Ben Maltby

Ben is a jazz pianist, multi-instrumentalist, and digital composer. He completed a Diploma of Music at the University of Adelaide in 2014, during which time he played and studied with prominent jazz musicians including James Morrison, Graeme Lyall and Gordon Goodwin. His compositions have been recognised by awards in the ASME Young Composers' Awards, and his big band compositions and arrangements have been played by bands including the Generations in Jazz Academy Band and the Melbourne Composers' Big Band. From 2015 onwards, he has been studying at the University of Melbourne, and has been doing his best to teach himself Ableton in his spare time.

'Absorbed' is a muse on the relationship between the physical and the virtual. When one spends their life interacting with technology, the distinction between 'real' and 'unreal' life often becomes confused; in particular, the ever-present smartphone imposes itself upon, and alters, one's perception of the physical world around them. By fusing the pitch of everyday events in the physical world with the many pitches – 'ringtones' – made by a smartphone, this piece questions how self-aware we can be when we find ourselves constantly 'absorbed' in a tiny screen and, indeed, what 'self-awareness' actually means in the twenty-first century.