Don Banks
Don Banks (1923–1980) was an Australian composer of concert, jazz and commercial music. Serial craft, electronics and a lifelong pull toward jazz shaped chamber works, concertos and scores central to mid-century Australian modernism.
He treated composition as a craft, absorbing serial technique while keeping an ear for jazz colour and electronic timbre. Works that still circulate include the 1962 Horn Trio (TP114), the one-movement violin sonata on Jewel (ACD 110), and pieces such as Commentary (TP040) and Prologue, Night Piece and Blues for Two (TP004).
Sequence for solo cello (MD 3381) and the Three Studies for cello and piano (TP222) show the same taut lyricism. He helped develop the VCS1 synthesiser, later led composition and electronic music teaching in Canberra and Sydney, and argued for composers’ rights and an Australian music open to the world rather than self-consciously national.
Don Banks is featured on the following titles
Blue Silence: Australian Music for Cello and Piano
This is the first disc of its kind released in Australia: an overview of important works for cello and piano spanning 108 years. The earliest is Grainger’s Scandinavian Suite, a tour de force that deserves a place in the concert hall.
Horn Trios
A dazzling trio in horn trios by Banks, Berkeley and Brahms. Anyone who caught their Australian performances in 1998 will know how wonderfully these musicians work together.
Compositions by Don Banks also appear on
Australian Cello
Sydney-based Danish cellist Georg Pedersen’s first solo disc centres on three major Australian works for solo cello by Banks, Kos and Whitehead. The Kos and Whitehead pieces were written especially for him.
Cello Dreaming
Pereira has inspired more new works for his instrument than any other Australian musician. This is his first solo CD of works mostly written for him, and the first of three such discs then planned. His performances are powerful and persuasive.
Stroke
A striking programme of contemporary Australian piano music, superbly played by New York–based Australian pianist Lisa Moore. Smetanin's formidable title work, among the most demanding in the repertoire, was captured here in a single take.
Songs of Sea and Sky
Nigel Westlake and David Bollard present Australian music for clarinet and piano by Peter Sculthorpe, Ross Edwards, Mark Isaacs, Miriam Hyde, Margaret Sutherland and Don Banks.