THOUGH HE'S NOW BEST KNOWN as a composer, when he was younger David Horne was much better known as a pianist, particularly after he won the piano section of the BBC Young Musician of the Year Competition.
Yet even as he was practising hard for his successes at the piano he was viewing music through the ears of a composer. He was exploring and responding to the different sonorities he came across in his playing, and looking at composers with an eye to finding ways of expressing what he had to say as a composer.
It's possible, looking back, to see his musical style being shaped by the piano music he played. It’s also important to note how significant it's been for him to be a performing musician as well as a composer. He knows what it’s like to perform new music, and so he always tries to write well for instruments and get the best out of them. This doesn’t mean he makes his music easy, just possible!
David gives a vivid picture of what it was like preparing to be a concert pianist at the same time as emerging as a composer.
He also describes how important his general schooling in Edinburgh was and how he derived much inspiration from his teachers’ enthusiasms for literature and mathematics.
