24 SEPTEMBER 2019

NANA FORTE - SLOVENIA

BORN 24 SEPTEMBER

Nana Forte (born 1981) is a Slovenian composer. She was born in Zagorje ob Savi, Slovenia.

In 2005, Forte graduated in composition from the Music Academy in Ljubljana under Marko Mihevc. She continued her postgraduate studies at Hochschule für Musik Carl Maria von Weber in Dresden under Lothar Voigtländer from 2005 to 2007 and in Berlin at Universität der Künste under Walter Zimmermann (2007–09).

Her works include compositions for solo instruments, chamber music, orchestral music and pieces for choir. Forte is one of the few young Slovenian composers who are composing much choral music. While studying she worked with many Slovenian choirs and conductors and was awarded a number of prizes for her choral compositions.

Her compositions have been performed in concerts and festivals all over the Europe, including Young Euro Classic (DE), Weimarer Frühjahrstage (DE), Music Bienale Zagreb (CRO), Festival Bemus (SRB), Klara Festival (BE), Festival Emilia Romagna (I), Festival Semanas de Musica do Estoril (PT), Festival LES VOIXS DU PRIEURE (FR), Bienale of Contemporary Music Koper (SI), Ljubljana Festival (SI) and Festival Slowind (SI), and have been broadcast by various European classical music radio stations. Some of her pieces have been published and recorded.

Source: Wikipedia and Nana Forte Official Website

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En Ego Campana by Nana Forte

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DIANA ROTARU - ROMANIA
BORN 24 SEPTEMBER

Diana Rotaru (b. 1981, Bucharest) has written over 50 works, from chamber and orchestral music to chamber opera, multimedia shows and film soundtracks. Her music explores different expressive directions, such as hypnagogia or pre-oneiric aesthetics, feminine psyche and subtle eroticism or imaginary folklore. She has also been active as a promoter of new music in Romania, being the artistic director of SonoMania new music ensemble (since 2012), co-artistic director of InnerSound International New Arts Festival (2012-2015) and the main coordinator of the Romanian Music Information Center (CIMRO). She has worked with the SeduCânt synchretic group in various multimedia projects. She is currently teaching at the National University of Music in Bucharest (Composition and Composition Practice, Music Analysis). 

Diana Rotaru studied with Ştefan Niculescu and Dan Dediu at the National University of Music in Bucharest (2000-2005) – where she has a PhD in Composition (with the dissertationThe Recent Trance and the Principle of Repetition in New Music, 2012) – and with Frédéric Durieux at the Conservatoire National Superieur de Musique et de Danse de Paris (2005-2006). She participated at different summer composition courses such as Acanthes (Metz, 2008), Voix Nouvelles-Royaumont (2002 and 2006), or the International Bartok Seminary(Szombathely, 2003), thus working with Salvatore Sciarrino, Brian Ferneyhough, Michael Jarrell, François Paris, Jonathan Harvey among others. 

She has won numerous prizes, among which the Romanian Academy’s George Enescu Award (2010), the ISCM-IAMIC Young Composer Award (World Music Days, Vilnius, 2008), the IrinoPrize (Japan, 2004) or the George Enescu Prize ex-aequo (Romania, 2003 and 2005). Her works have been commissioned by Ensemble XXI (Dijon), Stockholm Saxophone Quartet, Pärlor för svin, Ernst von Siemens Foundation, Takefu International Music Festival, etc.

Source: Diana's Rotaru Official Website

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Verde by Diana Rotaru

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23 SEPTEMBER 2019

MARIE-ELIZABETH VON SACHSEN MEININGEN - GERMANY

BORN 23 SEPTEMBER

Princess Marie Elisabeth of Saxe-Meiningen (23 September 1853 – 22 February 1923) was the only daughter of Georg II, Duke of Saxe-Meiningen, by his first wife, Princess Charlotte of Prussia. She was notable as a musician and composer. One of her most famous works is Romanze in F major for clarinet and piano.

As her father was a great patron of the stage and the founder of a national theater, Marie Elisabeth was raised in this environment, consequently becoming artistic and a great lover of music like her parents. She received a thorough education under the tutelage of Theodor Kirchner, a talented pianist. Her father was a great patron of German composer and pianist Johannes Brahms, who worked as a music teacher in Meiningen for various pupils, including Marie Elisabeth, whom he gave piano lessons to. In addition to Brahms, Marie Elisabeth was in close contact with other famous musicians, such as Richard Strauss, Franz Mannstädt, and Hans von Bülow.

