Peter Chilvers is a

Cambridgeshire Cambridgeshire (abbreviated Cambs.) is a Counties of England, county in the East of England, bordering Lincolnshire to the north, Norfolk to the north-east, Suffolk to the east, Essex and Hertfordshire to the south, and Bedfordshire and North ...

-based British musician and software designer. Chilvers has created several iPhone applications in collaboration with

Brian Eno Brian Peter George St John le Baptiste de la Salle Eno (; born Brian Peter George Eno, 15 May 1948) is a British musician, composer, record producer and visual artist best known for his contributions to ambient music and work in rock, pop an ...

. As a musician, he is best known as a collaborator with Eno and with

Tim Bowness Tim Bowness (born 29 November 1963) is an English singer and songwriter primarily known for his work as part of the band No-Man, a long-term project formed in 1987 with Porcupine Tree's Steven Wilson. Music career In addition to recording album ...

, but has also worked with

Karl Hyde Karl Hyde (born 10 May 1957) is an English musician and artist. He is a founding member of British electronic group Underworld. Hyde has also released a solo album, made albums with Brian Eno and Matthew Herbert, and contributed towards the sco ...

Natalie Imbruglia Natalie Jane Imbruglia ( , ; born 4 February 1975) is an Australian singer and actress. In the early 1990s, she played Beth Brennan in the Australian soap opera '' Neighbours''. Three years after leaving the programme, she began a singing car ...

Chris Martin Christopher Anthony John Martin (born 2 March 1977) is an English singer-songwriter and musician. He is best known as the lead vocalist, pianist, rhythm guitarist and co-founder of the rock band Coldplay. Born in Exeter, Devon, he went to Univ ...

and others. He is one of the three co-founders of the

Burning Shed Burning Shed is an independent record label established in April 2001 by musicians Tim Bowness and Pete Morgan. The label was envisaged as an artistically focused, online extension of labels such as 4AD, Factory, ECM, DGM and Mute. Burning Sh ...

online record label (with Tim Bowness and Pete Morgan).

Work in software design and computer music

Chilvers has collaborated with Eno on several iPhone,

iPod Touch The iPod Touch (stylized as iPod touch) is a discontinued line of iOS-based mobile devices designed and marketed by Apple Inc. with a touchscreen-controlled user interface. As with other iPod models, the iPod Touch can be used as a music pl ...

, and

iPad The iPad is a brand of iOS and iPadOS-based tablet computers that are developed by Apple Inc. The iPad was conceived before the related iPhone but the iPhone was developed and released first. Speculation about the development, operating s ...

generative music applications: Bloom, Scape and Air (available on the

iTunes Store The iTunes Store is a digital media store operated by Apple Inc. It opened on April 28, 2003, as a result of Steve Jobs' push to open a digital marketplace for music. As of April 2020, iTunes offered 60 million songs, 2.2 million apps, 25,00 ...

)."Generative Project With Brian Eno", news item on Peter Chilvers homepage 25 January 2007 He has also written a number of

generative music Generative music is a term popularized by Brian Eno to describe music that is ever-different and changing, and that is created by a system. Historical background In 1995 whilst working with SSEYO's Koan software (built by Tim Cole and Pete Col ...

soundtracks for the '' Creatures'' computer games released by

Creature Labs Creature often refers to: * An animal, monster, or alien Creature or creatures may also refer to: Film and television * ''Creature'' (1985 film), a 1985 science fiction film by William Malone * ''Creature'' (miniseries), a 1998 TV movie abou ...

Work as musician

Chilvers is a multi-instrumentalist who favours acoustic piano,

electric piano An electric piano is a musical instrument which produces sounds when a performer presses the keys of a piano-style musical keyboard. Pressing keys causes mechanical hammers to strike metal strings, metal reeds or wire tines, leading to vibrations ...

