Hidden Treasures

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Luna Alcalay – Una Strofa di Dante (1967)
Presented by: Austria – ORF / Österreich 1
Luna Alcalay was born in Zagreb in 1928. After her family moved to Vienna she studied piano and composition there at the Conservatoire, from 1951. After successfully completing her studies in 1958, she gained a scholarship to spend a year at the Austrian Cultural Institute in Rome. From 1963 to 1995 she taught piano at the Universität für Musik in Vienna. She registered international successes early on, also being the recipient of numerous prizes. Her compositional beginnings lay in serialism, and this, following stimuli from the Darmstadt Summer Courses in the 60s, and Bruno Maderna, led to her finding a system of her own. In the 70s she began to engage with multi-media forms of expression. . In 1968, on commission from the Austrian Music Council, she composed a “UNO-Cantata”, setting the text of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. In 1985 she wrote the opera “Jan Palach”. She died on October 9th 2012 in Vienna.
Julia Tsenova – Unveiling Isis (1998)
Presented by: Bulgaria – Bulgarian National Radio
Julia Tsenova was among the strongest and distinct voices in Bulgarian contemporary music for decades. On the the other hand, unlike the younger generations, she has not the chance to extensively travel, study abroad and achieve wider recognition. “Unveiling Isis” is one of her best compositions, bringing the listener to different worlds, both ancient and contemporary, eastern and western, composed and improvised.
Olja Jelaska – Blue Wave (1967)
Presented by: Croatia – Croatian Radiotelevision
Olja Jelaska born in Split 1967, graduated theory and composition at Music Academy in Zagreb, where she is a full time professor from 2016. (from 1997. she was professor at the Art Academy in Split). After graduation, she attended masterclasses in Białystok and Darmstadt, and she participated in the activities of the Mediterranean Music Academies in Damascus. She has recieved numerous and significant national awards, her music is performed at major festivals in Croatia, but also in Slovenia, Portugal, Italy, USA, Sweden, China and other countries. Her output is mostly chamber, but there is also orchestral, vocal and concertante works, and two chamber operas. Her music has specific spirituality and Mediterranean colours, as well as clear formal aspect, and there is obvious quest for the sound which could be used in “a coherent, contemporary, prosodicaly poetic and masterfully refined manner”, as one critic said.
Soňa Vetchá- Hyperkrychle (2018)
Presented by: Czechia – Czech Radio
Soňa Vetchá (1992) studied piano and composition at the Brno Conservatory, under the mentorship of Dagmar Pančochová and Pavel Zemek Novák. She later continued at the Academy of Performing Arts in Prague (AMU) completing her bachelor and master degrees of music composition with prof. Ivan Kurz. She now studies the PhD degree at AMU under the supervision of Slavomír Hořínka and Zdeněk Otčenášek. Within her doctoral studies, Soňa researches the impact of auditory illusions on composition process. She applies the qualities of psychoacoustic illusions and their impact on the listener in most of her recent compositions. Since 2017, she is a member of the international Swedish group of composers Föreningen Musikspektra T and since 2019 she is a member of Konvergence, Umělecká beseda, and Czech Composers Society music composers‘ groups. Soňa figured at several international festivals and concerts of contemporary music (Prague, Brno, Ostrava, Bratislava, Brussels, Sweden, USA, Italy, etc.).
Kirstine Lindemann- Further And Back (2015)
Presented by: Denmark – DR (Danmarks Radio)
With a special interest in the body as the origin of compositional material Kirstine Lindemann focuses on the space between you and I. She explores the limitations and the possibilities of connection posed by the body when understood as a musical instrument. Based in Denmark, Lindemann (33) tours the world both as a composer and performer. She studied at the music academies in Helsinki, Amsterdam and Odense, and holds a degree of advanced postgraduate studies as a physical performer and recorder player. As one of the most talented composer-performers in Europe, Lindemann is part of the prestigious Danish Arts Council’s program: ‘The Young Artistic Elite’ supporting artists. Among her many grants and awards is the Dioraphte Gold Award at Amsterdam Fringe Festival. She is currently developing the installation ‘Between Strings’ which will be performed by her duo “OTHER EYE” in Theaterhaus Stuttgart in 2021. Their work was hailed by the press as one of the highlights of the 2018 IMD, Darmstadt.
