MILLS, R Four Dances from “Snugglepot and Cuddlepie”
(Arr. Kevin Power) piano, oboe, clarinet, horn and bassoon

Richard Mills (b. 1949) is deservedly one of Australia's most sought after composers and music directors. In recent years he has pursued a diverse career as a composer and a conductor, which has seen him working with a large number of the nation's music organisations.

Mills pursued his advanced musical studies under Edmund Rubbra (composition) and Gilbert Webster (percussion) at the Guildhall School of Music, London, where he won the Saltzman Prize. Throughout his career he has also been recipient of the Maggs Award (1982), the Don Banks Music Fellowship (1995), and in 1999 was awarded an Order of Australia.

Mills made his debut as an opera conductor at Opera Queensland with The Magic Flute. Now, through his work with West Australian Opera, he has a large repertoire of standard works, as well as a reputation for conducting contemporary opera and his own compositions. Victorian State Opera commissioned him to write an opera of Ray Lawler’s Summer of the Seventeenth Doll, which premiered in Melbourne in 1996. Opera Australia commissioned his second opera Batavia, which was premiered at the Melbourne Festival in 2001 to great critical acclaim. Batavia consequently received a number of Green Room and Helpmann Awards including Best Opera at both ceremonies and Best New Australian Work.