Author Archives: Chris

Happy New Year!

Here’s an an­ec­dote to herald in 2011: ‘At one time Karlheinz [Stockhausen] and I would talk and ex­change ideas. You know the story about the talk about singing? Well, he was writing a song for Cathy Berberian, who I later also wrote for, and he said, “if you were writing for a singer, would you write […]

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2010: A Miscellany

As the end of the year ap­proaches, here are some of the best things that I have read, seen and heard in the past twelve months. Two major, large-scale per­form­ances this au­tumn made an im­pact on me. The London Sinfonietta’s con­cert of Lachenmann at the Southbank Centre in October was one. I already knew the […]

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The Inward Beauty of Helmut Lachenmann

In cel­eb­ra­tion of Helmut Lachenmann’s 75th birthday, University of Manchester new music en­semble Vaganza are presenting two con­certs of his music this Friday. A free lunch­time con­cert will see Ad Solem Chamber Choir per­form Lachenmann’s Consolation II along­side works by stu­dents, in­cluding Tom Coult and Joy Chou. The evening sees a more thor­ough ex­am­in­a­tion of […]

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[…] and every at­tempt Is a wholly new start, and a dif­ferent kind of failure Because one has only learnt to get the better of words For the thing one no longer has to say, or the way in which One is no longer dis­posed to say it. […] — T.S. Eliot, ‘East Coker’, Four Quartets

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Composer Portrait:
Nina Whiteman

With re­cent premi­eres by Dutch ac­cor­dion duo TOEAC, Colinton Amateur Orchestral Society, Manchester Camerata and period in­stru­ment trio Spirituoso, 29-year-old com­poser Nina Whiteman has had a busy year, not men­tioning per­form­ances as a vo­calist with her flute, voice and cello group, Trio Atem, whose most re­cent per­form­ance was the premiere of graphic scores by artist […]

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Nina Whiteman
  • Microbiography

    Chris Swithinbank is a British-Dutch com­poser who works with both acoustic in­stru­ments and elec­tronic sounds. He is cur­rently a stu­dent at Harvard University with Chaya Czernowin.
    Full Biography »

  • Hear