Galina Grigorjeva – Молитва (2013)
Presented by: Estonia – Estonian Public Broadcasting
The works of Galina Grigorjeva are deeply rooted in Russian culture and spirituality, Old Russian folklore and Orthodox sacred music. An open and vehement Slavonic soul finds its voice in her music, but the texture of its sound is modernistically structured and precise. The compositions of Grigorjeva mostly convey a suggestive spiritual message and are dramaturgically convincing. Due to prescision to detail, Grigorjeva may conventionally, in the broad sense of the word, be considered a minimalist. The sound world of her works is transparent, she pays attention to each single interval and timbre. Her works quite often contain magic repetitions; these, however, do not aim at the static or the intuitional, but rather at a process in music, mirroring the journeys of human soul. Born in Ukraine, Galina Grigorjeva studied at the Simferopol Music School and Odessa Conservatoire. In 1991, she graduated from the St. Petersburg Conservatoire under Prof. Yuri Falik and was engaged in postgraduate studies with Lepo Sumera at the Estonian Academy of Music in 1994–1998. Now she works as a freelance composer.
Maria Kallionpää – El Canto del Mar Infinito (2020)
Presented by: Finland – YLE
Dr. Maria Kallionpää (1981) is an internationally active composer and pianist, currently working as an assistant professor at the Hong Kong Baptist University, and as a composer in residence of the Mixed Reality Laboratory of the Nottingham University. Her research as postdoctoral fellow (2016-2018) at the University of Aalborg focused on gamification as a composition technique (funded by Kone Foundation, Finland). Furthermore, as a winner of the Fabbrica Young Artist Development Program of Opera di Roma, Kallionpää was commissioned to compose an opera (fp: Teatro Nazionale, Rome, Oct 2017). In collaboration with her colleague Markku Klami, Kallionpää has composed the first full length puppet opera produced in the Nordic Countries (fp: March 2018). Kallionpää was a laureate of Académie de France à Rome in 2016. She got her PhD in composition at the university of Oxford in 2015 and has graduated from the Royal Academy of Music (2009) and Universität für Musik und Darstellende Kunst Wien (2010). Kallionpää won the first prize of the OUPHIL composition competition in 2013.
Kristín Þóra Haraldsdóttir  – Blóðhófnir (2016)
Presented by: Iceland – RÚV
Kristín Þóra Haraldsdóttir is a composer and interdisciplinary performer, with viola as her main instrument. Her compositions include solo instrumental music, songs, chamber music, orchestral work and physical-/music theatre, which have been performed in Iceland and abroad by herself as well as soloists and groups such as Tinna Þorsteinsdóttir, Umbra Ensemble, Nordic Affect, Trio XelmYa, Kúbus and Icelandic Symphony Orchestra. Her piece ‘Water’s Voice’ for Orchestra was nominated by the Icelandic National Broadcasting Service for the 62nd International Rostrum of Composers in Tallin in 2015. As a performer, Kristín has a rich background in playing with groups and ensembles ranging in an array of styles. Kristín is an explorative improvisor who uses gesture and touch as means of sonic expressions. She has lent her voice and viola playing to numerous records, and is currently a member of the Icelandic-Belgian band Mógil and Icelandic Umbra ensemble. She released her first solo record this year, performing solo guitar and field recordings, with the VDSQ label in the United States. She has performed and premiered viola pieces written by her contemporaries at festivals such as Dark Music Days, Tectonics Reykjavík and Glasgow and Dogstar festival in Los Angeles. Kristín studied viola performance and composition at Iceland Academy of the Arts (’09), and holds an MFA in performance/composition form California Institute of the Arts (’11).
