General comments:

"Ingenious and industrious, full of ideas and craft... You have abundant talent and energy to focus it which only a halfwit would miss... Keep up the (very) good work. "
- Howard Goodall

"Music that is meant to entertain - surely one of music’s primary fuunctions.  It never outstays its welcome; and its unpredictability makes for intriguing listening.  It is clearly as enjoyable for players and listeners alike."
 - David Inman

"Gorgeous music"
 - Audience member
 
 

Audience feedback:

String Quartet No3
"Thank you so much.. I enjoy it tremendously.. I'll come back for more! Greetings from Vienna, Austria - Kerstin"

Three Women's Poems from World War One
"Very moving... beautifully written..."

"Made a special impression... keeps going round in my head.."

Mass
"A brilliant Mass.. exciting and exhilerating.. I was just swept along.."

" Do carry on composing. We need more of these joyful musical experiences to enhance our lives..."
 

Cube Root
"How much I enjoyed the piece - as everyone else seems to have done!"

"This is wonderful modern music! - Stephan Egeling, Trio Lezard, Saarbrücken"
 

Three Brunel Crossings
"What a wonderful piece of music you have composed..."
 

(Counter)Point
"Definitely the wittiest contribution to the weekend..."

Reviews
2003

Concert at Tudeley, 1st February 2003
From the review by Adrian Pitts (Sevenoaks Chronicle)

Prelude Fugue & Riffs
"...disarmingly eclectic, drawing on jazzy rhythms, complex imitative ideas, and a chord vocabulary not too distant from the Beatles’ Sgt Pepper album...."
Lace
"...Dunkin Wedd’s more serious abstract mood, exploring the relationship of space and pattern in lace-design through musical ideas...."
Gallimaufry
"...illustrating Dunkin Wedd’s fascination with the techniques and ancestry of the guitar. The opening movement (Fluent Guitar) sought out the colours of the instrument - Dunkin Wedd’s familiar ostinato technique producing some surprising and technically complex phrase endings. The Blues Boogie was jazz inspired, while the moving Elegy was performed with great lyricism and clarity of texture..."
Duologue
"...Dunkin Wedd produced some wonderful sonorities...  erotic arching melodies matched by some sensual chords..."
String Quartet No 3
"Taking its lead from Browning’s ‘first fine careless rapture’ the opening movement danced, yet the ensemble was never compromised or ragged. The swift-changing sequences that are a feature of Dunkin Wedd’s music were well suited in the chorale-like second movement.....a sweet-toned muted cantilena melody.... music comes from the heart of the 19th century English tradition of Elgar and Vaughan Williams, with a passing nod to Richard Strauss, Dunkin Wedd’s melting chords firmly in reflective mood.
The Scherzo, wittily titled Canonballs showed Dunkin Wedd’s more humorous nature. Based loosely on the famous Canon by Pachelbel, Dunkin Wedd weaves a good number of well known tunes as a counterpoint: The Archers theme, Barbara Allen, London Bridge is Falling Down - to name a few. It ends with the solo ‘cello not bothering to complete the famous sequence of notes.
The last movement (Final Fling) is unusual as it is a pizzicato (plucked) one. This is vigorous, muscular music with plenty of exciting ostinatos that ends with a pizzicato version of the theme from the first movement."

Adrian Pitts, 3 February 2003
 

Audience feedback:

"A fantastic feast of many courses... particularly enjoyed the guitar piece and the string quartet...  The flute and harp piece had a particular freshness about it... colour and humour transferred onto the stave..."

"Particularly enjoyed the guitar piece..."

"Especially enjoyed the harp and flute piece... loved the jazz and humorous elements..."

"We really enjoyed the variety and humour..."

"The music I loved!"

"Such an interesting evening - it was fun!"

"Gorgeous music..."
 

Concert at Tonbridge, 1st February 2003
From the review by Charles Vignoles (Kent & Sussex Courier)

String Quartet No 2
"...highlight of the evening... the composer comments ‘There’s Shostakovitch amongst the Gilbert and Sullivan’ and indeed this was the case. Fiercely energetic outer movements in jazzy complex time-signatures contrasted with a lyrical slow movement and the nautically flavoured Salty Dances...  wit and sparkle as well as darker moments..."

