The piano reduction of Steve’s Paganini Concerto for guitar and orchestra has just been published. It was commissioned by Artyom Dervoed, Mikhail Pletnev, and the Russian National Orchestra. It’s based on Paganini’s Grand Sonata M.S.3. The edition includes new extended cadenzas for the first and second movements. The piano reduction is designed for concert performance as well as rehearsal and can be played on 19th Century guitar and fortepiano (as well as on modern guitar and piano).

Petar Čulić gave the premiere of Perpetual Motion Machine, for solo guitar, on 22nd August at the Omiš Guitar Festival in Croatia. The music can last anything from a few seconds to several hours, depending on the routes that the performer takes through the musical material. The performer can begin and end anywhere during the piece. Rather than presenting the music in a linear or cyclical way – a single path, it is presented as a network, in which every point can be connected to any other point.

The Patterson Sutton Duo released a CD of Steve’s collected cello and guitar music on the Ravello Records label on 26th June 2020. Still Life, the piece that gives the CD its title, is a celebration of the life and work of abstract expressionist Clyfford Still. Its seven movements explore Still’s passion for jazz, Beethoven, and William Blake. The score and parts for Still Life were published by Doberman to coincide with the album release. Other works on the CD include Motherlands, The Autumn Song, Welsh Folksongs, and Park of Idols. There is an album website with more details here.

Matthew Wadsworth commissioned Steve’s Theorbo Concerto through the Hong Kong Academy of Performing Arts, the North York Moors Festival, and Arts Council England. Performances have taken place in Hong Kong, the UK, the Netherlands, and a tour with the Scottish Chamber Orchestra. The SCO recorded the concerto and the recording was released on the Deux-Elles label in 2019. The recording has received excellent reviews in Gramophone and BBC Music magazines. The full score, solo theorbo part, and version for theorbo and string quartet are all now available form the Doberman website.

Commissioned through Andrew Zohn and Jamie Nix at CSU, Georgia, this concerto for guitar and wind orchestra was funded by a consortium of American wind ensembles. After an initial run of 13 performances in the US, the score and parts for the piece have now been published by Doberman-Yppan. The piano reduction is now also available.

Steve was commissioned by the Chiltern Arts Festival to write the first ever piece for marimba and theorbo. The premiere was given by Evelyn Glennie and Matthew Wadsworth on 5th March 2020 as part of the festival. Details here

The BBC National Orchestra of Wales performed The Shard on 4th March 2020 at the Wales Millennium Centre in Cardiff.

Verismo was commissioned by Aniello Desiderio, who was due to give the first performance at the Tchaikovsky Hall in Moscow on 21st March 2020 as part of the Guitar Virtuosi Festival. Unfortunately, the festival has been cancelled due to the Covid-19 crisis. Verismo is a fantasy for guitar based on themes from 19th and 20th Century Italian operas by composers such as Puccini, Verdi, Rossini, and Mascagni. A new date for the premiere will be announced in due course. Aniello will record the piece later in the year.

Cinema Paradiso was commissioned by Guitar CoOp for Zoran Dukić, who gave the first performance at the Koblenz International Guitar Festival on 3rd June 2017. Zoran will record the piece this year for the Guitar CoOp label. The piece is based on films by Quentin Tarantino, Wim Wenders, Lars von Trier, Francois Truffaut, and Charlie Chaplin. Cinema Paradiso has been the subject of a DMA thesis on music and nihilism.

Ian Bostridge and Xuefei Yang recently performed The Book of Songs in Tucson and Wheaton in. BBC Music Magazine gave Ian and Xuefei’s recording of the song cycle 5 stars for both performance and recording.

The Barrios Guitar Quartet gave the premiere of Tarot for four guitars and percussion in Friedberg, Germany in September 2019. They are recording the work in February 2020 for release later in the yar. The work has 7 movements, each based on a tarot card. The order of the movements and the number of movements played is determined by the dealing or choosing of cards.

Threnody was commissioned as the set piece for the 52nd Pittaluga International Guitar Competition. The competition took place from 23rd to 28th September 2019 in Alessandria, Italy, where all the contestants performed the piece in the semi-final round. The official premiere was given by Marco Tamayo on 22nd September at the Conservatorio Antonio Vivaldi, Alessandria and the prize for the best competitor performance was awarded to Jesse Flowers.

The Koblenz Concerto for two guitars and orchestra received its premiere on 7th June 2019 at the Koblenz International Guitar Festival. SoloDuo (Lorenzo Micheli and Matteo Mela) were the soloists with the Staatorchester Rheinische Philharmonie at the Koblenz International Guitar Festival.

The Mēla Guitar Quartet gave the premiere of Steve’s Venezuela for four guitars at the Purcell Room, South Bank Centre, London on 5th May at 7.00pm. On 10th May, Trifarious gave the first performance of Steve’s Crunch Time for viola, clarinets, and piano, at the Guildford international Music Festival.

The Flower of Cities was commissioned by John Williams for the 50th Anniversary of the City of London Festival. The recording features John Williams and Craig Ogden – guitars, Max Baillee – violin, Laurence Ungless – double bass, and Timothy Evans – percussion. Thomas Carroll was conducting and the recording was engineered and produced by Stewart French.