My Music

'The tree looks like a place where fairies gather and whisper together.'
Remember to 'look' for the whispers...
Music and pictures by Book Stuart.



The music was one of my one take doddles sitting at the piano. Hadn’t really any idea what to do with it until I got Ólafur Arnalds Composer Tool Kit and tried out the Felt Piano. The name came later after finding old pictures, 9.5mm and 8mm films from my childhood. I decided to make a film from the material to fit to the music. Somehow the last film sequence follows in some way my hand movements at the piano although the music came about 58 years after I was filmed.
Music and film by Book Stuart.


Sometime ago I was playing around on the piano and created a one take doodle that sounded like it could be used with a music box. The piano was the Noire from Nils Frahm to which I added in the background some quiet bursts of synthetic strings from Heavyocity. I then remembered that I had taken with a Sony HDR-CX450 some closeup film sequences from a music box that we have. I used the material to create the film in Power Director using the music track as a guide.
Music and film by Book Stuart.


After listening to one of my one take piano doodles I decided to just play along on top with a cello. I called it ‘In Passing’ because I got the feeling the two voices are sometimes conversing with each other and then just passing each other occupied with themselves.
I used Nils Frahm’s Noire Piano, Emotional Cello from Harmonic Subtones and as background Ólafur Arnalds Chamber Evolutions.
The pictures were taken in The Arboretum in Bad Langensalza.
Music and film by Book Stuart.


Nocturne No.1
Again this is a one take at the piano having the midi on my Kawai piano recording in the background. After transferring it to Cubase and cleaning it up a bit I printed in Dorico so I could play it again.
I decided to give it an official classical title instead of a cryptic one. The original piano sound was from Nils Frahm‘s Noire library. I split the left and right hands and let the particle engine create random notes on the melody with a high range glockenspiel like sound.
I wasn’t that happy with the results as the randomness was creating too much dissonance, but it was going in the right direction. I took the audio of the particle engine and converted it to midi and did a lot of editing. I selected the glockenspiel from Sonokinetic’s Idiophones library to play the result. In the end I changed the piano to Max Richter‘s piano.
As I wanted to upload it to YT I needed either something to look at. As a nocturne is a night piece I thought of using a snow covered landscape with moon and stars. As I didn’t have any pictures of such a scene I decided to attempt to create one using Leonardo.AI.
After some experimentation the following prompt “Serene winter landscape with a crystal-clear sky, half-illuminated by the soft glow of moonlight, although the moon itself remains hidden from view, a black sky with lots of stars, no stars are connected” created the picture that I used in the video.
Why I got a large prominent moon where it was suppose to be hidden I have no idea!
So as to make the picture a little more interesting I let the little stars play. Try and follow..
Music and visualiation by Book Stuart.


This project was started in the mid-90s using Notator and a Kurzweil K1000 as source. Last year I finally transferred and converted all my old music files from the Atari to Cubase. One of the pieces was a collection of underground sounds with a half-finished spooky melody. I decided to focus on just the background sounds. I found a library with a patch called Four Railways with eerie sounds of rolling stock and other related train sounds. This reminded me of the many times in the early 70s waiting, usually alone, late at night at South Ken. Station for the last train home and hearing distant undefinable sounds in the tunnels and wondering what was causing them. So based on this I created a more complex soundscape and uses it as a backdrop to a tale about having just missed a train. The title should be familiar to anybody that has travelled on the London Underground.
I used the libraries Haunted Spaces, Ashlight, Mysteria, Geosonics and Natural Forces. Visualisation uses AI graphic manipulation and Power Director for FX.
Music and film by Book Stuart.