Photo: Bill Frakes

My name is James Humberstone, and I’m a composer, a technologist, and a passionate educator. This project is hosted on my full website, www.composerhome.com, but works as a standalone record of a two year research project that I’ve undertaken as part of my work at the Sydney Conservatorium of Music, which is part of the University of Sydney.

The main page of this website is a reverse-timeline, with the most recent information on the left, and historical information further and further to the right. You can scroll “back in time” by dragging the main page, or use the handy scroll bar at the bottom. Click on each post to read about my research into the project, to listen to samples of the music I’m composing for the project, and find out where those musical ideas are originating.

Architect’s illustration of the new Warships Pavilion at ANMM – copyright ANMM

Oh, you’re wondering what this project is? Well, the Australian National Maritime Museum on Sydney’s spectacular Darling Harbour are building a brand new “warships pavilion” to go between the two real live vessels that are part of the permanent exhibition. My job is to compose the sound for the installation – but not typical museum sound: the directors of the project want innovation, confrontation, and something that will stand alone as a work of art. This is just the kind of project I love, and having such a long lead time means that I’ve been able to spend a lot of time planning and researching to create something truly new.

Please feel free to leave comments on individual posts. This website sometimes lags a little time behind the present, because often my sketches are incomplete or in pencil (or I’m too busy doing other things that pay the mortgage), but there is already an awful lot of interesting stuff here. Or at least, stuff that I hope you find interesting.