Viola Yuen  – Living with Despair (2008)
Presented by: Hong Kong SAR – RTHK
Viola Yuen is an active composer, arranger, conductor and an A Cappella singer who is enthusiastic about the application of human voices in musical compositions of different styles. Her music displays uniqueness, originality and profound emotions. She is currently an adjunct lecturer of the Hong Kong Academy for Performing Arts, conductor of the Hang Seng University Sinfonietta and Music Director of the Sregnis Singers, the first contemporary A Cappella group in Hong Kong, the founder of the Coro Allegra, and the composer-in-residence of the Academia de Música S. Pio X, of the Macao Diocese. She was the conductor of the choirs of the Hong Kong Music Institute from 2012 to 2019. For the period between 1990 and 2017, she was appointed as the conductor of the Diocesan Choir – Catholic Diocese of Hong Kong and the instructor of a choral conducting course under the Sacred Music Commission, the Catholic Diocese of Hong Kong. She is also a member of the Composers and Authors Society of Hong Kong (C.A.S.H.) and the Membership Secretary of the Hong Kong Composers’ Guild. With the sponsorship of the Hong Kong Arts Development Council, the Hong Kong Composers’ Guild published the music score of her nine-part A Cappella works and the recording of another composition “LAMENTOR”, a three-movement music piece written in 2010 for choir and philharmonic orchestra, in a music CD in 2013.
Rūta Vitkauskaitė  – Chrysalis for percussion and symphony orchestra (2018)
Presented by: Lithuania – Lithuanian National Radio and Television
Rūta Vitkauskaitė’s (b. 1984) musical interests are widely varied – while working in the field of classical composition (last year she received PhD in Composition at the Royal Academy of Music in London), she has also been an active initiator of experimental music groups (music visualization group Music is Very Important, post-comedy band R&R Electronics), organizer and curator of contemporary music events (director of Druskomanija Festival in 2006–2010 and of workshop series The Process in 2009–2012, facilitator of the New Music Incubator project together with President of FST, Martin Q Larsson in 2013–2016). She often appears as a performer of her own music (violin, piano, voice, electronics, her instrument collection, and her handmade instruments). Vitkauskaitė has a deep interest in the music education (Birmingham Contemporary Music Group Learning Trainee, Fellow at the Open Academy at the Royal Academy of Music, working creatively with people living with dementia through Westminster Arts). In her creative practice she often takes collaborative approach in music (e.g. spatial opera Confessions with Asa Nordgren and Jens Hendman, produced by Operomanija, and recently awarded Golden Cross of the Stage and Nail of The Year in Lithuania). She is a collaborator in interdisciplinary (creative opera group Kliudžiau) and cross-genre works, e.g. Aronia Overture. On her individual practice, Vitkauskaitė is researching personal music performance (Something Personal performance, and her current project Walking Opera).
Andrea Chamizo Alberro  – Tlatelolco, 68 (2018)
Presented by: Mexico – Radio UNAM
Andrea Chamizo Alberro (Mexico, 1988) She studied composition and theoretical music at the Center of Research and Music Studies (CIEM) where she receives the degree of Master of Music Composition (FLCM) and Bachelor of Theoretical Music (LMusLCM) both endorsed by the London College of Music. Between his Her teachers are María Antonieta Lozano, Víctor Rasgado and José Julio Diaz Infante. She has been a beneficiary of the “Arturo Márquez de Musical Composition 2018” awarded by the UNAM, and the Youth scholarship Creators 2019-2020 awarded by FONCA. His works have been selected and performed in Mexico, Canada, United States, Wales and Ukraine, at festivals such as the International Forum of New Music Manuel Enríquez, the INBA-SACM Conference, the Arcomis International Brass Event, the KLK New Music Forum, and recently his work I am desert, she received honorable mention in the Arturo Composition Contest Márquez for Chamber Orchestra 2019. Among the ensembles that have performed her music, CEPROMUSIC, the Eduardo Mata University Youth Orchestra, the Arcane Quartet, the Quartet Aurora, the Canadian duo Wapiti, the Chromatica Duo, the Philharmonic Orchestra de Sonora, the Lemberg Sinfonietta, the Ensamble 20+ and she has participated in workshops with interpreters such as Mauricio Náder, the Quintet of Breaths of the City of Mexico, as well as Irvine Arditti. She is currently the Academic Coordinator at CIEM and a teacher teaching the subjects of Piano, Practical Harmony and Melodic Structuring at the degree, and she is Principal Clarinet in the University Symphony Orchestra Autonomous of Mexico City.
