Howard Skempton has worked as a composer, accordionist and music publisher. He studied with Cornelius Cardew, who helped him to discover a musical language of great simplicity. Since then Howard has continued to write undeflected by compositional trends, producing a corpus of more than three hundred works, many being miniatures for solo piano or accordion. His work has grown consistently from its roots in the experimental tradition and is characterised by an extreme economy of means and a concentration on essentials. Working always with chosen limits, discovering internal detail within a defined structure, he is primarily concerned with the sound-material itself, rather than with expansion and development.