Remember
"...haunting setting of Christina Rossetti’s Remember..."

Phyllida’s Fancy
"This exceedingly enjoyable piece fulfilled its brief admirably, being highly accessible to players and audience alike with its mood of celebration and romance laced with a few Dunkin Wedd stylistic hallmarks - look out for those deceptive false endings!"

Charles Vignoles, 10 March 2002
 

2001

Concert at Tonbridge, 4th February 2001
From the review by David Inman (Kent & Sussex Courier)

Piano Trio
"... magical passage in the slow movement where the arpeggiated chords of the piano’s opening are taken over by the strings against a long-breathed cantilena on the piano."

Django
"... a substantial and technically demanding work, the first movement playing games with a 5/4 time signature without making it sound like 3 plus 2; quite a trick, Mr Dunkin Wedd."

Lace
"A fascinating and demanding exercise in musical form."

Mass
"... imaginatively serious - and consonant, not dissonant - music that is meant to entertain - surely one of music’s primary functions.  It never outstays its welcome; and its unpredictability makes for intriguing listening.  It is clearly as enjoyable for players and listeners alike."

".. listeners... musical cognoscenti all, were by turns absorbed, beguiled, amused, enthralled and above all entertained..."

David Inman, 6 February 2001
 
 

Head Heart & Feet

"Infectious Head Heart & Feet... nostalgic and evocative... an affirmation of humanity... fanfare of impressive stature..."
From the review by Adrian Pitts (Kent & Sussex Courier)

"Clearly hugely enjoyed by all present... thought-provoking and with not the slightest hint of triviality... Head Heart & Feet did just what its composer intended - it appealed to all three."
Tudeley Parish Magazine

"It was an unforgettable privilege for the Society, in the Millennium year, to be able to perform your work for the first time to a live audience who clearly enjoyed it"
David Packer, Chairman, Tonbridge Philharmonic Society

Audience feedback:

"Certainly warmed the cockles of peoples' hearts.. such an achievement... look forward to the next inspirational event"

"Just a quick line to say how much I enjoyed, and how privileged I felt to be hearing your super composition... loved it all but especially the lyrical passages with such a feeling of Englishness. When is your next opus?"

"I really enjoyed your composition - it was great fun... I'm so glad I came.."

"Thoroughly enjoyed our evening... your skills are most impressive.."

"A wonderful evening... many many congratulations... a joyous exhilerating piece of music..."

"Music was wonderful... such a variety.. delightful dreamy woodwind section..."

"Vibrant, dreamy... enchanting! ... it was quite something."

"Outstanding! Stupendous! Exhilerating! Surprising!
Fascinating! Weird! Original! Deep! Daring! Exhausting!
Kaleidoscopic! Infectious! Hopeful! Shocking! Scary!
Meaningful! Puzzling! Unique! Friendly!
Invigorating! Pretty Damn Good!"

Concert at Tudeley, July 1997
From the review by David Inman (Kent & Sussex Courier)

"There followed what for many must have been the high point of the evening, Cube Root... highly entertaining, nay downright amusing, this was a piece of mature, well-crafted and polished writing betraying a detailed knowledge of the instruments' capabilities. Amusing yet not lightweight, jazzy and syncopated, yet far from trivial.... it would be a pleasure to hear it again. I would be difficult to say who enjoyed themselves more, players or audience... an encore would not have gone amiss!"

David Inman, 4 July 1997

Audience feedback:

Cube Root
"How much I enjoyed the piece - as everyone else seems to have done!"

1989

Trombone Quintet
"This determinedly neoclassical style has not the merit of originality. The unusual combination of instruments is not explored in any way for its sonorous possibilities. It is difficult to judge this work other than as an exercise in pastiche."

"One must admire the trouble taken over the presentation of the score. However, the piece is not worthy of an SPNM performance."

"This is not an effective piece. It is unfocused and lacks real meaning."

- Reading Panel, Society for the Promotion of New Music.