dichotomy of the beautiful landscape of Scotland with the cold, industrial and post-industrial areas which contribute to Greenhouse Gas emissions.

Although we showed both sides, we made the conscious decision that we did not want a gloomy take on climate change, so in my music composition, I focused on creating more positive and uplifting pieces to reinforce the core idea behind COP26: That there is still hope and time for us to make positive change. In keeping with the Scottish theme, all of my compositions for the brief are inspired by Traditional Scottish & Gaelic music.

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Brief 2 - Restorative Justice - Telescopic Murmur

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For Brief 2, I was again part of a group with three other MA Music students, tasked with creatively responding to Restorative Justice. Our work was inspired by Charity Vox Liminis' 'Distant Voices' project. I found the brief interesting as Restorative Justice is an alternative interpretation of the justice system, based around meetings between victims and offenders.

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In response to this brief, my group created a double A/A release consisting of two rap songs. The first was composed, produced and mixed by myself and the other was composed, produced and mixed by my colleague Arron Taylor. Both tracks featured vocals written by another colleague in the group, Amar Chhina with recording engineering duties being fulfilled by Jamie MacPherson. Initially, we found the idea of Restorative Justice a difficult topic to creatively respond to without either agreeing or disagreeing with the concepts. We chose to base our lyrics and compositions around the theme of the justice system being cold and generally disregarding the best interests of both victims and offenders. I also contributed research into Restorative Justice and the Distant Voices project to underpin our creative work with factual information on Restorative Justice and what it aims to achieve.

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Brief 3 - Charity Event - UWS Christmas Bash

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For Brief 3, I was part of a group of 8 students tasked with creatively responding to the brief of planning and holding an event for a charity of our choice. We chose Drake Music Scotland to be our charity as their mission statement of aiming to "transform people’s lives through the power of music" resonated with us as Music students ourselves.

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Our response to the brief took the form of a charity concert which was to be held in the UWS Student Union. As part of a smaller sub group with 2 other students, I was a live sound engineer. This involved assisting in planning how best to utilise the space, liasing with artists and handling the technical aspects of stage mangement and live sound mixing. The event was unfortunately cancelled due to the potential risk of the COVID-19 Omicron variant.