I adore Sai Natarajan’s titles: We Long For an Adventure. We Yearn to Tell Stories. I love the way they sparkle with wonder and communion and possibility.
It’s no surprise to learn that composer Natarajan, 23, grew up reading fantasy – Harry Potter, Percy Jackson – books that transport and crackle with magic.
The NZSO plays We Long for an Adventure on its four-city Jubilation tour, in a programme that includes a work by fellow Todd Corporation Young Composer Award finalist Henry Meng and music from Richard Strauss and Shostakovich.
Natarajan says We Long For an Adventure and We Yearn to Tell Stories are complementary. “We Yearn to Tell Stories is about the act of creating, the joy you get from that, and We Long for an Adventure is the joy you get from being the listener.”
The joy, alas, is brief, just four minutes, the result of the time limit imposed by the Todd awards. “I think it says everything it needs to say,” Natarajan reckons. “It’s not a piece that takes itself too seriously, it’s not a big symphonic score. I’d like to write a piece like that one day, but I’ve been working a lot on short-form pieces.”
As a freelance composer, Natarajan, from Palmerston North, has provided soundtracks for YouTubers, podcasts, commercials and video games, and he’s released Neon Dream, an EP of ambient electronica. The purpose and principles of that music are different from writing concert pieces for an orchestra. Natarajan appreciates how his media work imposes boundaries.
“Writing concert music is over-whelming because you have so many options. When you write for a film or video game, there is a set brief, a story, a kind of sound you’re after. With concert music, you don’t get that.”
Natarajan accepts there’s some sniffiness about writing for media, but he’s a graduate of the New Zealand School of Music and all of his work is composed with skill and craft. A couple of minutes into We Yearn to Tell Stories, for example, there’s a lovely harmonic shift that’s subtle but significant. It only lasts a second or two but it’s enough to give you a glow without taking you out of the music, and Natarajan says that harmony is increasingly important to him.
“This is the sort of music I enjoy writing,” he says.
“I want people to enjoy my music and I want the players to enjoy my music; I feel the prerequisite for that is that I have to enjoy it myself, otherwise there’s no hope for anyone else, y’know?”
NZSO: Jubilation plays in Wellington, Blenheim, Dunedin and Invercargill, May 30-June 13.
