Music for Strings
String works by Katy Abbott: solo cello and cello with piano, viola and double bass, string quartets and piano trios, and works pairing strings with voice. Teaching pieces and professional repertoire. Scores and parts are linked with each piece.
Solo and String Duo
Dive Bomb
(2026)
Solo Cello
Duration: 6 minutes
Advanced work for solo cello, composed for Zoe Knighton.
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Indoor Yachting
(2026)
Cello + Piano
Duration: 3:20 minutes
A new cello and piano work from Katy Abbott’s song-cycle The Domestic Sublime.
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At The Clothesline
(2026)
Cello + Piano
Duration: 5:30 minutes
A new cello and piano work from Katy Abbott’s song-cycle The Domestic Sublime.
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Coat Hangers Galore
(2026)
Cello + Piano
Duration: 5:30 minutes
A new cello and piano work from Katy Abbott’s song-cycle The Domestic Sublime.
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Seranade
(2022)
Viola and Double Bass
Duration: 3 minutes
Composed and arranged for Claire Edwardes (pc) and Julian Smiles (cello).
It also appears as a recording on Kammerbox (ABC Classics)
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Interview with Katy Abbott on Re-Echo being chosen as one of three Australian pieces to be presented to the 2016 International Rostrum of Composers in Wroclaw, Poland.
Performance of Re-Echo by Claire Edwardes (vibraphone) and Blair Harris (cello)
Autumn Song
(1996/rev.2001)
Viola + Piano
Duration: 4 minutes
Autumn Song
(1996/rev.2001)
Cello + Piano
Duration: 4 minutes
Autumn Song
(1996/rev.2001)
Double Bass + Piano
Duration: 4 minutes
String Ensembles
Autumn Song
(1996/2025)
Piano Trio
Duration: 5 minutes
This version of Autumn Song is for Piano Trio and arranged for Sutherland Trio.
Autumn Song is also available for other instrumentation.
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Splitting The Ambivalence
(2022)
Mezzo-Soprano + String Quartet
Duration: 22 minutes
Text: The words of Margaret Sutherland, compiled by Katy Abbott.
Splitting the Ambivalence in psychology terms is about polarising positions between two separate entities (such as a couple, two countries for example) so that any question between them becomes an either/or scenario. This or That. There is no middle ground.
When reading the words of Margaret Sutherland and noticing how she is often referred as feisty, strong-willed, a get-things-done kind of woman – I wondered about her other side – the side that isn’t so visible to the public and the public perception of Margaret versus what might be the ‘real’ Margaret.
Her writing, her letters, her music and the stories that accompany her life, paint an image of a woman unafraid to rattle the establishment, described often as “incensed” and “indignant” we are left with a sense of a woman who (somewhat admirably) took on the world and all of its irritations with great insouciance. Entitled, opinionated and sedulous in putting angry pen to paper, criticising where – in her less than humble opinion – critique was long overdue!
But of more interest to me was the split – the underlying gentleness, the wistfulness, the delicacy, romanticism almost that also appears in her work and reflections. The image staring back in the mirror, the white against the black; ambivalence.
It was tempting to only choose text which would portray her wonderful stubbornness and her forthright ideas, or stories that would delve into relationship dramas with colleagues and the ABC!
Certainly, she cannot be genuinely captured without that insight but the gentle reminiscing and the soft-focus descriptions, in particular in her life as a child, offers completeness. I wonder at the moments when Margaret Sutherland superbly ‘belonged to herself’ and how that made the woman and the composer.
© Katy Abbott / Maureen Johnson. 2022
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Earth Lullaby
(2017)
Shakuhachi + String Quartet
Duration: 10 minutes
Commissioned by and composed for Enigma Quartet + Riley Lee.
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Culturally, we have lost the art of trusting our intuition as individuals or a group. This piece requires the musicians to trust their own instincts as well as each other’s sense of musicality. It requires trust ideally with one instrument not being more ‘present’ than another.
The musical and human elements must interlock in order to function fully.
Our environment – the Earth, is a most wonderful role model.
