tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-47234487186736743032024-03-13T03:03:06.486-07:00RHIAN SAMUELRHIAN SAMUEL,
Composer,
LONDON and WALES
Unknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger1125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4723448718673674303.post-15696105473147462822019-09-27T09:32:00.030-07:002024-03-11T05:46:24.124-07:00<blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><div dir="ltr" style="text-align: justify;" trbidi="on"><div class="separator" en-us="" style="background-color: black; font-family: arial; text-align: justify;"><span style="color: #fff2cc;">Composer Rhian Samuel was born in Aberdare, Wales, in 1944 to a Welsh-speaking, musical family and has lived in Britain and the United States. </span><span style="color: #fff2cc; font-family: "arial";">She writes orchestral music, chamber music and vocal and choral music and has worked with many of today's foremost classical artists. </span><span style="color: #fff2cc; font-family: "arial";">Her large orchestral works include </span><i style="caret-color: rgb(255, 242, 204);"><a href="https://youtu.be/P9AifUSoia0"><span style="color: #01ffff;">Elegy-Symphony</span></a></i><span style="font-family: "arial";"><span style="color: #fff2cc;"> (St Louis Symphony Orchestra, Leonard Slatkin, conductor, 1981); </span><i><a href="https://youtu.be/41HWaJ3KJFQ"><span style="color: #01ffff;">Clytemnestra</span></a></i><span style="color: #fff2cc;"><a href="https://youtu.be/41HWaJ3KJFQ"> </a>(1994) for soprano and orchestra, which was released on disc in 2020 and short-listed for a Gramophone Award, </span><i><a href="https://youtu.be/F7ILaYaWvug" target="_blank"><span style="color: #01ffff;">Dawnsiau'r Nant / Dances of the Stream</span></a></i><span style="color: #fff2cc;"> (1999) and </span></span><i style="caret-color: rgb(255, 242, 204); color: #fff2cc;"><a href="https://youtu.be/MqLV8aC0jmE"><span style="color: cyan;">Tirluniau / Landscapes </span></a></i><span style="color: #fff2cc; font-family: "arial";">(2000), which was premiered at the BBC Millennium Proms in the Albert Hall by the BBC National Orchestra of Wales (BBCNOW), Tadaaki Otaka, conductor. </span><span style="color: #fff2cc; font-family: "arial";">In the USA, among many other awards, she was joint winner of the ASCAP-Rudolph Nissim Award, 1983, from The American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers, for her choral-orchestral work, </span><i style="caret-color: rgb(255, 242, 204); color: #fff2cc;">La belle dame sans merci</i><span style="color: #fff2cc; font-family: "arial";">. In the UK she won first prize at the Greenwich Festival (1979) and has received subsequent accolades including the Glyndŵr Medal for services to the Arts in Wales and an Hon DMus from the University of Wales. </span><span style="color: #fff2cc; font-family: "arial";">To date over 140 of her works have been published. </span></div><div trbidi="on"><div style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><div class="MsoNormal"><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: arial; text-align: left;"><br /></span></div></div></div></div><div class="separator" en-us="" style="background-color: black; color: #fff2cc; font-family: arial; text-align: justify;"><span style="color: #fff2cc;"><span style="text-align: left;">I</span></span><span style="background-color: transparent; text-align: left;"><span style="color: #fff2cc;">nfluences on the music of Rhian Samuel include her rich Welsh literary and musical heritage, the landscape of her present home in mid-Wales and her long sojourn in the USA. She is interested in all facets of classical music, particularly early music and American music; in her youth she played the oboe in orchestras and the viol and wind instruments in early music groups; she completed a PhD with a study of 16th-century vocal music. She identifies with her female colleagues in a profession still dominated by males, seeing her position, somewhat outside the male tradition, as an exciting one with many challenges and opportunities.</span></span></div></div></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><div style="text-align: justify;" trbidi="on"><div style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><div class="MsoNormal"><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: arial; text-align: left;"><br /></span></div></div></div></div><div style="text-align: justify;" trbidi="on"><span style="color: #fff2cc; font-family: arial;"><div style="background-color: black;"><span style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0);">Rhian Samuel's orchestral works have been premiered by BBCNOW, the St Louis Symphony Orchestra, Sinfonia 21, the Brunel Ensemble, the BT Scottish Ensemble, Sinfonia Adesso and others. Vocal music is also an important part of her output; she has written works, including 20 song-cycles and song-sets, for many renowned solo singers </span><span style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0);">with orchestra, piano and/or chamber ensemble. </span><span style="font-size: 16px; text-align: left;">Throughout her career she has sung in and</span><span style="font-size: 16px; text-align: left;"> </span><span style="font-size: 16px; text-align: left;">conducted choirs</span><span style="font-size: 16px; text-align: left;"> </span><span style="font-size: 16px; text-align: left;">and written </span><span style="color: #fff2cc; font-family: arial; font-size: 12pt; text-align: left;">music for them, including her own choirs at Reading University and City University, London, UK. As a graduate student in the USA she sang </span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #fff2cc; font-family: arial; font-size: 12pt; text-align: left;">in the Washington </span><span style="background-color: transparent; font-size: 16px; text-align: left;">University </span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #fff2cc; font-family: arial; font-size: 12pt; text-align: left;">Madrigal </span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #fff2cc; font-family: arial; font-size: 16px; text-align: left;">Singers at</span><span style="color: #fff2cc; font-family: arial; font-size: 12pt; text-align: left;"> the White House for President Lyndon Johnson</span><span style="color: #fff2cc; font-family: arial; font-size: 16px; text-align: left;">. Other c</span><span style="caret-color: rgb(255, 242, 204); color: #fff2cc; font-family: arial; font-size: 16px; text-align: left;">hoirs for whom she has written include </span><span style="color: #fff2cc; font-family: arial; font-size: 12pt; text-align: left;">the BBC Singers and New College (Oxford) Choir and its directors, </span><span style="caret-color: rgb(255, 242, 204); color: #fff2cc; font-family: arial; font-size: 16px; text-align: left;">Edward Higginbottom and </span><span style="color: #fff2cc; font-family: arial; font-size: 12pt; text-align: left;">Robert Quinney, as well as many college and high school choirs in the UK and USA.