Diana Burrell
Burrell’s first major orchestral piece, simply entitled Landscape (1988) has been described as depicting both a wild windswept countryside and a tough urban vista. The use of instruments in their extreme registers is a hallmark of the diversity of orchestral palette the composer puts at her disposal in all her works. Landscape is one of the recent ‘Encore’ winners (an award organised by the Royal Philharmonic Society and BBC Radio 3 and sponsored by the PRS Foundation).
Diana Burrell’s body of work covers the spectrum of compositional achievement from the 1993 String Quartet Gulls and Angels to chamber ensemble pieces such as the vividly ritualistic dreamscape Barrow (1991), opera (The Albatross, written in 1987 and premiered to great critical acclaim by Trinity College of Music in June 1997) and of course her dramatic and colourful Symphonies of Flocks, Herds and Shoals (1995-6) which was a commission from the BBC and was premiered in 1997 by the BBC Symphony Orchestra. She has also written many works for young and amateur performers with both respect and imagination, never lowering her compositional sights or blunting the edge of her style.
Her more recent works include Gold (2001), a bright, virtuosic piece for piano and 7 brass players, the Concerto for Violin with Singer and 3 Ensembles (2009) with its fresh and intense sound world, and the wide-ranging yet often intimate structures of the 8 separate works which make up The Hours (2011). This major set of pieces for the organ (or related instruments such as accordion and harmonium) sets the instrument at the core of various different and unusual chamber ensembles, the whole being structured around the ancient, liturgical ‘Hours’ of the Church.
Blaze, a BBC Proms commission for the Norwegian brass group tenThing was premiered in 2013 at the Cadogan Hall. A second BBC commission, this time for the BBC Symphony Orchestra, lead to the Concerto for Brass and Orchestra, premiered at the Barbican in December 2016 and conducted by Jukka-Pekka Saraste. In the same year Diana was commissioned by Brentwood Cathedral in Essex to write a new setting of the ‘Missa Brevis’, a work that has recently been heard at the London Festival of Contemporary Church Music and the Three Choirs Festival. More recent works include anthems for New Music Wells, Pentecost, a large-scale work for piano solo, written for Matthew Schellhorn, and a Christmas Carol for the Choir of St Catharine’s College, Cambridge.
During her time as Artistic Director of the Harwich Festival (2012-2014), Diana’s bold, imaginative programming, with its emphasis on the contemporary and the thought-provoking, attracted national acclaim, greatly lifting the profile of the festival. Diana’s own music has been called fresh and vital, uncompromising in its integrity whilst communicating directly to the listener. She has written of the need for ‘strong, rough-edged things, brave disrespectful shapes and sounds…’ as much a reference to her love of modern architecture as a declaration of her compositional creed. She has succeeded in creating a unique, personal language which is both primeval and unequivocally of our time.
Photo © Steve Brading (www.stevebradingphotography.com)
First performance: 3 September 1993, COMA, Sheffield.
First performance: ECO Wind & Brass Ensemble/David Parry, Greenwich Festival.
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First performance: 7 April 2017, Benjamin Goldscheider (horn), European Union Chamber Orchestra/Eva Stegmann, Bradford Cathedral, UK.
First performance: 14 September 1996, Robert Plane (clarinet), Northern Sinfonia/John Lubbock, Hexham Abbey Festival.
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First performance: 7 December 2016, BBC Symphony Orchestra, Jukka-Pekka Saraste, conductor, Barbican Hall, London.
First performance: 15 October 1992, Orchestra of St John's Smith Square/John Lubbock, London.
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Texts from Lille Verden by Tove Ditlevsen (1917-76).
First performance: 13 October 1996, Barbican Hall, London, City of London Sinfonia, conductor Richard Hickox.
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First performance: 12 December 1994, The City of London Sinfonia, London.
First performance: 8 January 1998, William Bennett (flutes), London Schools Symphony Orchestra/John Lubbock, Barbican Hall, London.
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First performance: Piccadilly Festival Players/Ivor Bolton.
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Written for BBC TV's The Cry of the Cosmos, Easter 1989. BBC Symphony Orchestra/Lionel Friend.
First performance: Fulham Symphony Orchestra/Joseph Vandernoot.
First performance: 21 May 1993, Bournemouth Sinfonietta/Tamas Vasary, Newbury Spring Festival.
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First performance: 1 July 1996, Borders Regional Wind Orchestra, European Youth Music Festival, Ishøj, Denmark.
First performance: Norfolk County Youth Orchestra.
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First performance: 5 February 1997, BBC Symphony Orchestra/Michael Schønwandt, Royal Festival Hall, London.
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First performance: 19 June 2009, London CoMA Ensemble, Gregory Rose, director, Christ Church, Spitalfields, London.
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First performance: 31 May 2003, CoMA, Assembly Rooms, Bath.
1. Vigils - organ, 2 flutes(doubl. 2 alto flutes), 2 violins, 2 double basses, 2 percussion - 19'.
2. Lauds - organ & electronics - 11'.
3. Prime - cello & accordion - 8'.
4. Terce - organ & accordion - 12'.
5. Sext - harmonium, keyboard, cello, 3 singers (S.Mz.T) - 12'.
6. None - 2 bassoons, 2 tubas, 2 perc, organ, 2 double basses - 16'.
7. Vespers - oboe (doubl. c.a. & E flat musette), 2 bassoons, 2 tubas, 2 perc, organ, harmonium, accordion, keyboard, 3 solo voices (S.Mz.T), 2 violins, cello, 2 double basses - 26'.
