Composers 2008
Robert Fokkens is a South African composer based in London. His music has been performed in many major venues in the UK including the Wigmore Hall, the Royal Festival Hall, the Purcell Room, the Institute of Contemporary Arts, the Riverside Studios, the Warehouse, Oxford's Holywell Music Room, and the Battersea Arts Centre; and at festivals including the Spitalfields Festival, the Park Lane Group New Year Series, the Fresh Festival at the South Bank Centre, the Almeida Festival, the Buxton Festival and Tête-à-Tête's The Opera Festival. His music is also heard frequently in South Africa, and has been performed in Germany, the Netherlands, Australia, the USA and Japan, and broadcast on BBC Radio 3. His music has been published in the journal The Liberal and recorded on the Herald label by the Oxford-based choir Commotio.
Robert studied at the University of Cape Town and the Royal Academy of Music, holding the Manson Fellowship at the RAM after completing all of his degrees with distinction. During this time he worked with many composers including George Crumb, Sir Harrison Birtwistle, Thomas Ades, Simon Bainbridge, Poul Ruders, Dominic Muldowney and Mauricio Kagel. He has recently completed his PhD at the University of Southampton, where he was supervised by Michael Finnissy. Throughout his studies, Robert was generously supported by a number of prizes and scholarships.
www.robertfokkens.co.uk
Larry Goves is a composer based in the UK. His music has been performed by the London Sinfonietta, the Nash Ensemble, Sarah Nicolls, the BBC Philharmonic, Psappha, Ixion, The Hallé, 175 East, The Continuum Ensemble, Oliver Coates and many others all over the UK and abroad. He has been broadcast on BBC Radio 3 and New Zealand’s Concert FM and had pieces released on NMC and Dutton Epoch. He founded, writes for and performs electronics with the experimental music group the house of bedlam with performances at the Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival and Faster than Sound 2008 amongst others. He currently teaches composition at the Royal Northern College of Music and at Royal Holloway University.
Anna Mededith is a composer of acoustic and electronic music as well as a performer, animateur and drum teacher. Her commission for the 2008 Last Night of the Proms for over 800 performers was recently broadcast to the nation on BBC 1. As a concert composer she has written for Ensemble Modern, LSO, BBC Philharmonic, SCO, Smith Quartet, de ereprijs and from 2004-2007 was Composer in Residence with the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra, for whom she recently completed a Trombone Concerto barchan for their Principal Trombone, Simon Johnson.
2007 saw the culmination of Anna’s part in the London Sinfonietta’s Blue Touch Paper project where she was mentored by Matmos. For the final performance, Anna created a new work (flak) with live electronics as well as a new electronic piece (music for intervals) with visuals by the Animation Department of Kingston University and flat-e.
During 2008 Anna is writing a youth music theatre work for Aldeburgh Music with libretto by Philip Ridley, due for performance in 2009. She is also working on projects with the beatboxer Shlomo and with the Camberwell Composers Collective, of which she is a founder member. Anna frequently works with visual artists, especially her sister Eleanor Meredith and has performed her electronic pieces at Faster than Sound, KOKO, Bongo Club, and the Luminaire. She plans to put together an album of her electronic pieces when the moment presents itself…
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Matthew Rogers is a composer and sound designer who has written and collaborated with a host of leading instrumentalists, ensembles and technologists. His output ranges from purely acoustic Classical works for ensembles including the Britten Sinfonia and London Symphony Orchestra, through experimental work with live instruments and electronics to pure electronica, all of which has received performances at many seminal music venues including the Royal Festival Hall, Koko and the Luminaire.
Virginia Samuel started her career as a violist, studying with Dorothy DeLay, Raphael Hillyer, and Scott Nickrenz at the New England Conservatory where she graduated with a bachelors degree in Viola Performance, and a masters degree in Music Composition. She attended the Tanglewood Music Festival, won 1st prize at the New England Conservatory Chamber Music Competition, and was principal violist of the Boston Philharmonic Orchestra. She has performed solo and chamber music throughout the United States. She earned her Ph.D. in Music Composition from Harvard University, and studied with Donald Martino, Andrew Imbrie, and Malcolm Peyton.
Her composition awards include the Walter Hinrichsen Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, 1st prize in the Boston Chamber Ensemble Competition, 1st prize in the Friends and Enemies of New Music Competition, a North/South Consonance Performance Award, an American Music Center Margaret Fairbank Jory Grant, a Soundclock Performance Award at Merkin Hall, New York City, two Harvard University Bohemian Prizes, an Atherton Fund Grant, a Heywood Memorial Fund Grant, a Weyman Fund Travelling Fellowship, a Fromm Foundation Award, and a Fellowship from the New Jersey Council on the Arts. Her commissions include ones from EARPLAY, the Michael Foundation, and the Peabody Trio, and her music is published by Henmar Press (C.F. Peters Edition).
Most recently she was awarded the Lakond Prize from the American Academy of Arts and Letters. Her music has been extensively performed in North America and Europe. She currently lives in Oxford, England.
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