After completing a PhD at the University of Sydney where she studied with Peter Sculthorpe, Anne Boyd and Ross Edwards, and followed by a fellowship at Harvard University, Australian composer Jane Stanley (b. 1976) was appointed Senior Lecturer in Music at the University of Glasgow. 

Cerulean Orbits is the first album devoted solely to Stanley’s compositions and features five chamber works composed between 2013 and 2023. It’s named for a 2016 work for violin and piano in which these two instruments dance around one another as absolute equals, “at once blending with and antagonising each other,” as Stanley puts it. 

Helix Reflection (2013), for flute and B-flat clarinet, works in quite a different manner. It employs harmonic stasis, microtonal inflections, glissandi and variations in vibrato to produce a shimmering, hypnotic sound world. 

The Indifferent is a five-movement song cycle setting of the titular poem by Judith Bishop (b. 1972), scored for the very effective combination of soprano voice, clarinet, harp and double bass. The poem’s complex sea imagery, long understood as a metaphor for emotional turbulence, is reflected in Stanley’s...