• QUICK BIO: The evocative music of award-winning composer, JONATHAN DAVID LITTLE, BMus(Hons), ThA, PhD, FLCM, FISM, FRSA, is notable for its mystical beauty, intensity, richness and intricacy.
10/11/2024 1:53:51 PM
Jonathan David Little
Haslemere UK Melbourne AUS - United Kingdom • Contemporary Classical [Concert Music]
• INFLUENCES: "Ecstatic Minimalism" - "Archaic Futurism" - "Picturesque Archaism" [Worldwide critical definitions of musical style]
• MEMBER(S): JONATHAN DAVID LITTLE-COMPOSER-CONDUCTOR + Orchestrator, Project Manager
britishmusiccollection.org.uk/composer/jonathan-david-little
facebook.com/pages/jonathan-little/130447910332838
• BIO: CONTEMPORARY CONCERT & MEDIA MUSIC COMPOSER:
* 2020: MUSIKVEREIN NEW SYMPHONY VIENNA, "INTERNATIONAL COMPOSERS COMPETITION": 2nd PRIZE (AUSTRIA)
* 2019: FELLOWSHIP of the LONDON COLLEGE of MUSIC [FLCM] (Music Composition) (UK)
* 2018: "AUSTRALIA PRIZE": RUNNER-UP (for Distinctive Choral Work) [Council for the Humanities, Arts & Social Sciences]
* 2017: ASCAP "RUDOLF NISSIM PRIZE": SPECIAL DISTINCTION (for "Best Original Orchestral Score") (USA)
* 2016: WINNER, ROYAL PHILHARMONIC SOCIETY / BBC RADIO 3 "ENCORE Choral" AWARD (UK)
* 2014: FELLOWSHIP of THE INCORPORATED SOCIETY OF MUSICIANS [FISM] (UK)
* 2012: "BEST ALBUM of the MONTH" AWARD & "BEST ALBUM of the YEAR" NOMINATION [RNA] (SPAIN)
* 2012: PRSF / BLISS TRUST COMPOSER BURSARY (for Orchestral Music composition) (UK)
* 2011: COLLARD FELLOWSHIP of THE WORSHIPFUL COMPANY of MUSICIANS (for "Outstanding Excellence" in Composition)
* 2010: THE AUTHORS' FOUNDATION / ROYAL LITERARY FUND AWARD (for 2-vol. monograph on "Exotic" Orchestration) (UK)
* 2009: MUSICIANS' BENEVOLENT FUND "PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT AWARD" (towards String Recording project) (UK)
* 2008: FANFARE MAGAZINE CRITICS' CHOICE ("WANT LIST" - for first Choral-Orchestral Album release) (USA)
The atmospheric and evocative music of composer/conductor/scholar JONATHAN DAVID LITTLE is marked by its intensity, richness of material, and intricate craftsmanship. Much of his work is frequently noted for its mystical and “luminous otherworldly beauty and colour”, and his choral and orchestral sounds have been described by Gramophone as simply "resplendent".
Jonathan studied music at the University of Melbourne – winning the Lady Turner Exhibition for overall excellence – then undertook a PhD studying the development of "exotic" orchestration in 19th- and 20th-century music, alongside studies in church music and liturgy (through the Australian College of Theology), and conducting studies with Gerald Gentry, former Staff Conductor, BBC. In 2011, the City of London's ancient Musicians' Company (first established in 1500) bestowed upon him one of their highest honours, the prestigious Collard Fellowship, awarded to "a professional musician of outstanding ability" for "undoubted excellence". Jonathan's compositional style blends art music, folk/Celtic, and other sacred and secular musical influences, from as far back as the fourteenth century, with new and innovative textures and orchestration (and sometimes also include spatial effects). European critics have categorised his historically-informed composition style as "Ecstatic Minimalism", "Archaic Futurism", or "Picturesque Archaism". He is a Fellow of the London College of Music (FLCM), a Fellow of the Incorporated Society of Musicians (FISM), a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts (FRSA), and Member of the Royal Society of Musicians.
From 2004-07 the US-headquartered French contemporary music label ERM (Editions de la Rue Margot) first issued a selection of his compositions within their "Masterworks" CD series, showcasing international contemporary composers. On ERM, his works were performed by the Czech and Kiev Philharmonic Orchestras, with vocal soloists of the Sofia National Opera. Important choral works include his Kyrie for SATB double choir and soloists, first performed at the historic Tallis 500th Anniversary Concerts in 2005, and then poignantly featured in Thierry Donard's French film, "Nuit de la Glisse".