It Is Just The Heart
(2006)
Song Cycle for Soprano + String Quartet
Duration: 25 minutes
Text: Various + Katy Abbott.
It Is Just The Heart is a song-cycle in four Movements where each movement is inspired by the composer’s experience at four different Melbourne Institutions:
I: The Immigration Museum (‘Hinta Palinta’)
II: The Melbourne Museum (‘Dinosaur’)
III: The Cunningham Dax Collection (‘It Is Just The Heart’)
IV: The Melbourne Planetarium (‘Night Thoughts’)
“I wanted to capture the ‘human’ element of each collection. Buildings and museums hold ‘things’; evidence of human interaction, innovation and feeling. I like to think of these places as a depiction / portrayal of our humanity. I have chosen the title to represent an emotional and human aspect of each institution.”
Katy Abbott.
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Making Angels
(2001)
Piano Trio
Duration: 7 minutes
This work has a companion piece: Music for Demons (2010).
The original version of Making Angels is for Flute, Clarinet in Bb and Piano.
Appears on Sunburnt Aftertones: The Chamber Music of Katy Abbott.
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Please contact me for Score and Parts.
Music for Demons
(2010)
Piano Trio
Duration: 8 minutes
Piano Trio arrangement by Tim Dargaville.
This work is a companion piece for Making Angels (2001).
This piece is based on a painting by Matthew Quick from his Pure Series titled Pure Obsession where digital looking space-invaders descend from the clouds.
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From the program of the premiere of Music for Demons.
Alcoholism, Chocoholism, Overeating, Bulimia, Sex Addiction, Drug Addiction, Kleptomania, Excessive Excercies, Caffine Cravings, Cigarettes, Gambling, Shoe Shopping, High-adrenalin sports, Self-help Books, Video Games – we human beings struggle each day with a colourful and voluminous number of addictions, some rather innocent, others highly dangerous – inner demons we must all do battle with.
Katy Abbott’s Music for Demons, written for Syzygy Ensemble as a companion piece to Making Angels, comments upon the ability of human nature to become easily obsessed, with a particular focus on the mesmerising pull of computer games. Playing video games can be a very hypnotic activity and without any obvious break in the pathways of the game, the player can feel persuaded to continue, often well into the night, torn between stopping and continuing play. Consciously choosing to stop playing becomes difficult.
Abbott has created musical pathways in Music for Demons to reflect this theme, particularly in the quirky dance-like section towards the end, which draws the listener in by the seemingly repetitive patterns, with no real way of knowing when the end is in sight.
Coady Green, 2010
Vertical Horizon
(2000)
String Quartet
Duration: 9:45 minutes
Segments of Vertical Horizon were used in a 2020 reimagining for the Flinders Quartet 20th Birthday Commission Hidden Thoughts II: Return To Sender.
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String Orchestra
Glacial Thunder
(2024)
String Orchestra
Duration: 8:00 minutes
Glacial Thunder was composed for and commissioned by Melbourne Chamber Orchestra for the opening of their 2024 Season, Music Speaks.
Glacial Thunder aims to pick up on the nuances of resonance in regards to communication; through playful gestures and ensemble “stillness”. Without any direct or specific narrative, the work “plays” with ideas and illuminates the interaction and communication between the musicians and also the composer-orchestra-audience dynamic.
Dedicated to Heather Rowell on the occasion of her 80th birthday.
“Striking, gestural, and crunchy at times… tightly packed melodies and interlocking rhythms ricocheted around the ensemble, morphing into catchy thematic fragments… demonstrating Abbott’s skill in being able to challenge both performer and listener without straying into esotericism.
It was an electric – and thoughtful – choice to kick off MCO’s first concert of the season.”
Lily Begg, Limelight Magazine, March 1, 2024.
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Please ask for an archival recording
Hidden Thoughts: Return to Sender
(2020/arr.2024)
Mezzo-sop + Narrator + String Orchestra
Duration: 60 minutes
Text: Katy Abbott with Maureen Johnson.
From the unopened, returned letters of encouragement from Australians to asylum seekers on Nauru Island.
Composed with support of a Australia Council for the Arts Fellowship (Music).
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Also available for String Quartet.