, laptop computer, assorted keyboards and

fretless A fretless guitar is a guitar with a fingerboard without frets, typically a standard instrument that has had the frets removed, though some custom-built and commercial fretless guitars are occasionally made. The classic fretless guitar was fir ...

bass guitar but also plays

Chapman Stick The Chapman Stick is an electric musical instrument devised by Emmett Chapman in the early 1970s. A member of the guitar family, the Chapman Stick usually has ten or twelve individually tuned strings and is used to play bass lines, melody lines, ...

double bass The double bass (), also known simply as the bass () (or #Terminology, by other names), is the largest and lowest-pitched Bow (music), bowed (or plucked) string instrument in the modern orchestra, symphony orchestra (excluding unorthodox addit ...

acoustic guitar An acoustic guitar is a musical instrument in the string family. When a string is plucked its vibration is transmitted from the bridge, resonating throughout the top of the guitar. It is also transmitted to the side and back of the instrument, ...

and electric guitar. He is also a

programmer A computer programmer, sometimes referred to as a software developer, a software engineer, a programmer or a coder, is a person who creates computer programs — often for larger computer software. A programmer is someone who writes/creates ...

, extending this skill to electronic percussion parts and extensive electronic orchestrations. Chilvers has released four albums under his own name – ''He Wrote This'' (a selection of mostly instrumental pieces played on bass guitars, double bass and Chapman Stick), ''Stormwatcher'' (the soundtrack to an "''imaginary film version''" of

Graham Joyce Graham William Joyce (22 October 1954 – 9 September 2014) was a British writer of speculative fiction and the recipient of numerous awards, including the O. Henry Award and the World Fantasy Award, for both his novels and short stories ...

's fantasy novel of the same name), ''Free'' (a virally marketed

CD-R CD-R (Compact disc-recordable) is a digital optical disc storage format. A CD-R disc is a compact disc that can be written once and read arbitrarily many times. CD-R discs (CD-Rs) are readable by most CD readers manufactured prior to the in ...

release of predominantly ambient pieces) and ''Piano'' (a collection of solo piano pieces). He is also the leader of A Marble Calm – an ambient-inclined music collective centred on himself and reclusive

marimba The marimba () is a musical instrument in the percussion family that consists of wooden bars that are struck by mallets. Below each bar is a resonator pipe that amplifies particular harmonics of its sound. Compared to the xylophone, the timbre ...

vibraphone The vibraphone is a percussion instrument in the metallophone family. It consists of tuned metal bars and is typically played by using mallets to strike the bars. A person who plays the vibraphone is called a ''vibraphonist,'' ''vibraharpist,' ...

player Jon Hart. Other participants have included

Theo Travis Theo Travis (born 7 July 1964 in Birmingham, England) is a British saxophonist, flautist and composer. He is best known for being a member of Soft Machine which he joined in 2006 while the group was still using the "Legacy" suffix and for being ...

, Sandra O'Neill, Steve Adey and Cambridge experimental-country guitarist Rob Jackson. This project has released two albums – ''Surfacing'' and ''Blue Turns To Grey''."Generative Music: an interview with Peter Chilvers"
by Matteo Milani, U.S.O. Project, September 2009 Chilvers is the instrumental half of the ambient-folk duo Letka (with singer Sandra O'Neill), which released the album ''Far Off Country'' in 2011. Letka was previously called Alias Grace, and released three previous recordings under that name – the albums ''Embers'' and ''Storm Blue Evening'' and the ''Griosach'' EP. Chilvers is a frequent musical partner of

(the singer of

No-Man No-Man are an English art pop duo, formed in 1987 as No Man Is an Island (Except the Isle of Man) by singer Tim Bowness and multi-instrumentalist Steven Wilson. The band has so far produced seven studio albums and a number of singles/outtakes ...

). As Tim Bowness/Peter Chilvers, they released an album of dark reflective ballad songs – ''California, Norfolk'' – and an online only remix CDR, ''Overstrand''. The two have also worked together as part of the ambient folk band

Samuel Smiles Samuel Smiles (23 December 1812 – 16 April 1904) was a British author and government reformer. Although he campaigned on a Chartist platform, he promoted the idea that more progress would come from new attitudes than from new laws. His prim ...

