Event overview
Smirnov talks about the Chicago Premiere of 'Space Odyssey', CSO with Riccardo Muti conducting
The Centre for Russian Music and Graduate Forum presents composer Dmitri Smirnov.
'Space Odyssey', for Symphony orchestra written by the Russian composer Dmitri N. Smirnov was selected by Riccardo Muti for his Russian Tour 2012 and played by CSO under his baton 7 times in Chicago, Moscow and St Petersburg. The composer will discuss some of his symphonic works with demonstration of audio recording of his Chicago Premiere.
Dmitri Smirnov was born in Minsk in 1948. He studied at the Moscow Conservatoire from 1967 to 1972 with Nikolai Sidelnikov (composition), Edison Denisov (instrumentation), and Yuri Kholopov (analysis), and also privately with the Webern pupil Philip Gerschkovich. From 1973 to 1980 he was an editor for Sovetsky Kompozitor Music Publishers in Moscow, and has subsequently devoted himself to composition and teaching. Since 1991, Smirnov and his wife Elena Firsova have been resident in the UK. They were joint composers-in-residence at Cambridge and Dartington in 1992, at Keele University from 1993 to 1997, and from 1998 have been resident in St Albans, near London.
Smirnov's works have demonstrated his fascination with the art and poetry of William Blake. A song cycle (1979) to Blake's The Seasons generated a symphony which has been performed at the Tanglewood Festival and at the South Bank Centre in London. Two Smirnov operas set texts by Blake: Tiriel was staged by the Stadttheater in Freiburg, and The Lamentations of Thel by the Almeida Festival in London, both in 1989. Recent scores include Jacob's Ladder and the River of Life, commissioned for the London Sinfonietta, Quartets No.3 and No.6 for the Brodsky Quartet, Song of Songs for the Orchestre de la Suisse Romande, and Between Scylla and Charybdis for the Nieuw Sinfonietta of Amsterdam and the English String Orchestra.
All welcome, not just for graduates!
Note reprinted by kind permission of Boosey & Hawkes
Dates & times
| Date | Time | Add to calendar |
|---|---|---|
| 23 Apr 2013 | 5:00pm - 6:00pm |
Accessibility
If you are attending an event and need the College to help with any mobility requirements you may have, please contact the event organiser in advance to ensure we can accommodate your needs.
