KERRY, GORDON Cold Pastorale^#
oboe, bassoon and piano

Based in northeastern Victoria, Australia, Gordon Kerry is a freelance composer and writer.

2004 sees premieres of new works in the Netherlands, Sweden, the United Kingdom and Australia. These include a new song cycle for mezzo soprano and string quartet commissioned by Wigmore Hall, London for Catherine Wyn-Rogers and the Belcea Quartet; Figured in the drift of stars for the Sydney International Piano Competition of Australia an the orchestral cantata Through the Fire featured at Opera in the Alps to commemorate the disastrous bushfires which ravaged southeastern Australia in 2003. 2004 CD releases include harvesting the solstice thunders, a disc of his orchestral music with the Tasmanian Symphony Orchestra under David Porcelijn for ABC Classics; the original cast recording of the opera Medea from the Chamber Made Opera production; and the Southern Cross Soloists’ recording of the solo cantata, Breathtaking.

In 2003, the Ulster Orchestra premiered Upon Empty Air (a BBC commission) at the Sonorities festival and the West Australian Symphony premiered This Insubstantial Pageant under Matthias Bamert. The latter recently won the APRA-Australian Music Centre Award for Orchestral Work of the Year. The Bangalow Etudes, commissioned by Virginia Farley, were premeired by pianist Kevin Power at the Bangalow Festival.Works premiered in 2002 include his Clarinet Concerto for Francesco Celata and the Sydney Symphony under Mark Elder, Kindled Skies for soprano Merlyn Quaife and the Tasmanian Symphony Orchestra under Howard Shelley, A Kind of Radiant Darkness (a setting of poems by Peter Steele commissioned by Greg Roger for the Southern Cross Soloists) and Cold Pastoral for the Bangalow Festival.

Other recent works include orchestral, chamber, solo and choral music written with the support of an Australia Council Fellowship awarded in 1999: the Australian Youth Orchestra under Mikko Frank performed That Gong-tormented Sea in 2001 at La Roque D’antheron festival and the Amsterdam Concertgebouw; St Francis’ Church, Melbourne inaugurated its new organ with the premiere of the Mass of Christ the King; chamber works included Im Winde for Trio Jean Paul, premiered at London’s Wigmore Hall and given again at the 2001 Schwetzingen Festival, Rasa for the Australian Piano Quartet, and And the nothing that is, given its premiere by Blue Noise in Berlin and its Australian premiere by the Seymour Group. Prominent Australian soloists have premiered his solo instrumental works in Australia and the USA. During this period Kerry also wrote Blue Latitudes for the Nash Ensemble of London (commissioned by Wigmore Hall), and Vigil for the Australian Virtuosi piano duo commissioned by Julian Burnside, QC. The latter work was awarded the 2001 Australian Music Centre Award for the best new composition of the previous year.

Kerry’s orchestral music, including several symphonic pieces and concertos for cello, viola, clarinet and trumpet have been commissioned and performed by most Australian symphony orchestras through the Symphony Australia network. He has composed numerous chamber works, many for Musica Viva Australia – such as the Sonata da camera for the Australia Ensemble and Harmonie for the Canberra Wind Soloists. His opera Medea, to a libretto by Justin Macdonnell, has been produced by Chamber Made Opera in Melbourne, Sydney, Canberra and Washington, and by the Berliner Kammeroper in Berlin, Beeskow and Düsseldorf. Other works are available on Tall Poppies and Vox Australis labels, and the Southern Cross Soloists will shortly release his cantata, Breathtaking.

Gordon Kerry studied composition with Barry Conyngham at the University of Melbourne. He has held awards and fellowships from the Australia Council, Peggy Glanville-Hicks Trust and the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts He is also an experienced arts administrator, most recently as Artistic Director of Musica Viva's Sun Microsystems Yarra Valley Festival at Domaine Chandon, and freelance music journalist. In 2003 he was awarded the Centenary Medal for his services to Australian society through music.


^# Especially written for the SOUTHERN CROSS SOLOISTS