8. Compline - organ, 2 alto flutes, 1 sop saxophone, 1 player to play 2 'home-made' organs, swanee whistle, maraca, shell-chimes - 14'.
First complete performance: 27 October 2011, St Marylebone Parish Church, London, performers from the Royal Academy of Music.
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First performance: 6 October 1994, Jane Atkins (viola), Orchestra of Saint John's, Smith Square/John Lubbock, Norfolk and Norwich Festival.
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First performance: A Man, A Woman and A Double Bass.
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6 pieces that can be performed separately and in any order: Ritual, War Cries 1 and 2, Weights, Hurdles, Trapeze.
Commissioned by Sharp Edge, the new music ensemble of the RPO.
First performance: 29th May 2000 at the Albert Hall, Nottingham.
First performance: 19 June 1991, Jane's Minstrels, London.
First performance: 15 July 2000, Members of NYOGB, Pittville Pump Room, Cheltenham.
Commissioned by the BBC Proms.
First performance: 10 August 2013, Cadogan Hall, London, tenThing, Tine Thing Helseth, director.
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First performance: 20 June 1998, Brunel Ensemble/Christopher Austin, Bristol.
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First performance: Guildhall String Ensemble.
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First performance: 26 May 1996, Chard Festival.
First performance: 3 November 1999, Michael Tippett Centre, Bath by Double Image.
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First performance: 31 October 1998, New Zealand String Quartet, Hamilton, New Zealand.
First performance: 14 April 1997 Guildhall String Ensemble, Wigmore Hall, London.
Commissioned jointly by Huddersfield Festival and Thames Valley University.
First performance: 28 November 2001 by the Royal Northern Brass Ensemble and Philip Mead.
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First performance: 12 April 1994, Sorrel Quartet, London.
First performance: 17 August 1992, Mary Wiegold, soprano, The Composers' Ensemble, Dartington.
May be performed with 'Shadow'.
First performance: Orchestra of St John's, Smith Square, John Lubbock, conductor.
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First performance: 1979, Wren Consort, Spitalfields Festival.
First performance: 21 April 1999, Wigmore Hall, London.
May be performed with 'Io!'
First performance: The Orchestra of St John's, Smith Square, John Lubbock, conductor.
First performance: 20 October 1988, The Mühlfeld Trio.
First performance: 10 November 1990, Capricorn.
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Mary Magdalene (mezzo-soprano), Peter (baritone), Jesus Christ (tenor), Woman - takes role of Narrator/ Servant Girl / a Disciple (soprano), Man - takes roles of 'Angel' at the Tomb / a Disciple (tenor).
Ensemble: clarinet, trumpet, violin, cello, bassoon, percussion (1 player)
Directed from the chamber organ.
Duncan Pike (tenor), Hilda Pike (soprano), Ted Flint (tenor), Davey Ward (baritone), Old Beattie (contralto), Alice Flint (mezzo soprano), Esther Ward (mezzo soprano), barmaid (soprano), 4 children, 4 fishermen (2 tenors, baritone, bass).
Orchestra: 2(picc)1(ca)2(bhn)1(cbn)/3000/3 perc/strings (min44321).
First performances: 10-12 July 1997, Trinity Opera Group and Instrumental Ensemble, cond. Christopher Fifield, director Stephen Langridge, Spitalfields Market Opera, London.
First performance: 2 May 1998, Allegri Singers, Michael Nicholas, conductor, London.
First performance: 20 November 1996, Festival of St Cecilia, London.
First performance: 24 December 1993, King's College Chapel Choir, Cambridge, Stephen Cleobury, conductor.
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First performance: 27 August 1993, Three Choirs Festival, Worcester.
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First performance: 14 October 2018, Wells Cathedral Choir conducted by Matthew Owens, as part of the festival 'new music wells 78-18'.
Duration c.5'.
First performance: 26 September 1993, St Matthew's Church, Northampton.
Recorded for BBC Radio 3 by the BBC Singers and City of London Sinfonia, Richard Hickox, conductor.
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First performance: 26 May 1990, London, The Centre for Young Musicians, Ian Humphris, conductor.
First performance: 27 April 1996, Norwich Cathedral Choir.
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First performance: Holy Trinity Church, Mile End, London.
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First performance: 1980 St Endellion Festival, Richard Hickox, conductor.
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First performance: 18 December 1991, London.
First performance: 18 October 2018, Wells Cathedral Choir, Jeremy Cole (organ), and Matthew Owens (conductor), during the festival 'new music wells 78-18'.
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First performance: 21 November 1991, New London Children's Choir, Ronald Corp, conductor.
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First performance: 6 August 1990, David Titterington, BBC Proms, London.
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First performance: 16 November 1991, Bradley Creswick, London.
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First performance: 28 July 1992, Fiona Cross and Kathryn Page, Shropshire.
Publ. ABRSM - Spectrum Vol.1.
Publ. ABRSM - Spectrum Vol.2.
First performance: Oundle Festival, Kevin Bowyer, organ.
First performance: 5 July 2015, Jane Chapman, harpsichord, St Nicholas Church, Harwich, as part of the Harwich Festival.
First performance: Lowri Blake and Caroline Palmer.
'The Hours' No.2.
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First performance: 2 July 1991, Mecklenburgh Opera, London.
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Commissioned by Matthew Schellhorn.
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'The Hours' No.3.
Commissioned by the Royal Academy of Music for their '200 PIECES' Bicentenary project.
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'The Hours' No.4.
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