Wendy Hiscocks : Represented Artist
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Random Audio Sample: Rainforest toccata (solo piano) by Wendy Hiscocks, from the CD Spin |
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Photo: Bridget Elliot
Artist website: http://www.wendyhiscocks.com
Composer-pianist Wendy Hiscocks was born in Wollongong near
Sydney and began playing the piano at an early age. In her teens
she started composing, and went on to study composition with
Peter Sculthorpe at University of Sydney. Her career started with
a two-year residence as composer and composition teacher at a
major Perth school that resulted in the establishment of
composition as an accredited subject in the West Australian
school syllabus.
Since moving to London in 1988 she has received commissions,
premieres and broadcasts from distinguished soloists, ensembles
and choirs from around the world. These have included Jesus
College Choir, Cantab., Sydney Chamber Choir, Philharmonic Chorus
(Adelaide), Schubert Ensemble (London), Krommer and Terpsychords
Quartets (Switzerland), Kallmunz Festivalorchester (Germany),
Bande Stagione (Germany); singers Elizabeth Connell (Britain),
Rachel Nichols (Britain) and Keith Hempton (Australia); pianists
Roy Howat (Britain), Piers Lane (Australia-Britain), Vladimir
Stoupel (Russia-Germany), Scott McCarrey (USA), Cordelia Williams
(Britain); string players Miwako Abe, Carolyn Lam, Sophie Rowell
(Australia) and Matthias Feile (Germany-Britain).
In March 2010 the British Film Institute commissioned Wendy
Hiscocks to compose and perform a score for the silent film
Alice in Wonderland (1903). In August 2010, Shades
of the Alhambra will be premiered by Michael Collins (cl),
Louise Hopkins (vc) and Kristian Chang (pf) at the Australian
Chamber Music Festival in Townsville.
Wendy Hiscocks's recent appearance in an ABC TV documentary on
the Australian painter Lloyd Rees includes a performance of her
choral work Grace and has been broadcast in 2008 and 2009. As
pianist she has appeared internationally at venues ranging from
London's Purcell Room to festivals on various continents such as
the Kusatsu International Summer Academy and Festival in Japan
and Australia's Port Fairy Festival. She performs piano duos and
duets, chamber music and accompanies singers in a large range of
repertoire, including her own compositions. She has recorded
piano duet and duo music by Chabrier with Roy Howat for the
French label Stil and her piano duet arrangement of Saint-Saëns's
Danse Macabre was published by Edition Peters in
2007.
Wendy Hiscocks is also an authority on the music of Arthur
Benjamin, a topic on which she has submitted a doctorate at the
Australian National University and on whom she will be writing
the first biography. Plans for 2010 will feature Hiscocks as
composer in residence at the Australian Festival of Chamber Music
in Townsville, Australia, and as lecturer and performer in events
celebrating the Arthur Benjamin anniversary for a variety of
organisations including the ABC.
Wendy Hiscocks is a composer of great finesse, well tuned to
the fantasy-world of children, and her works for young pianists
'Two Pieces for Cordelia' and 'Light' are delightful, exquisite
miniatures worthy to stand beside the classic children's
repertoire. She understands and nurtures piano colour, something
often neglected or even negated by new composers…For more
advanced pianists there is a suite of four pieces 'The Piper at
the Gates of Dawn' and a searching piano trio called 'Coral
Fantasy' - I found a lot to savour in this compelling music.
(Piano Magazine)
Wendy Hiscocks's 'Coral Fantasy', inspired by visits to coral
reefs in Hawaii and Australia, inhabits a very different sound
world. It's a delight. In turn restful and turbulent, with brief
obeisances to Prokofiev and Shostakovich, and frequent changes of
tempo (and pleasingly varied tonal colourings to add interest to
the listening experience, Hiscocks's piece has an unpretentious
charm and immediacy. (The West Australian)
[Hiscocks's] attractive suite 'Pastel & Oil'…launched the
evening with imaginative flair…The outer pieces, 'Morning Song'
and the final, lilting 'Waltz' drew rich sonorities from the bloc
textures, with tonally orientated harmony offset by some colorful
dissonance, and aptly 'pastel shading' in the delicate, high,
melismatic lines for flute and clarinet. Their playful dialogues
of trills and skittish gestures in the second piece 'Scherzo',
formed an engaging contrast with the 'Nocturne's' eloquent
rhetorical exchanges amongst the bassoon, oboe and horn.
(Pan magazine)
Wendy Hiscocks — current to March 2010
Selected Commissions
Work | Commission Details | |
---|---|---|
Dry white fire : for violin and piano (2010) | Commissioned for a Riverina Conservatorium Composers' Forum | |
Lanterns on Lake Illawarra (solo piano) (2007) | Commissioned by Scott McCarrey. | |
Trees and lightning (solo piano) (2007) | Commissioned by Scott McCarrey. | |
Keshovati : flute solo (2002) | Commissioned by Mark Underwood. | |
Pages of poetry (quartets: clarinet, violin, viola, cello) (2000) | Commissioned by Deborah de Graaff for performance by Kuringai Virtuosi. | |
Unseen dances : piano duet (2000) | Commissioned by the British Music Society, Melbourne |