COMPOSITION AND CONTEMPORARY MUSIC - AWS
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COMPOSITION AND CONTEMPORARY MUSIC 2021/22
WELCOME OUR STAFF
The Composition Department is at the heart of creativity and experimentation HEAD OF COMPOSITION VISITING PROFESSORS
at the Royal Academy of Music. Our students collaborate with fellow performers Professor Philip Cashian Hans Abrahamsen Oliver Knussen
in a wide variety of projects, both at the Academy and further afield. In light of Chair of Composition
the Covid-19 crisis, it is more important than ever to address the opportunities DEPARTMENT ADMINISTRATOR Sir Harrison Birtwistle
and challenges facing 21st-century composers, and our cutting-edge curricula AND PROJECT MANAGER Tod Machover
do just that. Lectures, talks, seminars, classes, concerts, recording sessions, Emily Mould James Newton Howard
installations, collaborations, rehearsals, interviews, workshops and multimedia Andrew Norman
live events make up the core activity of this busy department. Bent Sørensen
Ryan Wigglesworth Richard Rodney
As a student at the Academy, you will become part of an institution that enjoys Bennett Professor of Music
extraordinary levels of success. Recent composition alumni have been awarded
places on young composers’ schemes with the London Philharmonic, London PRINCIPAL STUDY PROFESSORS
Symphony and Philharmonia orchestras and been commissioned by the BBC Dr Rubens Askenar
Proms, LA Phil and Aurora Orchestra, as well as working on numerous opera Christopher Austin
and multimedia projects. Gary Carpenter
Professor Philip Cashian
PROFESSOR PHILIP CASHIAN Dr Edmund Finnis
Head of Composition Helen Grime MBE
Morgan Hayes
David Sawer
I chose the LECTURERS
Dr Philip Dawson
Academy for Dr Gareth Moorcraft
its unrivalled Paul Morley
opportunities, HONORARY RESEARCH FELLOWS
including weekly Dr Tansy Davies
one-to-one Huw Watkins
composition CONTACT
lessons with Tel: +44 (0)20 7873 7379
such respected Email: composition@ram.ac.uk
Web: ram.ac.uk/composition
composers as
David Sawer,
Edmund Finnis
and Gary
CarpenterCOURSES BMUS COURSE
The Composition Department has an international reputation thanks
to its innovative undergraduate and postgraduate courses
As a composer in the Academy, you will be given numerous opportunities
to have your music played and recorded, and to develop your individual
compositional style and musical personality.
The four-year BMus course is designed to prepare you for the professional world
and equip you with the skills you will need to work in a broad range of musical
genres and disciplines. It is clearly structured, while still allowing flexibility for
specific areas of interest to flourish.
Whether your interests lie in concert music, electronic music, media,
The one-year MA and one- or two-year MMus courses are designed to enable TV and film music or composing for staged productions, you can
advanced students to develop artistically and technically by means of a cohesive tailor your studies to suit
yet contrasting series of commissions, projects and tasks.
As an undergraduate composer you can choose to write for the Academy
The MPhil/PhD is designed to encourage postgraduate composers to pursue their Symphony Orchestra, Manson Ensemble (chamber orchestra), brass dectet,
artistic development to the highest possible level, and to reflect critically upon Academy Symphonic Wind or wind quintet/string quintet mixed ensemble
the significance of their compositional activity through analytical exploration and each year. Your new piece will be workshopped and recorded during a
collaborative work in the Academy’s rich performance environment. three-hour session.
Our composition professors are dedicated teachers and active composers with a In addition, we hold three Composers’ Platform concerts each year, consisting
wide range of industry knowledge and insight. Distinguished visiting composers entirely of student premieres. Two of these concerts take place outside the
work with students in masterclasses, give lectures and teach one-to-one lessons Academy, to offer students a more public profile for their work.
on a regular basis.
All undergraduate students receive a one-hour lesson each week with their
principal study professor. You will be encouraged to swap lessons with a fellow
student twice a term to get a fresh perspective on your work. There are also
opportunities to have a lesson with our biannual composers in residence and
visiting professors.
BMus students choose four works to submit to their portfolio at the end of each
year. These will grow in duration and scale over the course of your training. In
your first and second years you will take classes in orchestration, technology and
techniques of composition, as well as repertoire classes and weekly seminars.
You will also compose music for recording sessions as part of the Music and
Media Applications module.