Marie Elisabeth was a student of the Conservatorium; she and Prince Alexander of Hesse, another royal pupil of Brahms, celebrated the birthday of musician Joachim Raff in Frankfurt in 1886. There, they interpreted Brahm's Sonata (Op. 78) for pianoforte and violin in a special feature for the ceremony. At the 1878 wedding of her elder brother Bernhard to Princess Charlotte of Prussia, eldest daughter of German Crown Prince Frederick, Marie Elisabeth composed a piece of music specially meant for the occasion entitled torch dance.

As of 1913, Marie Elisabeth was the author of Einzugsmarsch for orchestra, Fackeltanz for piano as well as several other piano compositions. She also wrote a "pretty" Cradle Song for violin and piano, and, in 1892, she produced a Romanze in F major for clarinet and piano which had been influenced by Brahms' teachings. At her residence in Berchtesgaden, Marie Elisabeth received a regular circle of artists and encouraged talented singers by financing their education.

Marie Elisabeth died on 22 February 1923 in Obersendling. She never married, and is buried in the cemetery park in Meiningen.

Source: Wikipedia and People Pill

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Romanze by Princess Marie Elisabeth of Saxe-Meiningen

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VIERA JANÁCEKOVÁ - SLOVAKIA
BORN 23 SEPTEMBER

Viera Janárčeková was born in Svit, Slovakia. She studied harpsichord and piano the State Conservatory in Bratislava and continued her studies at the Academy of Performing Arts in Prague. She also studied with Rudolf Firkušný in Lucerne. After completing her education in 1967 she taught music and performed as a pianist. She has resided in Homberg, Germany since 1972, and has worked as a composer since 1981. She received an invitation to be composer-in-residence for the International Festival in Lockenhaus in 2000.

Janárčeková composes mainly for chamber ensemble and instruments. Selected works include: Quadratura for cello; Banyan for bass clarinet and trombone; Der Geheimnissvolle Nachen

Aschenputtel trio for clarinet, violincello and piano; String Quartet No. 5.

Source: Wikipedia and Viera Janárčeková Official Website

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Tangomutanten by Viera Janárčeková

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22 SEPTEMBER 2019

OLGA VICTOROVA - UKRAINE

BORN 22 SEPTEMBER

Olga Viktorova was born on 22 September 1960 in Ukraine.

She is a graduate from the Kharkov Music School for gifted children. In 1984, she graduated with honours from the St-Petersburg State Rimsky-Korsakov Conservatory where she studied composition (with professor B. Arapov) and folklore. In 1986 she completed her postgraduate course at the same conservatory. Since 1996 she has been a member of the Composers' Union of Russia.

Olga Viktorova worked as a Music Director of the Kemerovo Drama Theater, taught composition and music theory at the Kemerovo College of Music. Nowadays she teaches composition and instrumentation at the Sverdlovsk College of Music.

In 1998, Olga Viktorova along with Oleg Paiberdin founded the Contemporary Music Club which turned into the Workshop of the New Music Autograph.

Olga Viktorova's works were performed at numerous festivals and concerts in the Netherlands, the USA, Spain, Belgium and Russia. Her music has been performed by Kuzbass Symphony Orchestra (Kemerovo, Russia), Billings Symphony Orchestra (USA), BACH Chamber Orchestra and the Ural Philharmonic Orchestra (Yekaterinburg, Russia), Ensemble '88 (the Netherlands).

Source: New Consonant Media and Donemus

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Milky Way by Olga Viktorova

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KEYLA OROZCO - CUBA
BORN 22 SEPTEMBER

Keyla Orozco received professional music education since the age of 8. She started with piano at the Conservatory in Santiago de Cuba, her city of birth, and later at the Escuela Nacional de Arte (ENA) in Havana, where in 1998 she obtained her diploma in Piano Pedagogy and Performance. In 1993 she became a Bachelor in Composition at Instituto Superior de Arte (ISA) in Havana under the guidance of Harold Gramatges. Later she followed advanced composition studies for three years with Theo Loevendie at the Koninklijk Conservatorium in The Hague and at Conservatorium van Amsterdam.

