# Matthew Shlomowitz

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Australian composer (born 1975)

**Matthew Shlomowitz** (born 7 February 1975) is a composer of contemporary classical music and Associate Professor in Composition at the [University of Southampton](/source/University_of_Southampton).

## Biography

He was raised in [Adelaide, Australia](/source/Adelaide%2C_Australia), and studied with [Božidar Kos](https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Bo%C5%BEidar_Kos&action=edit&redlink=1) [[sl](https://sl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bo%C5%BEidar_Kos)] at the [Sydney Conservatorium of Music](/source/Sydney_Conservatorium_of_Music) and with [Brian Ferneyhough](/source/Brian_Ferneyhough) at [Stanford University](/source/Stanford_University). He also studied privately with [Michael Finnissy](/source/Michael_Finnissy) in the United Kingdom.

Since 2002 he has lived in London[1] where he lectured at the [Royal College of Music](/source/Royal_College_of_Music) and for the [Syracuse University](/source/Syracuse_University) London Program. He taught composition at [Durham University](/source/Durham_University) during the 2008/09 academic year and was a Programme Collaborator for the Borealis Festival in Norway.

## Music

He is co-director of [Plus minus ensemble](/source/Plus_minus_ensemble) and the performance series Rational Rec and is a member of InterInterInter, a group that creates events mixing performance and audience activity. He was also a co-founder of [Ensemble Offspring](/source/Ensemble_Offspring).[2] He has been represented by the New Voices scheme at the British Music Information Centre and by the [Australian Music Centre](/source/Australian_Music_Centre).

The bulk of his compositions are for chamber ensembles and often involve unusual instrumental combinations. *Free Square Jazz*, for instance, is for recorder, electric guitar, double bass and drum kit and *Line and Length*[3] is scored for soprano saxophone, oboe, clarinet, bass clarinet & bassoon.

A number of his works are interdisciplinary such as the music-video pieces *Train Travel*[4] and *Six Aspects of the Body in Image and Sound* (co-created with Rees Archibald) and an ongoing series of works for visual performer and musician called *Letter Pieces*. Certain works fall more comfortably into the genre of "performance pieces" such as *Northern Cities* and *When is a Door Not a Door?* Other works blur the boundaries between concert music and performance piece such as *Five Monuments of Our Time*, an orchestral work that requires the conductor to perform a series of choreographed gestures often ludicrously unrelated to the music being played. Such apparent absurdity and humor is not unintended; it has been said that,[5]

... he seems to have a special feeling for those inadvertently comical situations in which we all sometimes find ourselves: a peculiar kind of miscommunication where we don’t so much get our wires crossed ... as get entangled in them

— musicuratum.com

Some of his music shows the structural constraints analogous to the rules of [Oulipo](/source/Oulipo);[5] familiar sounds from popular and everyday culture are also a regular feature of his music palette.[6]

## Musical style

He has described his own music as being "something like the bastard love child of [Brian Ferneyhough](/source/Brian_Ferneyhough) and [Philip Glass](/source/Philip_Glass)."[7]

## Musical works

Selected musical works, including commissions and major works, are:[8]

Category Title Year Orchestration Commissioned by Vocal music Instrumental Music 2011 8 voices EXAUDI Performance pieces Letter Pieces 2007+ Open-score pieces for performer and musician - Orchestra Music and Actions for strings, keyboard and conductor 2015 Conductor, keyboard and string orchestra Nederlands Strijkers Gilde " Listening Styles 2013 orchestra with drum kit The Adelaide Festival 7+ players Popular Contexts, Volume 3: The Music of Theatre Making 2011 Conductor, flute, oboe, bass clarinet, drum-kit (with glockenspiel), guitar, mandolin, violin, viola, cello, double bass and sampler keyboard Nieuw Ensemble " Avant Muzak 2010 Flute, soprano saxophone, drum kit, electric guitar, harp, violin, cello and sampler Centre Henri Pousseur for Ensemble bESIdES " Joy Time Ride for Ives 2009 Flute, oboe, bass clarinet, bassoon, drum-kit, electric organ, 2 violins, cello and double bass Ives Ensemble 2–6 players Popular Contexts, Volume 7: Public domain music 2014 Clarinet, electric guitar, synthesizer and sampler, drum-kit and cello asamisimasa " The Major Sevenths Medley 2014 4 electric guitars TRANSIT Festival for Zwerm " Popular Contexts, Volume 6 2013 Trio for vibraphone, drum-kit and sampler keyboard MaerzMusik, Speak Percussion with support from Julian Burnside " Logic Rock 2013 Guitar and drum kit bESIdES " Songs about words and about the pleasure of misery 2012 Soprano and piano The Britten-Pears Foundation " Popular Contexts, Volume 4: Rhythm Section 2012 midi guitar and 3 drum kits Drumming Grupo da percussao " Theme Street Parade 2009 String quartet BBC for Quatuor Diotima " Earth Breeze Smoke 2008 2 recorders The Bruges Concertgebouw " Line and Length 2007 Soprano saxophone, oboe, clarinet, bass clarinet & bassoon The 2007 Spitalfields Festival for Calefax " Slow Flipping Harmony 2006 Four melodic instruments and one auxiliary player The Australia Council for the Arts for Ensemble Offspring " Free Square Jazz 2005 Soprano/tenor recorder, electric guitar, double bass and drum kit The Orpheus Institute for Champ D'Action Solos Popular Contexts, Volume 2 2010 For piano, sampler, voice and physical actions (one person) Centre Henri Pousseur for Stephane Ginsburgh " Serious and Sincere Sentiments About Something (or "Thought Rhythms") 1999 Guitar The Australia Council for the Arts Works with video A Documentary Saga of the OULIPO 2006–7 Video work with Rees Archibald & Andrew Infanti - " Six Aspects of the Body in Image and Sound 2004 Clarinet, piano, violin, viola, cello and video (by Rees Archibald) The Bath International Festival of Music for The Tate Ensemble

