Hugh Davies

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

This article does not cite any references or sources. (December 2007) Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unverifiable material may be challenged and removed.

Hugh Seymour Davies (23 April 1943 – 1 January 2005) was a musicologist, composer, and inventor of musical instruments.

Davies was born in Exmouth, Devon, England. After attending Westminster School, he studied music at Worcester College, Oxford from 1961 to 1964. Shortly after he traveled to Cologne, Germany to work for Karlheinz Stockhausen as his personal assistant. For two years, he assembled and documented material for Stockhausen's compositions and was a member of his live ensemble. From 1968 to 1971 Davies played in a group called the Music Improvisation Company.

Davies invented musical instruments that he constructed from household items. Among them was the shozyg, a generic name he used for any instrument housed inside an unusual container. The name is derived from the first of such instruments, which was housed inside the final volume of an encyclopaedia (covering the subjects from SHO– to ZYG–).