Rozalie Hirs  – Roseherte (2008)
Presented by: Netherlands – NL NPO/NTR
Rozalie Hirs (1965) is a contemporary Dutch composer and a poet. Her poetry and music are lyrical as well as experimental. The principal concerns of her work are the adventure of listening, reading, and the imagination. Her music consists of vocal, orchestral, and electronic compositions. She often combines traditional instruments with electronic sounds. Hirs holds degrees from Columbia University (Composition; Doctor of Musical Arts, 2007), the Royal Conservatoire, The Hague (Composition; Master of Music, 1998), and Twente University (Chemical Engineering; Master of Science, 1990). www.rozaliehirs.nl
Anne-Marie Ørbeck  – Pastorale and Allegro for Flute and Orchestra (1959)
Presented by: Norway – NRK
Anne-Marie Ørbeck was born in Oslo in 1911. She studied piano in Oslo and in Berlin with Sandra Drouker. She continued her studies in music and composition under teachers including Gustav Fredrik Lange, Mark Lothar, Paul Höffer and Darius Milhaud. She made her debut as a pianist in Oslo in 1933 with the Oslo Philharmonic Orchestra. Her career as a musician and composer was interrupted by World War II, but her song cycle “Vonir i blømetid” (Hope at Blossom-Time) won a prize in 1942 from the Norwegian Society of Composers. In the 1950s, she studied composition again with Nadia Boulanger in Paris, and later with Hanns Jelinek in Vienna. Her Symphony in D Major was premiered in Bergen in 1954, making her the first female Norwegian symphonic composer. She died in Bergen in 1996.
Barbara Buczek  – Anekumena. Concerto for 89 Instruments (1974)
Presented by: Poland – Polish Radio PLPR
Barbara Buczek (1940–1993) studied at the State Higher School of Music in Krakow: piano with Ludwik Stefański and composition with Bogusław Schaeffer (whom she treated as her mentor). She was also a member of the artistic association Grupa Krakowska and the international association Frau und Musik. Buczek is considered one of the greatest individuals among Polish composers. She was also a real outsider in life. Fortunately, almost all the manuscripts of her works have been preserved (although many compositions are still waiting for their world premiere). The period of her studies was crowned with Anekumena (1974). In her subsequent works, Buczek turned to a more homogenous and microtonal sound. Her mature work is characterized by the use of sophisticated expressive means and subdued expression. Researchers on the work of Barbara Buczek pay attention to the unusual technical difficulties of her works, at the same time emphasizing the extraordinary sensitivity to color, sophistication and perfect mastery of the composer’s craft.
Inés Badalo  – Entropia (2017)
Presented by: Portugal – Antena 2 – RTP
Inés Badalo studied at the Superior Music School of Lisbon where she completed her studies in the fields of Guitar and Composition with Luís Tinoco. She has received master classes from composers F. Yeznikian, C.Bochmann and J. M. López López, and has received several awards including the Concurso Internacional de Composición “Manuel de Falla”, Prémio SPA /Antena 2, Premio Francisco Guerrero Marín – Jóvenes Compositores de la Fundación SGAE/CNDM, Prémio Internacional de Composição F. Lopes-Graça, Premio FIDAPA Concorso Internazionale di Composizione Città di Udine, Convocatoria para Jóvenes Compositores de Plural Ensemble and Premio de Composición Musical Colegio de España en París-INAEM. She has received commissions from the National Centre of Musical Diffusion (CNDM), Philharmonic Society of Badajoz, Radio and Television of Portugal – Antena 2, Movimento Patrimonial pela Música Portuguesa, Festival Ensems, Festival Mixtur, among others. Her work has been premiered by the Trío Arriaga, Ensemble Sonido Extremo, Neopercusión, Orquesta de Extremadura, Plural Ensemble, Orquestra Gulbenkian, Ensemble vocal Soli-Tutti, Ensemble Kuraia, GMC de Lisboa, Cuarteto Dalia, Sinoidal Ensemble, Grupo Enigma. www.inesbadalo.com
Svetlana Savić  – On Wolves and Trains (2016)
Presented by: Serbia – RTS – Radio Belgrade 3
Svetlana Savić (1971, Serbia) is an Associate Professor and the Head at the Composition Department of the Faculty of Music in Belgrade. From 2011 she is a lecturer at the Interdisciplinary studies at University of Art in Belgrade. She has collaborated with renowned Serbian and foreign performers, ensembles, and orchestras. Her compositions were commissioned for Belgrade Music Festival (BEMUS), International Review of Composers, Cello Fest, and other festivals in Serbia, USA, Austria, Israel, Lithuania, Russia, Greece, Japan, South Africa… Her major works include The Poor Sad Don Juan’s Daughter for soloists, women’s choir, and electronics, Quincunx for string orchestra, Sustineo for symphonic orchestra, Songs about Stars for women’s choir and chamber orchestra, Re-versions for chamber ensemble, Trapped for women’s choir and electronics, and Sonnets for female vocal, violoncello, piano, and electronics. Svetlana Savic won “Stevan Mokranjac” prize for 2014. year and Musica Clasica’s “Composer of the Year 2016”.