## Operas

- Electric Dreams (2017)[9]

## Prizes and awards

- 7th Johann-Joseph-Fux Competition for Opera Composition[10]

## References

1. **[^](#cite_ref-1)** ["Group's strengths play more to contemporary than older music"](https://news.google.com/archivesearch?&q=%22Matthew%20Shlomowitz%22&num=100). *[The Sydney Morning Herald](/source/The_Sydney_Morning_Herald)*. 26 January 2010. Retrieved 23 March 2011.

1. **[^](#cite_ref-2)** ["No divas, just sparkling team effort"](http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2003/11/03/1067708141260.html). *[The Sydney Morning Herald](/source/The_Sydney_Morning_Herald)*. 4 November 2003. Retrieved 23 March 2011.

1. **[^](#cite_ref-3)** ["Calefax"](http://entertainment.timesonline.co.uk/tol/arts_and_entertainment/music/live_reviews/article3074676.ece). *[The Times](/source/The_Times)*. 20 December 2007. Retrieved 23 March 2011.[*[dead link](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Link_rot)*]

1. **[^](#cite_ref-4)** ["Beauty of the spitting image"](http://www.smh.com.au/news/arts/beauty-of-the-spitting-image/2006/08/07/1154802819617.html). *[The Sydney Morning Herald](/source/The_Sydney_Morning_Herald)*. 8 August 2006. Retrieved 23 March 2011.

1. ^ [***a***](#cite_ref-Musicuratum2012_5-0) [***b***](#cite_ref-Musicuratum2012_5-1) ["Matthew Shlomowitz"](http://musicuratum.com/2012/09/20/matthew-shlomowitz/). 20 September 2012. Retrieved 25 August 2015.

1. **[^](#cite_ref-6)** ["Matthew Shlomowitz, what one hears in Popular Contexts"](http://www.memm.be/fr/news/detail/slug/matthew-shlomowitz-what-one-hears-in-popular-contexts). *Music Electronique / Musique Mixte*. Centre Henri Pousseur. Retrieved 25 August 2015.

1. **[^](#cite_ref-7)** GAIDA 2016 programme notes, cited in Makem in the Baltic (26 October 2016). ["Baltic Musical Gems"](http://balticgems.blogspot.com.au/2016/10/). *balticgems.blogspot.com.au*. Retrieved 17 September 2017.

1. **[^](#cite_ref-8)** Shlomowitz, Matthew. ["Works"](http://www.shlom.com/?p=works). *Shloms.com*. Retrieved 25 August 2015.

1. **[^](#cite_ref-9)** ["Matthew Shlomowitz (AU) | Electric Dreams"](http://www.steirischerherbst.at/english/Programme/musikprotokoll-2017/Electric-Dreams). *steirischerherbst* (in German). Retrieved 21 October 2017.

1. **[^](#cite_ref-10)** ["Prize winners"](https://www.kug.ac.at/en/arts-science/arts-science/competitions-courses/7th-johann-joseph-fux-competition-for-opera-composition/prize-winners.html). *University of Music and Performing Arts, Graz* (in German). Retrieved 21 October 2017.

## External links

- [Matthew Shlomowitz official site](http://www.shlom.com/)

- [British Music Information Centre](http://www.bmic.co.uk/composers/nv_details.asp?ComposerID=2774)

- [Australian Music Centre](http://www.amcoz.com.au/composers/composer.asp?id=1219)

- [Electric Dreams](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IdBKBLYyWTs) on [YouTube](/source/YouTube_video_(identifier))

Authority control databases International ISNI VIAF GND FAST WorldCat National United States Artists MusicBrainz People Deutsche Biographie Other SNAC Yale LUX

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Adapted from the Wikipedia article [Matthew Shlomowitz](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Matthew_Shlomowitz) by Wikipedia contributors ([contributor history](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Matthew_Shlomowitz?action=history)). Available under [Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/). Changes may have been made.