She is currently living and working in the US, after establishing herself in The Netherlands as an independent artist for over 18 years. She shares her professional career between these two countries mainly.

Her compositional work has been awarded with the Guggenheim and the Cintas Fellowships, Fromm Music Foundation Commission, Two-Years Composition Grant by the Dutch Performing Arts Funds, a Residency Fellowship at MacDowell Colony, First and Second Prizes at International Composition Contest René Amengüal in Chile, and the National Cuban prize for Symphonic Composition UNEAC.

Source: DKBB & Keyla Orozco

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Met de Schoenen by Keyla Orozco

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21 SEPTEMBER 2019

MIA ZABELKA - AUSTRIA

BORN 21 SEPTEMBER

Mia Zabelka (born 1963 in Vienna, Austria) is an Austrian contemporary violinist, improviser, and composer of Czech, Jewish and French familiar background. Comprehensively educated in classical music from early age on she opened up the traditional understanding of the violin as solo and ensemble instrument towards improvisation, experimental music, and sound art.

Mia Zabelka is known for her experimental style, with a big passion for free improvisation, jazz, rock, noise, drone and dark ambient. Comprehensively educated in classical music from early age on, she continued to construct and explore the limits of sound and music in a language entirely her own, based on the de- and reconstruction of the violin’s sonic possibilities, expanding the range of the instrument using live electronic devices, preparing it through the insertion of alien objects between or on the strings and innovative performance techniques.

Mia Zabelka basically changed the modern electric violin language. She has given concerts and performances at many Festivals throughout Europe, America and Asia. Numerous CD, vinyl and video releases. Recipient of highly regarded prizes (3- time winner of the Prix Ars Electronica) and awards, she was a guest of the DAAD’s (German Academic Exchange Service’s) international artists’ programme in Berlin and the Fulbright Commission in New York.

In 2017, the Solo album ‘Cellular Resonance’ was released on the British label LCR, which received numerous enthusiastic reviews.

Source: Mia Zabelka and Wikipedia

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Cellular Resonance by Mia Zabelka

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KATHERINE HOOVER - USA
DEATH 21 SEPTEMBER

Katherine Hoover (December 2, 1937 – September 21, 2018) was an American composer and flutist. She held a performer's certificate in flute and a Bachelor of Music in music theory from the Eastman School of Music, and a Masters in Music from the Manhattan School of Music. She was a faculty member of the Manhattan School of Music for fifteen years and taught flute at the Juilliard Preparatory School. Hoover won numerous awards for her compositions, and her music was hailed as "fresh and individual... dazzlingly crafted."

Hoover's compositional style has been described as "a romantic, often pictorial atonal style" that is "clear and eloquent [with] moments of startling beauty [emerging] from her sometimes acerbic harmonies." Three compositional elements stand out as consistent patterns in Hoover's music: 1) extra-musical references; 2) quotations and manipulations of other composers' melodies; and 3) use of abstract, original material. Extra-musical references have proven a consistent trend throughout Hoover's compositions, and she has found inspiration in a wide variety of sources.  She pulled from many different sources for her compositional ideas, and it is because of these references to extra-musical concepts that her music is often considered pictorial and evocative.

Hoover became particularly renowned for her compositions for flute. This was natural since she had quite a varied career as a distinguished flutist. Hoover believed that being an accomplished performer greatly benefitted her compositional abilities.

Source: Wikipedia & Katherine Hoover

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Summer Night by Katherine Hoover

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20 SEPTEMBER 2019

AGNES TYRRELL - CZECHIA

BORN 20 SEPTEMBER

Agnes Tyrrell was born in Brno, Moravia. She was the daughter of English teacher Henry Tyrrell and his wife Josefine Kotulan. She performed in her first recital at age nine, and attended the Conservatory in Vienna at age sixteen. She studied composition under Otto Ritzler and published her first compositions in 1872. Tyrrell became one of the few women to compose symphony works before 1900. Tyrrell died in Brno at the age of thirty-five.

Tyrrell composed over three hundred works for solo instrument, orchestra, chamber ensemble and voice. Selected works include: Andante, op. 6; Theme and Variations in F Major, op. 8; Nocturno, op. 16; Etudes, op. 48; Grand Sonata, op. 66; String quartet in G Major for chamber ensemble; Symphony in C Major for orchestra and others.

