Michael Peter Finnissy (born 17 March 1946) is an English composer, pianist, and

pedagogue Pedagogy (), most commonly understood as the approach to teaching, is the theory and practice of learning, and how this process influences, and is influenced by, the social, political and psychological development of learners. Pedagogy, taken as ...

. An immensely prolific composer, his music is "notable for its dramatic urgency and expressive immediacy". Although he rejects the label, he is often regarded as the foremost composer of the New Complexity movement.

Biography

Early life

Michael Finnissy was born at 77 Claverdale Road in

Tulse Hill Tulse Hill is a district in the London Borough of Lambeth in South London that sits on Brockwell Park. It is approximately five miles from Charing Cross and is bordered by Brixton, Dulwich, Herne Hill, Streatham and West Norwood. History The ar ...

, London at roughly two in the morning on 17 March 1946 to Rita Isolene (''

née A birth name is the name of a person given upon birth. The term may be applied to the surname, the given name, or the entire name. Where births are required to be officially registered, the entire name entered onto a birth certificate or birth re ...

'' Parsonson) and George Norman Finnissy. His father was employed at the

London City Council London City Council is the governing body of the city of London, Ontario, Canada. Composition London is divided into 14 wards, with residents in each ward electing one councillor. The mayor is elected citywide, who along with the councillors for ...

. When he was four, he received his first piano lessons from his great aunt Rose Louise (Rosie) Hopwood, soon after writing his first compositions, He attended Hawes Down Infant and Junior schools, Bromley Technical High, and Beckenham and Penge Grammar schools and excelled in graphic art, mathematics, and English literature.

Student years

Finnissy received the

William Hurlstone William Yeates Hurlstone (7 January 1876 – 30 May 1906) was an English composer. Showing brilliant musical talent from an early age, he died young, before his full potential could be realized. Nevertheless, he left behind an exquisite, albeit s ...

composition prize at the Croydon Music Festival, a factor which assisted his parents' decision to let him apply to music college. He was then awarded a Foundation Scholarship to study at the

Royal College of Music The Royal College of Music is a music school, conservatoire established by royal charter in 1882, located in South Kensington, London, UK. It offers training from the Undergraduate education, undergraduate to the Doctorate, doctoral level in a ...

where he then studied with

Bernard Stevens Bernard (George) Stevens (2 March 1916 – 6 January 1983) was a British composer. Life Born in London, Stevens studied English and Music at St John's College, Cambridge with E. J. Dent and Cyril Rootham, then at the Royal College of Music ...

and

Humphrey Searle Humphrey Searle (26 August 1915 – 12 May 1982) was an English composer and writer on music. His music combines aspects of late Romanticism and modernist serialism, particularly reminiscent of his primary influences, Franz Liszt, Arnold Schoen ...

. Soon after, he received an Octavia travelling scholarship to study in Italy with

Roman Vlad Roman Vlad (29 December 1919 – 21 September 2013) was a Romanian-born Italian composer, pianist, and musicologist. Biography Born in Cernăuți, Bukovina (now Chernivtsi, Ukraine), he studied with Titus Tarnawski and Liviu Russu in Romania ear ...

. Finnissy was then able to befriend

Brian Ferneyhough Brian John Peter Ferneyhough (; born 16 January 1943) is an English composer. Ferneyhough is typically considered the central figure of the New Complexity movement. Ferneyhough has taught composition at the Hochschule für Musik Freiburg and ...

. In 1968, he wrote his first proper compositions.

Professional career

To earn money for his classes he took up a job as a

répétiteur A (from the French verb meaning 'to repeat, to go over, to learn, to rehearse') is an accompanist, tutor or coach of ballet dancers or opera singers. A feminine form, , also appears but is comparatively rare. Opera In opera, a is the perso ...

and freelanced at the

London Contemporary Dance School London Contemporary Dance School (informally LCDS) is a contemporary dance school located in London, England and a part of the Conservatoire for Dance and Drama. It was founded by Robin Howard in 1966 to train new dancers for his company, Londo ...

and founded a department there, as well as working with numerous choreographers. In 1972 he made his concert début in the Galerie Schwartzes Kloster in

Freiburg im Breisgau Freiburg im Breisgau (; abbreviated as Freiburg i. Br. or Freiburg i. B.; Low Alemannic German, Low Alemannic: ''Friburg im Brisgau''), commonly referred to as Freiburg, is an independent city in Baden-Württemberg, Germany. With a population o ...

. Meanwhile, he had been appearing around Europe. Finnissy's first job as a composition teacher was at Dartington Summer School where he taught along with his colleague Ferneyhough and signed contracts with numerous publishers, including

Oxford University Press Oxford University Press (OUP) is the university press of the University of Oxford. It is the largest university press in the world, and its printing history dates back to the 1480s. Having been officially granted the legal right to print books ...

. He had been a member of the ensemble ''Suoraan'' (founded by James Clarke and

Richard Emsley Richard Emsley (born December 1951 in Goole, Yorkshire) is a British composer, sometimes associated with the New Complexity school. Emsley initially studied with Arnold Whittall at University College, Cardiff, after which he moved to London, wher ...

