Meet the man who can make beautiful music from old gas meters

This doesn't look like your typical musical ensemble�

Gary Tarn knows there's more than one way to string a fiddle - so he persuaded the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra to record a three-minute requiem performed on instruments fashioned out of old gas and electricity meters. Tarn was tasked with writing "A Requiem for Meters" to mark the phasing out of analogue meters for their smart cousins.

Why the song and dance?

Perhaps the allure of recording time at Abbey Road studios was too hard to resist. Organised by Smart Energy GB, the RPO musicians performed the requiem on specially produced instruments. "I wouldn't say it was easy but I think we've done pretty well given time and resources available," Tarn told the i paper.

Is he attached to older technology?

Smart meters will replace gas and electricity meters in every UK household by 2020 - and Tarn thinks it's about time. "There are machines that belong to a certain time and I think the idea that someone has to come along to read your meter seems to be of a different age," said the composer, who also dabbles in filmmaking.

Filmmaking? He's got a lot strings to his bow.

Earlier this year Tarn produced a two-minute film for the Royal British Legion to coincide with Armistice Day.

The film, which featured Olympian Jessica Ennis-Hill, was created to raise awareness of the annual silence. A Requiem for Meters has been released with a film of old meters to launch the national smart meter rollout.

Will meters be part of Tarn's future work?

"I'm not sure how many projects like this come along," he said. "I've been involved in music and film all my working life - I've never done anything like this."

See how they made "A Requiem for Meters" below:

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