contemporary classical

Born in Vermont in 1981 and raised in Providence, Rhode Island, New York–based composer Nico Muhly graduated from Columbia University with a degree in English Literature. In 2004, he received a Masters in Music from the Juilliard School, where he studied under Christopher Rouse and John Corigliano. A former boy chorister, Muhly has composed extensively for choir, including commissions from the Clare College Choir and the Brooklyn Youth Chorus.

Sophie Hutchings is Australian pianist and composer. Having begun playing piano young growing up in a musical family, Sophie started writing properly in her teens. Sophie’s compositions move from disarmingly spare and elegant beginnings to curl out with a tingling edge, propelling its austerity into urgent and epic realms. Violin, cello, drums, percussion and organ heighten the flight these pieces can take as well as dip and swell within the more dimly lit moods of gentler nuance, casting a particular spell across the range of feeling captured in Sophie’s playing.

Sarah Hopkins is a unique Australian composer-performer, highly acclaimed for her visionary music and inspiring performances for cello, harmonic overtone singing, handbells, choir and the celestial Harmonic Whirlies of her own creation. With a strong background and training in classical music, over the years she has moved into the realm of holistic music and developed a very distinctive compositional voice.

Thomas Adès (born in London, 1 March 1971) is a British composer, pianist and conductor. Adès studied piano with Paul Berkowitz and later composition with Robert Saxton at Guildhall School,London. He graduated in 1992 from King's College, Cambridge after studying with Alexander Goehr and Robin Holloway. His degree was classified as "double starred first", indicating outstanding academic distinction. He was made Britten Professor of Composition at the Royal Academy of Music, and in 2004 was given an honorary doctorate by the University of Essex.