New Music 20x12

Twenty commissions, each 12 minutes long, inspired by the dynamism of sport and the passion of human endeavour - marking a unique opportunity to create musical works contributing to 2012's Cultural Olympiad

DURATION: 7 MINS

Composed by Sheema Mukherjee and performed by The Imagined Village, Bending the Dark has been written from the point of view of a second generation immigrant tracing the path of the Indian diaspora across continents

DURATION: 13 MINS

Ping was a collaboration between composer Joe Cutler, the Coull String Quartet and Fusion table tennis club. It explores the distinct sounds and intricate cross-rhythms that table tennis players create accompanied by a string quartet

DURATION: 4 MINS

Mark-Anthony Turnage worked alongside inmates and staff at HMP Lowdham Grange, Nottinghamshire, to compose Beyond This. It presents music as a powerful vehicle for change

DURATION: 4 MINS

A 12 minutes long music piece based on the famous ringside battle between African American boxer Joe Louis and German boxer Max Schmeling in 1938

DURATION: 4 MINS

Fiddler and composer Aidan O’Rourke and An Tobar (The Tobermory Arts Centre) have created TAT-1, inspired by the first transatlantic telephone cable between Oban (Aidan’s home town) and Newfoundland

DURATION: 11 MINS

Inspired by Nijinsky’s ballet L’Apres-midi d’un Faune, Rambert Dance Company commissioned Gavin Higgins to write What Wild Ecstasy as a contemporary response to Debussy’s ground-breaking music

DURATION: 4 MINS

Luke Carver Goss was commissioned by the award-winning Black Dyke Band to write a piece using the structure of a relay race. It is divided into four 3 minute ‘legs’ – power, speed, loosing ground and, finally, triumph – telling the tale of success through team work and sporting pride, with poet Ian McMillan and the Manchester Chorale

DURATION: 5 MINS

Twenty-Seven Heavens is a composition which explores Blake’s Jerusalem. The work draws parallels between Blake's mythological worlds and various districts of London, including the borough of Hackney

DURATION: 12 MINS

The Voyage is a collaboration between composer Michael Wolters and theatre company Stan’s Café. The piece focuses on a mythological hero who leaves home, travels overseas to face trials and so may return a hero

DURATION: 4 MINS

A spirited meditation on humankind’s enduring fascination with fire, commissioned by The Opera Group and Ageas Salisbury International Arts Festival. It is based on a collage of texts from celebrated poet Vikram Seth and the 6th century Jewish poet Yannai

DURATION: 2 MINS

A piece for church bells, commissioned by the Central Council of Church Bell Ringers and Third Ear. Composer Howard Skempton believes that bells proclaim moments of public gathering, celebration and important news

DURATION: 2 MINS

Technophonia brings together cutting edge music interfaces used by commissioning organisation Drake Music Scotland, the nation’s leader in providing music making opportunities for people with disabilities. The piece challenges how people define musical instruments and performing musicians

DURATION: 4 MINS

Second Movement, in partnership with Liverpool Philharmonic, commissioned composer Emily Howard to write Zatopek!, a short opera inspired by Czech Olympian Emil Zatopek

DURATION: 15 MINS

Inspired by Benjamin Britten’s and WH Auden’s Nightmail, Track to Track celebrates the journey of the Olympic Javelin Train. Original motifs for the commission were prepared by children in the London Chamber Orchestra and Barnardo’s Music Junction partnership

DURATION: 13 MINS

EXAUDI, one of Britain’s leading contemporary music ensembles, worked with Aaron Cassidy to generate new sounds for the human voice by exploring experimental approaches to vocal production

DURATION: 3 MINS

Set against the backdrop of Northern Ireland in 1972 – the bloodiest year in the Troubles – and when local girl Mary Peters won an Olympic gold in Munich, listen to the short opera Our Day by Conor Mitchell

DURATION: 12 MINS

Explore new world rhythms with Skip, Dash, Flow, a cultural voyage from Beijing 2008 to Rio 2016

DURATION: 4 MINS

A fusion of east meets west. It is inspired by competition – from the battle of the sexes to the competitive spirit of the Olympics and Paralympics

DURATION: 12 MINS

A piece of music set to a text by Times columnist Melanie Reid who broke her neck in a riding accident in 2010

DURATION: 12 MINS

Commissioned by the National Youth Orchestra, HandsFree enabled the young musicians to share their talents and creative inventiveness without their instruments, through clapping, body percussion, movement and beatboxing

DURATION: 12 MINS

Watch the BBC Proms performance of HandsFree by Anna Meredith, in which members of the National Youth Orchestra shared their talents and creative inventiveness without their instruments, through clapping, body percussion, movement and beatboxing

DURATION: 14 MINS