Richard Ayres (born 29 October 1965, Cornwall) is a British composer and music teacher.

Biography

Born in Cornwall, England, Richard Ayres followed

Morton Feldman Morton Feldman (January 12, 1926 – September 3, 1987) was an American composer. A major figure in 20th-century classical music, Feldman was a pioneer of indeterminate music, a development associated with the experimental New York School ...

's classes at the Darmstadt and Dartington summer schools. He studied

composition Composition or Compositions may refer to: Arts and literature *Composition (dance), practice and teaching of choreography *Composition (language), in literature and rhetoric, producing a work in spoken tradition and written discourse, to include v ...

electronic music Electronic music is a genre of music that employs electronic musical instruments, digital instruments, or circuitry-based music technology in its creation. It includes both music made using electronic and electromechanical means ( electroa ...

, and

trombone The trombone (german: Posaune, Italian, French: ''trombone'') is a musical instrument in the brass family. As with all brass instruments, sound is produced when the player's vibrating lips cause the air column inside the instrument to vibrate ...

Huddersfield Polytechnic , mottoeng = Thus not for you alone , established = 1825 – Huddersfield Science and Mechanics' Institute1992 – university status , type = Public , endowment = £2.47 million (2015) , chancellor = George W. Buckley , vice_chancell ...

until 1989, graduating with distinction in 1989. Since September 1989, Ayres has lived and worked in the

Netherlands ) , anthem = ( en, "William of Nassau") , image_map = , map_caption = , subdivision_type = Sovereign state , subdivision_name = Kingdom of the Netherlands , established_title = Before independence , established_date = Spanish Netherl ...

. He studied postgraduate composition course at the

Royal Conservatory of The Hague The Royal Conservatoire ( nl, Koninklijk Conservatorium, KC) is a conservatoire in The Hague, providing higher education in music and dance. The conservatoire was founded by King William I in 1826, making it the oldest conservatoire in the Nether ...

, studying with

Louis Andriessen Louis Joseph Andriessen (; 6 June 1939 – 1 July 2021) was a Dutch composer, pianist and academic teacher. Considered the most influential Dutch composer of his generation, he was a central proponent of The Hague school of composition. Although ...

, and graduating in 1992. From 1990 Richard Ayres has worked as composer receiving performances from among others the

ASKO Ensemble Asko or ASKO may refer to: * Asko (name), a male given name common in Finland and Estonia * Askø, a Danish island * Asko Cylinda or Asko Appliances AB, a Swedish company producing household appliances * AskoSchönberg, a Dutch chamber orchestra ...

, the Schönberg Ensemble, Ives Ensemble, Orkest de Volharding, Maarten Altena Ensemble, The Netherlands Ballet Orchestra,

Netherlands Radio Symphony Orchestra The Netherlands Radio Symphony Orchestra (NRSO) was a Dutch radio orchestra. It was founded in 1985 after a merger of the Promenade Orchestra and the Radio Orchestra (Omroep Orkest). The orchestra participated in various operatic productions and ...

City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra The City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra (CBSO) is a British orchestra based in Birmingham, England. It is the resident orchestra at Symphony Hall: a B:Music Venue in Birmingham, which has been its principal performance venue since 1991. Its a ...

Apartment House An apartment (American English), or flat (British English, Indian English, South African English), is a self-contained housing unit (a type of residential real estate) that occupies part of a building, generally on a single story. There are ...

London Sinfonietta The London Sinfonietta is an English contemporary chamber orchestra founded in 1968 and based in London. The ensemble has headquarters at Kings Place and is Resident Orchestra at the Southbank Centre. Since its inaugural concert in 1968—givi ...

, Klangforum Wien, MusikFabrik, Continuum (Canada) as well as writing for ensembles with more unusual instrumentations formed for specific projects. Ayres received the

Gaudeamus International Composers Award The Gaudeamus International Composers Award is made by the Gaudeamus Foundation. The prize is awarded yearly, to a young composer at Dutch music concert, ''Gaudeamus Muziekweek''. The Gaudeamus Foundation had held an annual music week of Dutch c ...

for composition in 1994. His piece No. 31 (for trumpet and ensemble) received a recommendation at the

UNESCO The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization is a specialized agency of the United Nations (UN) aimed at promoting world peace and security through international cooperation in education, arts, sciences and culture. It ...

Rostrum of Composers in

Paris Paris () is the Capital city, capital and List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), ma ...

in 1999. He received the

Matthijs Vermeulen Award The Matthijs Vermeulen Award is the most important Dutch composition prize. It was named after the Dutch composer Matthijs Vermeulen (1888–1967). During the years 1972 through 2004, the prize was awarded annually by the Amsterdam Foundation f ...

in 2003. He was Featured Composer at the

Huddersfield Festival The Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival (also known by the acronym HCMF, stylised since 2006 as the lowercase hcmf//) is a new music festival held annually in Huddersfield, West Yorkshire, England. Since its foundation in 1978, it has featured ...

in 2003 and his music has been heard at the

Aldeburgh Festival The Aldeburgh Festival of Music and the Arts is an English arts festival devoted mainly to classical music. It takes place each June in the Aldeburgh area of Suffolk, centred on Snape Maltings Concert Hall. History of the Aldeburgh Festival Th ...

: his first opera, The Cricket Recovers was premiered there in 2005. It has since had new productions in Stuttgart, Weimar and Braunschweig. His second opera is ''Peter Pan'' (

Staatsoper Stuttgart The Staatsoper Stuttgart (Stuttgart State Opera) is a German opera company based in Stuttgart, the capital of Baden-Württemberg, Germany. The Staatsorchester Stuttgart serves as its resident orchestra. History Performances of operas, ballet an ...