In your third and fourth years, you will continue studies in orchestration and
technology, alongside further modules in improvisation, writing for theatre,
electronic music, analysis and structure.MA AND MMUS COURSES RECENT HIGHLIGHTS
Build on the strong foundations you already have, honing your • Over 120 new student concert of new student • A student performance
skills with a full schedule of project work works premiered in the choral works with of Hans Abrahamsen’s
last academic year. Blossom Street chamber piano concerto.
The main focus of our MA and MMus courses is a series of projects running choir, led by Judith Weir.
throughout the year that offer you the opportunity to write new pieces for • The Art of Chaos, a • Six new film scores
concerts and events in the Academy calendar. You will have the chance to three-day festival of • A PhD student project written for RADA.
workshop and try out works in progress prior to performance. new student work at Tokyo University of
with sound and video the Arts, collaborating • Six student premieres
Current postgraduate composers can choose to write new works for the installations, political with traditional of site-specific works
following projects: cabaret, animation and Japanese musicians for wind, brass and
concerts in Shoreditch. on new pieces. percussion at The
• CHROMA Ensemble Hepworth Wakefield.
• Mark Simpson, Huw Watkins and Zoë Martlew trio • Composers in • Master’s students
• Audio/video installations for the Academy’s Music and Time festival Residence Hans in 2016, 2017, 2018 • Students wrote for the
• Trio Mazzolini Abrahamsen, Harrison and 2019 took part London Symphony
• Spatial brass ensembles project Birtwistle, Georg in Creative Dialogue Orchestra’s Panufnik
• Opera Scenes project Friedrich Haas, workshops in the Composers Scheme,
• Marylebone ‘Changing Lives’ film project Andrew Norman, USA and Finland with the Philharmonia
• Piano and electronics project with George Fu Bent Sørensen and John Paul Jones, Composers’ Academy,
• Project with the guitar department Anna Thorvaldsdottir Anssi Karttunen, the BBC Symphony
• Creative transcription ensemble project attended concerts of Magnus Lindberg Orchestra’s Embedded
• Hill Quartet project their music and gave and Kaija Saariaho. Composer Scheme, the
masterclasses, seminars LPO Young Composers
You will also be encouraged to collaborate with Academy performers to organise and one to-one lessons. • Talks and masterclasses Scheme, Sound and
and put on your own concerts. Eleanor Alberga and with John Adams, Music’s Next Wave
Mark-Anthony Turnage Harrison Birtwistle and project, the Avanti!
At the end of your first year, you will write a 10-minute work for the Academy are in residence during the Gildas Quartet, Chamber Orchestra,
Symphony Orchestra. This will be rehearsed and recorded at the beginning of 2020/21. Gavin Bryars, Tom CBSO, RTÉ National
your second year. Coult, Laurence Crane, Symphony Orchestra
• Student premieres with Chaya Czernowin, and Ensemble Modern.
Postgraduate composers receive a 90-minute lesson each week with their the Academy Manson James Dillon, Rebecca
principal study professor and are encouraged to swap lessons occasionally to get Ensemble conducted Fiebrink, Michael • The week-long Sound
a fresh perspective from other professors. There will be the opportunity to have a by Christopher Austin Finnissy, Julia Haferkorn, & Vision music and
lesson with the biannual composer in residence and with visiting professors. and Tim Weiss, Emily Howard, Anssi art festival.
Academy Soloists led Karttunen, Christian
You will also take orchestration, conducting and technology modules. The by Clio Gould, Hermes Mason, Cassandra • Students created music
contemporary music workshop allows composition students to collaborate and Experiment, Echéa Miller, James Newton for the innovative
experiment with Master’s performers in the creation of new work. In your second Quartet, Colin Currie, Howard, Gascia Music for Trees app
year of study, you can choose between undertaking an analysis project of your Tabea Debus, Zubin Ouzounian, Mark in collaboration with
choice or curating a concert project. Kanga, Zoë Martlew, Simpson and Royal Parks.
Huw Watkins and a Philip Venables.PATRON HM The Queen PRESIDENT HRH The Duchess of Gloucester GCVO PRINCIPAL Professor Jonathan Freeman-Attwood CBE The Academy is a registered charity, number 310007, and a company registered with Companies House, number RC000438. royalacademyofmusic royalacademyofmusic RoyalAcadMusic royalacademyofmusic MARYLEBONE ROAD, LONDON NW1 5HT +44 (0)20 7873 7373 | RAM.AC.UK
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