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Photo: Dean Golja

Mary Finsterer was born in Canberra, Australia, in 1962. Having completed her Bachelor of Music degree at the University of Melbourne in 1987, Mary traveled to Amsterdam to study with Louis Andriessen in 1993 as recipient of the Royal Netherlands Government Award. She then completed a Master of Music degree with Prof. Brenton Broadstock at the University of Melbourne in 1995, and a Doctor of Philosophy degree in 2003.

Finsterer has been a lecturer at universities around the world including the University of Montreal (Canada), Dusquene University (Pittsburgh, USA), University of Wollongong, Victorian College of the Arts. She has lectured in composition at the Conservatorium of NSW, University of Sydney, since becoming a resident of Sydney in 2003, and at the Australian Film Television and Radio School since 2005.

Finsterer's work has received numerous awards including the Albert H. Maggs Award, Alfred S. Bequest, 'Let's Celebrate Oz Music' ABC Award 1989 and Le Nouvel Ensemble Moderne's Forum 91. In 1992 she won the Paris Rostrum Prize and 'Music Lives!' in Pittsburgh. In that same year she was composer-in-residence with Sydney Symphony Orchestra. In 1998 Mary received the Australia Council Composer Fellowship.

Finsterer has represented Australia in five ISCM World Music Day Festivals: Zurich 1991, Essen 1995, Manchester 1998, Bucharest 1999 and Zagreb 2005, and received the prestigious award to compose for Ensemble Intercontemporain and IRCAM in 2001. Other performances of her work have taken place throughout Europe, Canada, USA and Australia by leading ensembles including the Melbourne, Sydney, Queensland, Tasmanian and Western Australia Symphony Orchestras, Australian Chamber Orchestra, Het Trio, Ensemble Modern, Le Nouvel Ensemble Moderne, Pittsburgh New Music Ensemble, Asko Ensemble, Ictus Ensemble and the Arditti String Quartet.

In the last few years Finsterer has become increasingly involved in film, composing written scores and electro–acoustic soundscapes as part of multimedia events for the Zagreb Biennale in 1999 and 2005; for Le Nouvel Ensemble Moderne performing at the Adelaide Festival and at Strasbourg and Montreal in 2000, for Ensemble Intercontemporain and IRCAM performing at the George Pompidou Centre in Paris 2001, and the acclaimed Ictus Ensemble for performance in Lille and Brussels 2004.

Most recently Finsterer received a Churchill Fellowship for her continuing work in the film industry. She is presently composing an opera for the Song Company.

Biography provided by the composer — current to October 2006