Komische Oper Berlin The Komische Oper Berlin is a German opera company based in Berlin. The company produces opera, operetta and musicals. The opera house is located on Behrenstraße, just a few steps from Unter den Linden. Since 2004, the Komische Oper Berlin, al ...

Welsh National Opera Welsh National Opera (WNO) ( cy, Opera Cenedlaethol Cymru) is an opera company based in Cardiff, Wales; it gave its first performances in 1946. It began as a mainly amateur body and transformed into an all-professional ensemble by 1973. In its ...

and

Royal Opera House The Royal Opera House (ROH) is an opera house and major performing arts venue in Covent Garden, central London. The large building is often referred to as simply Covent Garden, after a previous use of the site. It is the home of The Royal Ope ...

, 2015). In the orchestral arena his No. 37b for orchestra was premiered at the Donaueschingen Musiktage by the SWR Sinfonieorchester Freiburg and Baden-Baden and has since been taken up by the

Frankfurt Radio Symphony Orchestra The Frankfurt Radio Symphony (german: hr-Sinfonieorchester) is the radio orchestra of Hessischer Rundfunk, the public broadcasting network of the German state of Hesse. From 1929 to 1950 it was named ''Frankfurter Rundfunk-Symphonie-Orchester''. F ...

and the

BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra The BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra (BBC SSO) is a Scottish broadcasting symphony orchestra based in Glasgow. One of five full-time orchestras maintained by the British Broadcasting Corporation ( BBC), it is the oldest full-time professional r ...

. No. 40 NONcerto for oboe and chamber orchestra was premiered by Baart Schneemann and the Netherlands Radio Chamber Orchestra in 2006. 2008 saw the premiere of No. 42 In the Alps for soprano and ensemble which was premiered and toured throughout the

Barbara Hannigan Barbara Hannigan (born 8 May 1971) is a Canadian soprano and conductor, known for her performances of contemporary opera. Education Hannigan's initial musical education came from music teachers in her hometown of Waverley, Nova Scotia, in Ha ...

and the Netherlands Wind Ensemble. He also wrote No. 43 Glorious, a work for chamber ensemble and film – a collaboration with film-maker

Guy Maddin Guy Maddin (born February 28, 1956) is a Canadian screenwriter, director, author, cinematographer, and film editor of both features and short films, as well as an installation artist, from Winnipeg, Manitoba. Since completing his first film i ...

for the SHIFT Festival in

Amsterdam Amsterdam ( , , , lit. ''The Dam on the River Amstel'') is the capital and most populous city of the Netherlands, with The Hague being the seat of government. It has a population of 907,976 within the city proper, 1,558,755 in the urban ar ...

and

Canada Canada is a country in North America. Its ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, covering over , making it the world's second-largest country by tot ...

. His piece No. 52 (''Three pieces about Ludwig van Beethoven: dreaming, hearing loss and saying goodbye'') was given its world premiere at the

BBC Proms The BBC Proms or Proms, formally named the Henry Wood Promenade Concerts Presented by the BBC, is an eight-week summer season of daily orchestral classical music concerts and other events held annually, predominantly in the Royal Albert Hal ...

on 20 September 2020 at the Royal Albert Hall,

London London is the capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary dow ...

, performed by the Aurora Orchestra conducted by

Nicholas Collon Nicholas Collon (born 7 February 1983 in London) is a British conductor. Biography A viola player, organist and pianist by training, Collon played viola in the National Youth Orchestra of Great Britain (NYOGB). He studied at Eton and was an org ...

. That and the piece's second performance were given five star reviews by

The Times ''The Times'' is a British daily national newspaper based in London. It began in 1785 under the title ''The Daily Universal Register'', adopting its current name on 1 January 1788. ''The Times'' and its sister paper '' The Sunday Times'' (f ...

and

The Daily Telegraph ''The Daily Telegraph'', known online and elsewhere as ''The Telegraph'', is a national British daily broadsheet newspaper published in London by Telegraph Media Group and distributed across the United Kingdom and internationally. It was f ...

who, respectively, described the piece as "startlingly joyous" and "deeply moving... gnificent". In January 2004, Ayres was appointed as teacher of composition at the

. He remained in his position here until 2006 and now teaches at the Amsterdam Conservatoire.

Selected works

*No. 8 Piano (solo) 1991 *No. 24 (NONcerto for alto trombone) 1995 *No. 31 (NONcerto for trumpet) 1999 *No. 30 (NONcerto for orchestra, cello and high soprano) 2003 *No. 30a "Schnell aber nicht immer" *No. 33 a-b-c (Valentine Tregashian COnsiders...) 2001 *No. 36 (NONcerto for horn) 2002 *No. 34b (Two pieces for cello and ensemble) 2003 *No. 39 The Cricket Recovers 2005 *No. 37b for Orchestra 2006 *No. 40 (NONcerto for oboe)2006 *No. 41 (Five Memos for Eva) 2007 *No. 42 (In the Alps- an animated concert) 2008 *No. 43 (Glorious) 2008 *No. 47 (Peter Pan) 2015 *No. 48 (Night Studio) 2015 *No. 52 (''Three pieces about Ludwig van Beethoven: dreaming, hearing loss and saying goodbye'') 2020

References

External links

Biography, Chronology, Gallery, Performances, News, Discography, Sample Pages, Works
( Schott Music)
Richard Ayres' Website

Richard Ayres' Myspace Page

Richard Ayres' Page on the London Sinfonietta Website
{{DEFAULTSORT:Ayres, Richard 1965 births English opera composers Gaudeamus Composition Competition prize-winners Living people Male opera composers Pupils of Louis Andriessen Royal Conservatory of The Hague alumni