In 2008, the first compilation album of his music was released to universal critical praise (a disc which contains a representative selection of music for a range of forces: choral, vocal, string, percussion, and a large-scale orchestral work, "Terpsichore - the 'Whirler' or Muse of Dance" - one of a series of epic orchestral tone pictures on the theme of the legendary Nine Muses. Cambridge University Press's "Tempo" described it as a "ground-breaking tour de force, incandescent", while, in America, "Fanfare" magazine admired its "music of tremendous power [and] astonishing range of colors and moods". American critic and recording historian Lynn René Bayley ranked the album amongst her Top 5 worldwide releases for the year (in Fanfare's "Want List 2008"), applauding "a major new, original and quite brilliant classical voice". The title orchestral work also later received Special Distinction in the Rudolf Nissim Prize 2017 (USA) - one of the concert music world’s most esteemed awards for "Best Original Orchestral Score".
In the US, Jonathan has been the recipient of Critics' Choice Awards, and recordings have been supported by the Foundation for New Music (USA), the Kenneth Leighton Trust (UK), and in 2009 Jonathan became the first composer to receive a Professional Development Award from the UK music business's own charity, the Musicians' Benevolent Fund, specifically to assist towards issuing a second major disc in early 2012 on the Navona fine music label (NV5867) of PARMA Recordings, entitled "Polyhymnia" (The Muse of Sacred Poetry) - featuring three European orchestras. In 2012, the UK's Bliss Trust helped to support composition of the next work in the "Nine Muses" series - "Erato".
In 2015, Jonathan was granted a major inaugural Australia Council “Individual International Arts Project Award”, to help fund the creation and recording of an album of multi-part, a cappella polychoral music (entitled "Woefully Arrayed" on Navona NV6113, 2017). US "Fanfare" reported: "Woefully Arrayed is a masterpiece … radiant … A superb disc … shot through with spiritual light and which speaks on a very deep level to the listener", while Choir & Organ (UK) argued that "Little writes very much in the manner of the renaissance masters, creating what a modern sensibility would identify as ‘immersive’ music of strongly mystical aspect". Jonathan was also one of only seven composers whose work was selected for the Royal Philharmonic Society’s “ENCORE Choral” Programme – for workshop, performance and broadcast on BBC Radio 3 during 2016-18. His music was subsequently selected for workshop performance by the BBC Singers, led by Judith Weir and conducted by James Morgan, at BBC Maida Vale Studios in October 2016. In March 2016, he was Featured Composer at the CNU New Music Festival, including a showcase concert of his works at the Ferguson Centre for the Arts, in Virginia, USA.
Jonathan has also pursued an academic and writing career. He was appointed Senior Lecturer at Buckinghamshire New University in 1999 on their innovative Music Industry Management course (the first such degree course in Europe), where he specialised in the workings of the British and international recording industry, and taught songwriting analysis. In 2001 he became Principal of the Academy of Contemporary Music in Guildford, England, Europe's largest specialist academy for students of contemporary music, and the first music education establishment to win the Queen's Award for Enterprise (Innovation category).
In 2005, Jonathan was made Consultant Editor to A&C Black's flagship volume of musical reference, the "Musicians' and Songwriters' Yearbook", and he has contributed articles on the future of music to the Hudson Institute's "American Outlook" magazine, and the British Academy's "Heart & Soul: Revealing the Craft of Songwriting" (published by Sanctuary to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the Ivor Novello Awards). He has been listed in the UK Music Publishers' Association Register of Expert Musicologists, and is currently working on several books including his "Anatomy of Musical Composition". Two major academic studies of exotic orchestration were issued by EMP (New York) in 2010-2011: "The Influence of European Literary and Artistic Representations of the 'Orient' on Western Orchestral Compositions, ca. 1840-1920: From Oriental Inspiration to Exotic Orchestration", and its companion, "Literary Sources of Nineteenth-Century Musical Orientalism: The Hypnotic Spell of the Exotic on Music of the Romantic Period". (This "vast" and "erudite" two-volume, 950-page survey of Orientalism in music and literature - “a valuable contribution in understanding the development of the modern symphony orchestra” - won him the first of two Authors' Foundation / Royal Literary Fund Awards). His specialisms include orchestration, ethnomusicology, and the future of the music industry.
Having acted as Visiting Lecturer in Music Composition at the University of Surrey, and Curriculum Consultant to the British and Irish Modern Music Institute, Jonathan was subsequently appointed to the inaugural dual role of Professor of Music Composition and Music History, and Head of Research, at the University of Chichester, and, in 2019, youngest ever Professor Emeritus. Future composition projects include his ongoing musical depiction of the Nine Muses. Jonathan is a member of The Recording Academy / Grammy Pro in the USA. Selected music examples of works may be found on SoundCloud & YouTube (see Video page).
Performers of works in recent years include: the Czech, Kiev & Moravian Philharmonic Orchestras; North/South Chamber Orchestra (New York); Soloists of the Sofia National Opera (Bulgaria); Stanbery Singers & Vox Futura (USA); Tallis Chamber Choir, Chichester Singers & BBC Singers (UK).
LINKEDIN: www.linkedin.com/in/jonathan-david-little
ACADEMIA: https://chi.academia.edu/JonathanLittle
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