Source: Wikipedia

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Overture to the Oratorio Die Könige by Agnes Tyrrell

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HARUNA MIYAKE - JAPAN
BORN 20 SEPTEMBER

Haruna Miyake (三宅 榛名 Miyake Haruna, born 20 September 1942 in Tokyo) is a Japanese pianist and composer who also uses the name Haruna Shibata. She was born in Tokyo and studied music there, making her debut as a pianist at age 14 playing Mozart with the Tokyo Symphony orchestra. She continued her studies at the Juilliard School of Music in New York City, and afterward worked as a pianist and composer, touring in the United States. She often collaborates with pianist and composer Yuji Takahashi. Her composition Poem for String Orchestra received the Edward Benjamin Award.

Miyake combines Japanese and Western idiom, and often uses traditional Japanese instruments in her compositions. Selected works include: Why Not, My Baby? for soprano, piano and trumpet; Shiyoku; Piano Concerto; Fantasy for Milky Way Railroad; Phantom of a Flower and others.

Source: Wikipedia & Oxford Musics Online

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Musik for piccolo, flute and guitar by Haruna Miyake

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19 SEPTEMBER 2019

EVE DUNCAN - AUSTRALIA

BORN 19 SEPTEMBER

Eve Duncan was born on September 19, 1956. She graduated with Honours in Music Composition from La Trobe University in 1990 after working with Theodore Dollarhide and Keith Humble. In 1992 she was awarded the International Modern Music Award for Composition, Vienna, for a work for solo violin.

Recent commissions include Rhapsody of Motion , a project which will take place in 2001, exploring the multiple levels of Federation and using the text of Aboriginal poet Lisa Bellear. Star Traiect - a work expressing northern and southern hemisphere star movements - is another new commission for the Romanian Ensemble Traiect.

International festival performances include the 2000 International Meetings of New Music Festival, Braila, 1999 ISCM World Music Days, 1999 Asia Week Yokohama, Tunungan '97, Manila, 1995 Bangkok Music Festival, the Summer Seminar for New Music, Vienna 1994, and 1994 International Days of New Music Festival, Moldova. Australian performances include the 1998 Melbourne International Festival, and the 1994 Performing Women's Festival.

Commissions include Ensemble Passacaglia Wien, Ensemble Troika, Trio Kinetikon, Carinya Strings, the City of Port Phillip, ChiaHong Drapal Liao, Andrei Podlacha, Stefan Feingold, Danae Killian, Timothy Veldman, Helfried Fister and Peter Neville.

A solo CD Recorded Messages: Violin is available on the Move label. Light Up for string quartet, Not Yet for woodwinds and Where are you Now? for guitar duet are published by RedHouse Editions.

She lives by the Yarra River in Melbourne with her family.

Source: University of Melbourne & Australian Music Centre

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Archai by Eva Duncan

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CARMEN MARIA CÂRNECI - ROMANIA
BORN 19 SEPTEMBER

Carmen Maria Cârneci was born in Romania. She first studied composition in Bucharest as a student of Dan Constantinescu, and later specialized in Freiburg, Germany, on a three years DAAD scholarship as a student of Klaus Huber.

She attended conducting classes with Constantin Bugeanu and Iosif Conta in Bucharest, with Kurt Masur in Weimar, Pierre Boulez in Avignon and Peter Eötvös in Szombathely. Cârneci won scholarships in Italy, France and England and conducting prizes in Austria and Germany.

As a composer Cârneci received scholarships in Germany, Italy, France and England, also awards in Mannheim, Rome, Köln, Bucharest, Hong Kong, as well as important commissions, such as from The City Opera in Bonn and the Ensemble für neue music Zürich (for the chamber opera Giacometti). She was invited both as a conductor and a composer to renown festivals of new music (Donaueschingen, Dresden, Heidelberg, Saarbrücken), andwas artistic director of the International New Music Week in Bucharest (2005; 2006). She appeared as a guest conductor in Stuttgart (State Opera), Milan (Piccola Scala) and Paris (Opéra Bastille). 

Among her works, published by Ricordi - München, Furore Verlag - Kassel and Editura Muzicala - Bucharest, are The Garden, Das Hohelied, Trojtza, REm - Cello concerto, the two cycles Giacometti-Szenen and OMENS.

Source: Wikipedia & Iscm Bio

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Que des mots by Carmen Maria Cârneci

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