(with Chilvers focussing mostly on piano) and the experimental rock band

Henry Fool ''Henry Fool'' is a 1997 American black comedy-drama film written, produced and directed by Hal Hartley, featuring Thomas Jay Ryan, James Urbaniak, and Parker Posey. Set like previous Hartley films in less affluent parts of Long Island, it recount ...

(with Chilvers concentrating on bass guitar and electric piano) and the singer-songwriter/ambient jazz project Slow Electric (with Chilvers on keyboards and atmospherics). Chilvers has also collaborated with

(playing piano for their comeback appearance at the Burning Shed Evening in June 2006, and contributing "space bass" to the album ''Together We're Stranger''). As a collaborator with

, Chilvers has contributed to Eno's ''Small Craft on a Milk Sea'' and ''Drums Between the Bells'' albums and his soundtracks for ''The Lovely Bones'' and ''Spore''. Chilvers is also credited as "digital archaeologist" on the 2008 David Byrne and Brian Eno album ''

Everything That Happens Will Happen Today ''Everything That Happens Will Happen Today'' is the second collaborative studio album by David Byrne and Brian Eno, released on August 18, 2008, by Todo Mundo. Marking Byrne's eighth studio effort overall and Byrne a ...

''. Chilvers' other musical collaborations include work with songwriter Paul Goodwin and Underworld's

(for whose live band he plays keyboards).

Selected discography

;Solo *''He Wrote This'' (Burning Shed, 2001) *''Stormwatcher'' (Burning Shed, 2002) *''Free'' (viral web release, 2002) *''Piano'' (Burning Shed, 2006) ;Collaboration *Alias Grace, ''Embers'' (self-released, 1998 – reissued on Burning Shed) *Michael Bearpark/Peter Chilvers, ''Thin Air'' (Burning Shed, 1999) *Tim Bowness/Samuel Smiles, ''World of Bright Futures'' (Hidden Art/Voiceprint, 1999) *Tim Bowness/Samuel Smiles, ''How We Used To Live'' (Hidden Art/Voiceprint, 2000) *Tim Bowness/Samuel Smiles, ''Live Archive One'' (Burning Shed, 2001) *Tim Bowness/Samuel Smiles, ''Live Archive Two'' (Burning Shed, 2001) *Alias Grace, ''Storm Blue Evening'' (Burning Shed, 2001) *Tim Bowness/Peter Chilvers, ''California, Norfolk'' (Burning Shed, 2001) *Tim Bowness/Peter Chilvers, ''Overstrand'' (Burning Shed, 2003) *A Marble Calm, ''Surfacing'' (Burning Shed, 2004) *Stefano Panunzi, ''Timelines'' (Emerald Recordings, 2005) *A Marble Calm, ''Blue Turns To Grey'' (ToneFloat, 2006) ;Guest musician *

Darkroom A darkroom is used to process photographic film, to make prints and to carry out other associated tasks. It is a room that can be made completely dark to allow the processing of the light-sensitive photographic materials, including film and ph ...

, ''Daylight'' (3rd Stone Ltd., 1998) *

, ''

Together We're Stranger ''Together We're Stranger'' is No-Man's fifth studio album released by the Snapper Music label in 2003. The first four songs are linked to form a 28-minute suite of continuous music with recurring lyrical and musical themes. The remaining three ...

'' (KScope/Snapper Music, 2003) *

, ''My Hotel Year'' (One Little Indian, 2004) ;Other *

David Byrne David Byrne (; born 14 May 1952) is a Scottish-American singer, songwriter, record producer, actor, writer, music theorist, visual artist and filmmaker. He was a founding member and the principal songwriter, lead singer, and guitarist of ...

and

– ''

'' (2008)

References

External links

Peter Chilvers homepage
{{DEFAULTSORT:Chilvers, Peter Ambient musicians Living people Musicians from Bath, Somerset People from Ely, Cambridgeshire Year of birth missing (living people) Place of birth missing (living people)