Bojana Šaljić Podešva  – OMeditation on Closeness (2008)
Presented by: Slovenia – RTV
Bojana Šaljić Podešva (Maribor, 1978) completed her studies of composition at the Ljubljana Academy of Music. She then undertook postgraduate studies of electroacoustic music in the class of Dieter Kaufmann at the Vienna University of Music. She went on to further her studies with Bruno Liberda, Wolfgang Mitterer and Françoise Barrière at the IMEB in Bourges (on a UNESCO-Aschberg scholarship), as well as with Richard Boulanger at the 9th International Academy for New Music and Sonic Art in Seefeld in Tirol (on a scholarship from KulturKontakt Austria). Her fundamental area of creativity is electroacoustic music, embracing both fully determined two-channel or multi-channel works and the “real time” treatment of instrumental-vocal sound or sound installations. A cross section of her creativity from this area is presented on the solo compact disc Welcome to the Dooshaland. Podešva also has a close affinity with chamber music, which allows direct contact with performers. She has received numerous prizes for her works in composition competitions (Gustav Mahler Kompostions Preis, the 32nd International Competition for Electroacoustic Music and Sonic Art in Bourges, etc.). Her works have been presented at the 2004 International Rostrum of Composers, the IREM Tribune, the Synthèse Festival (Bourges 2005, 2006), the Guarnerius Festival (Belgrade, 2009) at the opening of the Radenci Festival of Contemporary Music (Radenci, Slovenia, 2000), at the Slowind Festival and within the framework of the LIEU project (Ljubljana, Paris, Riga, 2010), as well as at numerous other international concert venues. In addition to the concert stage, Podešva is attracted to creativity in connection with other art forms, having created music for numerous Slovene puppet, dance and theatre performances as well as films. For these activities she has received a series of prizes, including second prize at the 2nd Biennale of the Slovene Foundation of Puppet Artists in Maribor in 2003 for her music for the performance Peskar, a prize at the 3rd Biennale of the Slovene Foundation of Puppet Artists in Koper in 2005 for her music for the performance Svetnik Krespel, and the prestigious Vesna Prize for the music for the film Otroci s Petrička. In 2020, her radiophonic opera Iden, created in collaboration with radio drama director Saška Rakef Perko and poet Tina Kozin, was nominated at the competitions Palma Ars Acustica and Prix Italia. She currently lives and creates in Ajdovščina.
Diana Krull – Quartet for two violins, clarinet and cello (1955)
Presented by: Sweden – Swedish Radio SESR
Diana Krull, born July 26, 1930 in Tallinn, died September 24, 2013 in Stockholm, was a Swedish linguist and composer. Krull, who was of Estonian descent, studied piano and composition from the beginning of the 1950s for e.g. Gottfrid Boon and Karl-Birger Blomdahl and was active as a music teacher and composer. She has composed music for chamber ensemble and solo instruments. In the early 1970s, she studied a number of languages ​​as well as general linguistics and phonetics. In 1988, she defended her dissertation in phonetics at Stockholm University and then continued to devote herself to research in the subject, especially on acoustic phonetics and speech perception and prosody. She became an associate professor in her research.
