Philip Cashian: The Composers’ Fund
Philip Cashian was born in Manchester in 1963. His fast paced style of music has been described as ‘an uncompromising reflection of the modern world’ and is regularly performed and broadcast worldwide.
Performances include the St. Paul Chamber Orchestra, London Symphony Orchestra, BBC National Orchestra of Wales, Britten Sinfonia, Royal Northern Sinfonia, Riga Sinfonietta, Ensemble Profil (Romania), the Esprit Orchestra (Toronto), Birmingham Contemporary Music Group, London Sinfonietta, Ergon Ensemble (Athens), Festival de Mùsica de Alicante, Aspen Music Festival, Ojai Festival (California), Musikmonat (Basle), Moscow Autumn Festival, Aldeburgh Festival, Spitalfields Festival, Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival and the BBC Proms as well as recent performances in Germany, France, Austria, Hungary, Holland, Norway, Spain, Denmark, Sweden, Italy, Australia, New Zealand and China. In March 2013 he was Composer in Residence at Oberlin Conservatoire where his Concerto for cello and strings received it’s premiere.
Cashian has also written extensively for young and amateur musicians: to date he has written six pieces for the ABRSM’s Spectrum series as well as large scale works for Contemporary Music for All and the Centre for Young Musicians. He is also a sought after teacher and has been Head of Composition at the Royal Academy of Music since 2007. Between 2010 and 2013 he was invited by the British Council to curate a series of concerts of contemporary British music in Bucharest during which works by over sixty living British composers were performed.
He is published by Cadenza Music and two CDs of his music, Dark Inventions and The House of Night, are available on the NMC label.
Through a series of workshops working closely with musicians in Psappha Philip is writing a 20 minute piece, Leonora Pictures, for conducted mixed ensemble.
Psappha will premiere the new work in Manchester during the New Music North West festival in November of this year. The piece will take a sequence of paintings by the Leonora Carrington as a springboard to create a single span work in connecting sections, each drawing on a different concertante instrument or group of instruments from within the ensemble.
Psappha will make a film of the premiere which will be available on their website and You Tube channel.