</span></div></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;" trbidi="on"><div><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif" style="text-align: center;"><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="background-color: black; color: #fff2cc; font-family: arial; font-size: 12pt; text-align: left;"><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="font-family: Times; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody><tr><td><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiiDMDu71EETWkL7cNSfih3GtIY6AI1-HC9BOt4AWeRKt8qQ7gmosAoVIUDTiF3kN7-VNKJM6uBrRbOdM-xQl51qF8Gw29ZkWkqpTEHEZNEzNTjmtEJIft3Wi9ME9wvBXFfFHTV0qdpZ_8/s1600/RS+White+House.jpg" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="248" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiiDMDu71EETWkL7cNSfih3GtIY6AI1-HC9BOt4AWeRKt8qQ7gmosAoVIUDTiF3kN7-VNKJM6uBrRbOdM-xQl51qF8Gw29ZkWkqpTEHEZNEzNTjmtEJIft3Wi9ME9wvBXFfFHTV0qdpZ_8/w342-h248/RS+White+House.jpg" width="342" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption"><span style="font-family: times;"><i style="font-size: 13px;">The Washington University Madrigal Singers at the White House </i><br /><i style="font-size: 13px;">(RS is in the back row, just to the right of the conductor's hand)</i></span><i style="font-family: arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;"> </i></td></tr></tbody></table></span></div></span></div></div><div style="text-align: justify;" trbidi="on"><div><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;"><span><span style="background-color: black; color: #fff2cc; font-family: arial;">Rhian Samuel is co-editor of the ground-breaking <i>New Grove/Norton Dictionary of Women Composers </i>(1994); her much-quoted preface to this dictionary discusses the situation of women composers over the previous 100+ years. She has also written articles on several of the operas of Harrison Birtwistle, including <i>Gawain</i>, <i>The Minotaur</i> and <i>The Second Mrs Kong</i>, publishing for the two former works both the programme notes for the ROH (invited to do so by the composer) and diaries of their first productions for the <i>Cambridge Opera Journal</i>.</span><span style="background-color: black;"> </span></span><span style="background-color: #444444; color: #fff2cc; font-family: arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span style="background-color: black; font-size: 12pt; text-align: start;">In the United States, she taught at Washington University, St Louis, where she completed her doctorate on 16th-century </span><span style="background-color: black; font-size: 12pt; text-align: start;"><i>musica ficta,</i></span><span style="background-color: black; font-size: 12pt; text-align: start;"> and the St Louis Conservatory of Music as Head of the Theory and Composition Department. In 1984 she returned to the UK, teaching at Kings College London, then </span></span></span><span style="background-color: #444444; color: #fff2cc; font-family: arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif" style="font-style: italic;"><span style="background-color: black; font-size: 12pt; font-style: normal; text-align: start;">Reading University. In 1995 she moved to </span></span></span><span style="background-color: black; caret-color: rgb(255, 242, 204); color: #fff2cc; font-family: arial; font-size: 16px; text-align: left;">City University, London, </span><span style="background-color: black; color: #fff2cc; font-family: arial; font-size: 12pt; text-align: start;">where she is now Emeritus Professor. She also </span><span style="background-color: black; caret-color: rgb(255, 242, 204); color: #fff2cc; font-family: arial; font-size: 16px; text-align: left;">taught composition at Magdalen College</span><span style="background-color: black; color: #fff2cc; font-family: arial; font-size: 12pt; text-align: start;">, Oxford University, where she was a member of the Music Faculty. She now composes full-time at her home in mid-Wales and in London. </span></p></div></div><div style="text-align: justify;" trbidi="on"><div><div><div><span style="background-color: black; color: #fff2cc; font-family: times; font-size: 12pt; text-align: start;"><br /></span></div></div></div></div><div style="text-align: justify;" trbidi="on"><div><span style="background-color: black; color: #fff2cc; font-family: arial; font-size: 12pt; text-align: start;">Much of Rhian Samuel’s music is published by Stainer & Bell Ltd, while many works are published by Tŷ Cerdd (the Welsh Music Information Centre). Others are published by Novello, Cadenza, ABRSM, Curiad, Simrock and Andresier/Bardic. </span></div><div trbidi="on"><div style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><div class="MsoNormal"><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: arial; text-align: left;"><br /></span></div></div></div></div><div><span style="background-color: black; color: #fff2cc; font-family: "arial";"><i>Performances of many of Rhian's works are on CD and/or on YouTube. This website has links to the latter: to hear individual pieces, go to any of the pages listing works by instrumentation (</i></span><span style="background-color: black; color: #fff2cc; font-family: arial;"><i>1-12) and click on</i> 'LISTEN'. <i>The CDs are listed in the </i>DISCOGRAPHY<i> and many may be accessed via Spotify.</i></span></div></div></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><p style="text-align: center;"><span style="color: #ea9999;"><i> NB: to use the contact form with Safari, in app. settings, under 'Hide IP address', 'Trackers' must be 'Off'. </i></span></p></blockquote>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com