Li Jo-Yu – Wonderful Time (2020)
Presented by: Taiwan ROC- IC Broadcasting Co.
Jo-Yu Li came from Taiwan. She completed her Postgraduate Diploma in composition at the Royal Northern College of Music (UK) with a scholarship. She is currently pursuing her doctorate at the National Taiwan Normal University and studies with Prof. Gordon Shi-wen Chin.
Her musical works have been performed in Taiwan and the UK and she has participated in the workshops with artists such as the BBC Singers, led by Judith Weir, the masterclass with Anders Hillborg and Elaine Gould, and the 2018 Cheltenham Composer Academy.
Her string quartet “Tafalong” is scheduled to be workshopped & recorded by the Ligeti Quartet in winter of 2020, and her mixed choir work “RAIN” was workshopped and sung by the BBC Singers in Jan.2018, and the orchestral piece “L’Oiseau bleu” was chosen to be performed at the RNCM Concert Hall in April 2018. Her Orchestral work “The Fire Window” won the 3rd prize of the National Taiwan Composition Competition in 2018. Jo-Yu was the first composer who won three awards in the competition including the orchestra players’ choice prize, audience’s choice prize, and the 3rd prize. The work was premiered by the National Taiwan Symphony Orchestra and has been released in the NTSO New Music Album in 2019.
Charlotte Bray – Falling into the Fire (2015)
Presented by: United Kingdom – BBC Radio3
The composer Charlotte Bray has emerged as a distinctive and outstanding talent of her generation. Exhibiting uninhibited ambition and desire to communicate, her music is exhilarating, inherently vivid, and richly expressive with lyrical intensity. Bray has been championed by numerous world-class ensembles and orchestras, including the BBC Symphony Orchestra, the Royal Opera House Covent Garden, London Sinfonietta and Birmingham Contemporary Music Group. Her work has featured at the BBC Proms, Aldeburgh, Cheltenham, Tanglewood, Aix-en- Provence and Verbier Festival. Several renowned conductors have performed her work and these include Sir Mark Elder, Oliver Knussen, and Jessica Cottis. In December 2019 Natalie Clein and the Aurora Orchestra premiered The Certainty of Tides, a new work for solo cello and strings, at Kings Place, London. May 2019 saw the premiere of Germinate, a triple concerto written for the Sitkovetsky Trio and the Philharmonia, commissioned by Investec International Music Festival. An ensemble work entitled Red Swans Floating premiered in June 2019, commissioned by the Tonhalle Düsseldorf for the combined forces of notabu.ensemble and Spectra Ensemble (Gent). Also in June, pianist Pierre-Laurent Aimard premiered Bring Me All Your Dreams at Aldeburgh Festival. Recent highlights include: In Black Light commissioned by Aix-en-Provence Festival for Tabea Zimmerman (July 2018); Reflections In Time commissioned by London Sinfonietta as part of their 50th anniversary season (May 2018); Scottish premiere of Stone Dancer with the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra under Geoffrey Paterson (March 2018); At the Speed of Stillness by the Vancouver Symphony Orchestra in the ISCM World Music Days Festival 2017; Voyage by The Nordic Saxophone Quartet (Torún, Poland); Black Rainbow by the DalaSinfonietta and Wermland Opera Orchestra (Falun and Karlstad, Sweden); cello concerto Falling in the Fire under Sakari Oramo and the BBC Symphony Orchestra with Guy Johnston, BBC Proms 2016; and a stage work Out of the Ruins (Royal Opera House Covent Garden). Bray’s second recording, a disc of chamber and solo works, was released in 2018 on the Richard Thomas Classical label. At the Speed of Stillness, Bray’s debut recording is available on NMC Records. Her many accolades include the Royal Philharmonic Society Composition Prize; Lili Boulanger Prize; Critics’ Circle Award; named in The Evening Standard’s Most Influential Londoners (2011); Honorary Member of Birmingham Conservatoire and named Alumni of the Year (2014).