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Composition alumnus selected for prestigious artist development scheme in USA

Thu 14 March 2019

Nicholas Morrish is one of seven composers who will participate in Los Angeles Philharmonic Orchestra’s National Composers Intensive (NCI) 2019.

Since 2015, the LA Phil’s NCI has brought together contemporary composers aged 18-30 in order to support new music from conception to performance. Over the next four months, prize-winning composer Nicholas will work with LA Phil’s programme director Andrew Norman and composer Ashley Fure to write and workshop a five to six minute piece.

Andrew Norman commented –

“We seek composers who will push themselves artistically and take risks, and I’m excited to say the 2019 NCI composers exemplify those qualities while representing a diverse spectrum of musical backgrounds and styles.”

The LA Phil, now in its centennial year, is collaborating for the first time with the New York City-based International Contemporary Ensemble (ICE) who will perform the new works. ICE is a trailblazing artist collective championing works by emerging composers. Musicologist Alex Ross has called them ‘America’s foremost new-music group’.

ICE Co-Artistic Directors Rebekah Heller and Ross Karre will be rehearsing and refining the pieces with the participants this month in New York. They will then reconvene in Los Angeles in May for further rehearsals, affording NCI participants the chance to work in two major American cities on opposite coasts, each vibrant centres of contemporary music.

The new works will be performed on 1 JUN at Walt Disney Concert Hall in Los Angeles during the LA Phil’s Noon to Midnight new music festival.

Since graduating from Trinity Laban in 2013, Nicholas has gone on to become a fellow at Harvard University and has had works performed at festivals across Europe. As the current Mendelssohn Scholarship holder, his recent work has combined sound, electronics and video to explore the concept of music as an expression of time.

 

Trinity Laban is London’s Creative Conservatoire: an internationally celebrated centre of excellence, offering world-class training that transforms those with potential into resourceful, enterprising and adaptable artistic leaders.

Find out more about composition at Trinity Laban by visiting our department pages.