Fun & fresh: flute/voice & guitar duo, Emily Andrews & Francisco Correa talk improvisation & collaboration on their new disc of Stephen Goss's music

Emily Andrews & Francisco Correa during the recording of From Honey to Ashes

Later this month, the Deux Elles label is issuing a two-disc set of music by composer Stephen Goss for flute and guitar performed by the husband and wife duo, guitarist Francisco Correa and flautist / mezzo-soprano Emily Andrews. In late 2024 I chatted to Stephen Goss about the triple album out, Landscape and Memory (also on Deux Elles) issued in celebration of Stephen's 60th birthday [see my interview] and it turns out that both Emily Andrews and Francisco Correa were performing on that album. Francisco has also collaborated with Stephen several times, including performing Stephen's guitar concerto in Colombia and Francisco's first disc on Deux Elles, Winterbourne, featured Stephen's Winterbourne Preludes.

The new disc, From Honey to Ashes, features Stephen's music for flute and guitar, including From Honey to Ashes from 2007, La Catedral Sumergida written in 2024 for the duo and Stephen's Welsh Folksongs in arrangements that date from across Stephen's career from 1988 to 2025; a total of nearly 90 minutes music in all. Both Emily and Francisco enjoyed collaborating with Stephen on the disc, finding he gave them great flexibility to perform. Yet the recording process felt like a collaboration: they were a trio, only with one member (Stephen) not actually performing. Both Emily and Francisco commented that it was a fun way to work and there is a sense that all three voices are heard on the disc, that of Stephen, Emily and Francisco.

Stephen encouraged them to make the pieces themselves, give the music their own voice. Rather than imposing on them, they felt able to ask him "Do you like that?" For Emily and Francisco this made the music more alive and allowed them to push their artistry. They had played a few of Stephen's pieces before, notably a few of the Welsh folksongs, but then they realised that Stephen had written a significant amount of music for flute and guitar. As a guitarist himself, Stephen has written extensively for the guitar. For the new disc, he wrote La Catedral Sumergida for Emily and Francisco, and wrote two new Welsh folksongs, as well as arranging American Pastoral for flute and guitar for them. In fact, on the disc Emily not only plays the flute and sings but on one track she plays the violin as well.

As a flute/voice and guitar duo, Emily and Francisco have played together for ages, and they are married. Their duo repertoire is wide with an emphasis on Latin-American music (Francisco is Colombian), and the two love Brazilian music. They are keen to record music that has not been recorded before or that warrants a different take on it; they are not really interested in making just another recording of standard repertoire.  On From Honey to Ashes, though the pieces are written out in the classical manner some have roots in folk music which gave them scope to create their own versions.



Emily studied the flute at the Royal Academy of Music then afterwards took private singing lessons, and now she sings more than plays the flute. Originally she was a flautist who sang, but now she thinks of herself as a singer who plays the flute. The new album is relatively unusual for her now as on it, she mainly plays the flute. As well as their own duo, Emily and Francisco also have a trio with guitarist David Massey, CarmenCo which has its focus on voice and two guitars, though she does play the flute as well.

Stephen's music features a broad range of influences from funk to rock to contemporary to Django Reinhardt and one piece on the new album, First Milonga, Last Tango is directly inspired by Piazzolla. With many guitar-focused composers, and Francisco mentions Leo Brouwer, their music is easily pigeonholed but Stephen's range is so broad. The new disc is very varied, the duo feel that if listeners don't like one piece then they can easily move on to another different one.

The recording process offered them great freedom as performers with Stephen likely to say "yeah, you could do that or do it differently". The folksongs were intended to sound like folk music and significant sections of the recording include improvisation, for instance 'Alba' in From Honey to Ashes is written as a flute melody over guitar chords and Stephen gave them the freedom to record a version that repeats the music with Emily's flute improvising over Francisco's guitar chords. Whilst other pieces on the disc were written very precisely, the duo felt it was nice to be given that flexibility with Stephen regarding the dots as just a guide. Stephen was also the producer on the album, so that after each take they had his notes. But where improvisation is concerned, you cannot really cut between takes, you have to select just one! This also means performances of the music by another duo would be different again, keeping the music fun and fresh. Stephen's Welsh folksongs are performed a lot, so the duo's free approach was appreciated and in them Emily plays flute, alto flute and, in one, violin (in order to get a rougher sound).

As a guitarist himself, Stephen knows the guitar well. Francisco sees Stephen's music as well-written, but it can be tricky, especially if Stephen is looking for a particular effect. But the music is always well worth the effort, it makes sense.  And Francisco points out that a composer like Joaquim Rodrigo did not know the guitar very well so that his Concierto de Aranjuez needs editing. Francisco estimates that Stephen's music requires playing of Grade 9+, even the pieces that sound simple. On Francisco's first solo album on Deux Elles he played Stephen's Winterbourne Preludes which were commissioned from Stephen to be music playable by good amateurs and most are (except for three, Francisco estimates).

Coming up, Emily and Francisco have a lot of work with their trio, CarmenCo, notably performances of A Pocket Opera which rewrites Bizet's Carmen in an irreverent way mixing concert, theatre and comedy. This is a programme they have performed over 50 times, and they have bookings into 2028. In the autumn the trio is presenting a new programme, My, my, my Delilah which reworks Saint-Saëns' Samson et Dalilah for trio, from Dalilah's point of view. 

As a duo, Emily and Francisco have a new programme, Land of a thousand rhythms, about all the different rhythms in songs and dances from South America, and in this programme that have even managed to slip in some of Stephen's Welsh folksongs! (After our chat is over, it strikes me as being rather apt given the strong Welsh presence in Patagonia). The new album is being launched at a concert in Guildford on 28 March when they will be performing music from the disc alongside South American music including pieces from Land of a thousand rhythms. Also looking ahead, the duo has a schools project based on music about birds from different angles.

Emily and Francisco also run their own festival, Ham Farm Festival which returns from 24 to 26 July 2026 for its 6th year. For the festival they open up their garden and over three days present double bills ever evening, with music from classical, jazz, cabaret, folk and more, then during the daytime there are community events and workshops.

From Honey to Ashes: Music by Stephen Goss - Emily Andrews, Francisco Correa - Deux Elles [link tree] 

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