Christopher Duncan (born 29 July 1989) is a Scottish composer and musician. His compositions have been featured on various television programmes, including '' Waterloo Road'', and have been performed by

Icebreaker An icebreaker is a special-purpose ship or boat designed to move and navigate through ice-covered waters, and provide safe waterways for other boats and ships. Although the term usually refers to ice-breaking ships, it may also refer to smaller ...

and the Sirens of Titan choir. His first solo single, "For", was released in December 2014. He is currently signed to

Bella Union Bella Union is a British independent record label founded in 1997 by Simon Raymonde and Robin Guthrie of Cocteau Twins. It is now run solely by Raymonde. History After releasing records with 4AD for a large part of their career, Cocteau Twin ...

. His debut album ''Architect'' was nominated for the 2015

Mercury Music Prize The Mercury Prize, formerly called the Mercury Music Prize, is an annual music prize awarded for the best album released in the United Kingdom by a British or Irish act. It was created by Jon Webster and Robert Chandler in association with the B ...

. In October 2016, he released his second album ''The Midnight Sun''. On 18 January 2019 Duncan announced his third album, ''Health'', would be released on 29 March 2019. On the same day, he released the first single from ''Health'', "Impossible". ''Health'' was produced by

Elbow The elbow is the region between the arm and the forearm that surrounds the elbow joint. The elbow includes prominent landmarks such as the olecranon, the cubital fossa (also called the chelidon, or the elbow pit), and the lateral and the me ...

's Craig Potter at Blueprint Studios at Salford, Manchester, and will be Duncan's first album he did not record and produce entirely by himself. The album was shortlisted for the

Scottish Album of the Year Award The Scottish Album of the Year (SAY) Award is an award given annually for an outstanding album produced by a Scottish artist. The award was launched in 2012 by thScottish Music Industry Association(SMIA) in partnership with Creative Scotland Cre ...

2019.

Life and career

Duncan's parents are both classical musicians. He initially took up piano and viola as instruments, but playing with bands in his teenage years, he also learned to play guitar, bass and drums. He enrolled in Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama (now the

Royal Conservatoire of Scotland The Royal Conservatoire of Scotland ( gd, Conservatoire Rìoghail na h-Alba), formerly the Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama ( gd, Acadamaidh Rìoghail Ciùil is Dràma na h-Alba) is a conservatoire of dance, drama, music, production, and ...

) to study music composition. His pieces were performed by various ensembles across the UK. Duncan's solo music takes in both classical and modern music and has been described as combining lush choral harmonies and acoustic instrumentation, textured like contemporary dreampop, and a cross of lo-fi folk with the harmonic width of choral composition. He has toured extensively with his band to support both his albums. Duncan is also an artist and has painted the pictures used as covers for his solo releases. Duncan is gay and wishes to use his platform as a recording artist to champion

LGBT ' is an initialism that stands for lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender. In use since the 1990s, the initialism, as well as some of its common variants, functions as an umbrella term for sexuality and gender identity. The LGBT term ...

causes. In a 2016 interview with The Seventh Hex, he said, "''I hope my music reaches as many people as possible. It might sound cheesy, but I honestly want to use my music to help others. For instance, I’m gay and growing up I didn’t have many gay alternative role models, so I’d like to help out in that way too.''" In a 2019 interview with Scottish broadsheet

newspaper A newspaper is a Periodical literature, periodical publication containing written News, information about current events and is often typed in black ink with a white or gray background. Newspapers can cover a wide variety of fields such as p ...

''The Herald'' while promoting his new album ''Health'', he explained to writer Martin Williams that his coming out was difficult intellectually to him and he is eager to contribute his

point of view Point of view or Points of View may refer to: Concept and technique * Point of view (philosophy), an attitude how one sees or thinks of something * Point of view (literature) or narrative mode, the perspective of the narrative voice; the prono ...

to the alternative music community: "''It is still a funny thing to have to do'' (come out to family and friends) ''because of the years of nerves before you do it. Before that you try to be something you are not. You kind of have a switch that goes on and off, certainly for me, but I now know exactly who I am...Gay alternative musicians are not that common, so I hope I can add to the group that are already there.''"

Discography

Albums

Singles

Notes

A The autumn rebuild version of "For" is included on the expanded edition of the album ''Architect''.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Duncan, C Living people 1989 births Musicians from Glasgow 21st-century Scottish male singers 21st-century Scottish male musicians Scottish gay musicians Scottish LGBT singers Gay singers 21st-century Scottish LGBT people Bella Union artists FatCat Records artists