Amid a blizzard of Christmas markets, holiday shoppers, and one of the coldest Novembers in years, composer Samantha Fernando is stepping out to bring a moment of calm to Manchester this winter. Her latest orchestral piece, Wintering, asks: what if we made peace with the darkest time of year?
Featuring The Marian Consort vocal ensemble and the Manchester Collective’s string quartet, the Wintering tour comes to Stoller Hall on 27 November for an evening of healing, restoration, and clarity.
Wintering is based on the novel of the same name by Katherine May. What stood out to you about this book?
Samantha: “Yes. I’ve always found winter really hard, so I just always struggle, particularly in January and February. I know lots of people feel that way. And then I discovered this book. I read it two winters ago and it just opened up another way of framing it, and this notion that you don’t always have to be busy and doing things. There’s a lot of value in rest and retreat, and it was kind of another way of thinking about winter.
“There’s also a lot of comparison with the natural world, so how animals hibernate and how there are lots of ways in which the natural world and the animal world work in sync with this season and don’t try to fight it, whereas sometimes us human beings, we do try to fight it. We think we need to be as productive in the winter as we are in the summer and the spring”.
Do you think that’s something you’ve taken to heart outside your music ?
Samantha: “Yeah, absolutely!
“I think there’s a lot of pressure in modern urban life where we’re bombarded in various ways through social media. How we compare ourselves to other people, and that we need to be busy, and doing, and productive. And it’s not always the healthiest way to be”.
As a composer, what was the process behind Wintering? Was it a lot of experimentation or was it quite intuitive?
Samantha: “Both, really. It’s a bit of both.
“The text of the piece I wrote myself, so it’s kind of my own response to the book. I spent a lot of time thinking about what text I wanted to use and how it would suit me.
The things in the book that I think have been most helpful to me in a musical sense are the way she evokes wintry landscapes – and I’ve tried to embody that in the music; this feeling of looking out onto a frozen landscape, but also the kind of internal landscape we have, of a busy mind that can’t rest. So there’s those two kinds of landscapes or soundscapes that then manifest in the music”.
What are you hoping people will get out of the performance?
Samantha: “I’m hoping, in some ways, parts of it will provide a moment of calm. The music is a lot of the time quite slow and still. So there’s that, but it’s also just a time to reflect on how we engage with winter.
“The text is part guided meditation, part inner monologue. So every now and again the soprano will pipe up: she’s got a spoken part in that movement, and it’s sort of her inner monologue, as if she’s trying to meditate. We hear this meditation text. She’s trying to meditate, but a kind of internal chatter in her mind takes over. So it’s kind of a bit of both. It’s sort of internal and external”.
What was it that got you into music in the first place?
Samantha: “I got into composition quite late. It didn’t really occur to me as a thing I could do.
“I learned the piano, the flute, and I sang as a child, so I did all of that, and I really enjoyed playing, but I was quite a nervous performer. It didn’t really suit me. I went on to study music at university, and it was then at university that I started doing some composing and realised that this was a great way for me to be creative. As a composer I could do my creative bit, be involved in the process of music making, but not have to deal with the performance nerves and all of the rest of it”.
Do you think it’s a lot harder now for people to get into the industry than it was when you were fresh out of university?
Samantha: “Oh yeah, I think it’s definitely getting harder. Because of the financial landscape, and coming out of Brexit and also Covid, there’s been a lot of funding cuts that have affected the arts negatively. And so, when there’s less money around, people are less willing to take risks, so in terms of their programme, they have to be more careful, understandably so, and it’s hard.
“You know, they [producers] want things that they know are surefire hit, so that experimentalism can get curtailed, which is such a shame because obviously there’s so much richness and variety that comes with new work.
“I am hopeful that these things go in peaks and troughs, and hopefully things will improve again and we will see a resurgence of support and funding for artistic endeavours”.
What do you think it will take to get to that point, if anything?
Samantha: “It’s to do with things that are much bigger. It’s to do with having access to the arts for young people, which is vital, and making sure that within the education system we still prioritise that.
“Our country, the arts… you know, if the powers that be actually looked and saw how much revenue it actually brings in, they might be more willing to think about how to nurture and support young and emerging artists”.
Do you think that there are enough opportunities for young people, or people from different backgrounds, to get into music?
Samantha: “I mean, there can always be more. The main thing, I think, where we do need to look at putting in resources, is access to music lessons for young people, to make sure that every child has access to music. That seems like a huge thing to say, but it’s just seems so vital to me. I just feel that it’s such a gift to be able to give a child, and you can see the things that can be achieved if a child has access to music”.
Is there any motivation that inspires you to keep pushing forward?
Samantha: “I don’t know. I think if you’re someone that likes to make things, that is the motivation. That’s what you want to do, is to make. So, it’s usually about the work itself: you have an idea, and you want to create something. That’s generally my focus with each project, it’s like, what am I trying to achieve, what sounds?
“For me, it’s kind of a sound object, but for another artist it might be a physical object – a painting or a book… But yes, I think if you’re creatively minded, then it’s the making that’s the focus”.
Samantha Fernando’s Wintering commissioned by Wigmore Hall is at Stoller Hall on 27 November and touring until 5 December 2025.