Geoffrey Alvarez is a British/Nicaraguan composer and conductor. He chairs the annual international composition competition run by the Alvarez Chamber Orchestra.[1] He is also a writer on music and inventor of Gravesian Analysis.[2]
Education and work
Alvarez studied composition privately with Giles Swayne, then with Paul Patterson at the Royal Academy of Music as a Leverhulme scholar, and later at the University of York with David Blake and Richard Orton, where he obtained a D.Phil.
Some of his papers are published in Gravesiana: The Journal of the Robert Graves Society, whilst he has contributed several articles for Tempo on the work of composers such as Michael Finnissy[3] and Alexander Goehr's Arianna.[4] His own work (his setting of Psalm XXIII in Hebrew) was reviewed in the same publication by Mark R. Taylor.[5]
His compositions range from the wind quintet The Travelling Musicians, performed by the Harlequin Wind Quintet in the Purcell Room in 2001 to seven symphonies and numerous operas including a collaboration with poet Ruth Fainlight commissioned by the Garden Venture of the Royal Opera House: The European Story.[6]
In November 2006, Geoffrey Alvarez returned from Poland as a prize-winning finalist and soloist with the Arthur Rubenstein Łódź Philharmonic Orchestra in the Final of the Tansman 6th International Competition of Musical Personalities, Composers Competition, Łódź 2006[7]
Selected works
Music
Montage for Clarinet, Horn & Orchestra (1979)
Symphony No. 1 (1980)
TheTell-Tale Heart (Opera) (1981–3)
Brass Etchings (1983)
Oboe Concerto (1984–85)
Three Madrigals for Chamber Choir (1986–8)
Lament in Memoriam Anderson (1987)
Hied and Seek for Soprano, Basson and Live Electronics (1987)
Triptych for Soloists, double choir and orchestra (1989)
Kerbcrawling for chamber ensemble (1989)
String Quartet (1990)
Sept Piece for Horn and Piano (1990)
Obsessions for Flute Viola and Harp (1990)
Oboe Quartet (1991)
Emisori Rites, Chamber Opera for Eight Performers (1991)