) and then its artistic director since the early 1970s, then joining ''Ixion'' (founded and still directed by Andrew Toovey) in 1987 - in both of these groups he not only played the piano but also conducted concerts. Finnissy was invited to join by

Justin Connolly Justin Riveagh Connolly (11 August 1933 – 29 September 2020) was a British composer and teacher. Life Justin Connolly was born on 11 August 1933 in London. He was the son of John D'Arcy-Dawson, a journalist and author, and his wife Bar ...

to join the

International Society for Contemporary Music The International Society for Contemporary Music (ISCM) is a music organization that promotes contemporary classical music. The organization was established in Salzburg in 1922 as Internationale Gesellschaft für Neue Musik (IGNM) following th ...

and was President from 1990 to 1996. He is currently an Honorary Member. He has attached to C.O.M.A. (initially known as the East London Late Starters Orchestra) since its inception, and is composer-in-residence

Victorian College of the Arts The Victorian College of the Arts (VCA) is the arts school at the University of Melbourne in Australia. It is part of the university's Faculty of Fine Arts and Music. It is located near the Melbourne city centre on the Southbank campus of the ...

and to the Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras in

Sydney Sydney ( ) is the capital city of the state of New South Wales, and the most populous city in both Australia and Oceania. Located on Australia's east coast, the metropolis surrounds Sydney Harbour and extends about towards the Blue Mountain ...

. He has taught at the

Royal Academy of Music The Royal Academy of Music (RAM) in London, England, is the oldest conservatoire in the UK, founded in 1822 by John Fane and Nicolas-Charles Bochsa. It received its royal charter in 1830 from King George IV with the support of the first Duke of ...

, the

University of Sussex , mottoeng = Be Still and Know , established = , type = Public research university , endowment = £14.4 million (2020) , budget = £319.6 million (2019–20) , chancellor = Sanjeev Bhaskar , vice_chancellor = Sasha Roseneil , ...

, and is professor of composition at the

University of Southampton , mottoeng = The Heights Yield to Endeavour , type = Public research university , established = 1862 – Hartley Institution1902 – Hartley University College1913 – Southampton University Coll ...

and composer-in-residence at

St. John's College, Cambridge St John's College is a constituent college of the University of Cambridge founded by the Tudor matriarch Lady Margaret Beaufort. In constitutional terms, the college is a charitable corporation established by a charter dated 9 April 1511. The ...

. He won a competition to supply a violin solo test piece to the 1990

Carl Flesch International Violin Competition The Carl Flesch International Violin Competition (also known as the International Competition for Violinists "Carl Flesch" and the City of London International Competition for Violin and Viola (Carl Flesch Medal)) was an international music competi ...

with ''Enek''. Finnissy completed his Verdi Transcriptions for piano (which he started in 1972) in 2005. He is

homosexual Homosexuality is romantic attraction, sexual attraction, or sexual behavior between members of the same sex or gender. As a sexual orientation, homosexuality is "an enduring pattern of emotional, romantic, and/or sexual attractions" to peop ...

Music

Works

Style

Finnissy is a profusely prolific composer, having written over 400 pieces for numerous ensembles, combinations, and instruments. His works for the piano are notable for their extreme demands on technique. They include his 36 '' Verdi Transcriptions'', written between 1972 and 2005. Finnissy is concerned with the political aspects of music, and he believes that all music is ' programmatic' to some degree, that is, a composition exists in not just the composer's mind, but inside a culture that reflects both the extra-musical and purely musical concerns of the composer. Music, far from being unable to express anything other than itself (as

Stravinsky Igor Fyodorovich Stravinsky (6 April 1971) was a Russian composer, pianist and conductor, later of French (from 1934) and American (from 1945) citizenship. He is widely considered one of the most important and influential 20th-century clas ...

said) is a force for change. This engagement with political and social themes became more frequent as his career progressed. For example, the influence of homosexual themes and concerns began to enter his work; as in ''Shameful Vice'' in 1994, and more explicitly in ''Seventeen Immortal Homosexual Poets'' in 1997.

References

Sources *

Bibliography

* Arnone, Augustus. 2013/2014. "The Ear Is Not A Camera: The Divide Between Visual And Acoustic Perceptual Habits In Finnissy's ''The History of Photography in Sound''". ''The Open Space Magazine'' 15/16: 251–268. * Barrett, Richard. 1995. "Michael Finnissy: An Overview". ''Contemporary Music Review'' 13, no. 1:23–43. * Bortz, Graziela. 2003.
Rhythm in the Music of Brian Ferneyhough, Michael Finnissy, and Arthur Kampela: A Guide for Performers
'
Ph.D. Thesis, City University of New York.
* Brougham, Henrietta, Christopher Fox, and Ian Pace (eds.). 1997. ''Uncommon Ground: The Music of Michael Finnissy''. Aldershot, Hants., and Brookfield, VT: Ashgate. . * Pace, Ian. 1996. "The Panorama of Michael Finnissy: I". ''Tempo'', no. 196 (1996), 25–35. * Pace, Ian. 1997. "The Panorama of Michael Finnissy: II". ''Tempo'', no. 201 (1997), 7–16. *Steenhuisen, Paul. "Interview with Michael Finnissy". I
''Sonic Mosaics: Conversations with Composers''
Edmonton: University of Alberta Press, 2009. *

Toop, Richard Richard Toop (1945 – 19 June 2017) was a British-Australian musicologist. Toop was born in Chichester, England, in 1945. He studied at Hull University, where his teachers included Denis Arnold. In 1973 he became Karlheinz Stockhausen's teac ...

. 1988. "Four Facets of the 'New Complexity'". ''Contact'', no. 32:4–50.

External links

*
Oxford University Press: FinnissyFinnissy Programme on BBC 4 (2007)
{{DEFAULTSORT:Finnissy, Michael 1946 births Living people 20th-century classical composers 21st-century classical composers Academics of the Royal Academy of Music Academics of the Royal College of Music Academics of the University of Southampton Academics of the University of Sussex English classical composers LGBT classical composers English opera composers Male opera composers People educated at Beckenham and Penge County Grammar School People from Tulse Hill English male classical composers 20th-century English composers 21st-century British composers 20th-century British male musicians 21st-century British male musicians