Alexander Lawther Taylor (born 1988) is a New Zealand composer, poet and writer.

Early life and education

Taylor was born in 1988 and attended

Westlake Boys High School Westlake Boys High School () is a state secondary school for boys in Forrest Hill, New Zealand, Forrest Hill, Auckland, New Zealand. The school opened in 1962, when Westlake High School (opened 1958) split into Westlake Girls High School on the ...

. At the

University of Auckland The University of Auckland (; Māori: ''Waipapa Taumata Rau'') is a public research university based in Auckland, New Zealand. The institution was established in 1883 as a constituent college of the University of New Zealand. Initially loc ...

he studied music and English. In 2011 he received an MMus(Composition) with a folio of compositions for viola and orchestra, piano, clarinet and ensembles. He was supervised by Eve de Castro-Robinson and John Elmsly.

Career

Taylor sings and plays several instruments: piano, violin and saxophone. He lists the 20th and 21st century composers and musicians who have influenced him as: Europeans

Anton Webern Anton Webern (; 3 December 1883 – 15 September 1945) was an Austrian composer, conductor, and musicologist. His music was among the most radical of its milieu in its lyric poetry, lyrical, poetic concision and use of then novel atonality, aton ...

György Ligeti György Sándor Ligeti (; ; 28 May 1923 – 12 June 2006) was a Hungarian-Austrian composer of contemporary classical music. He has been described as "one of the most important avant-garde music, avant-garde composers in the latter half of the ...

and

Gérard Grisey Gérard Henri Grisey (; ; 17 June 1946 – 11 November 1998) was a twentieth-century French composer of contemporary classical music. His work is often associated with the Spectralist Movement in music, of which he was a major pioneer. Biograp ...

, Americans

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, Annea Lockwood and

Conlon Nancarrow Samuel Conlon Nancarrow (; October 27, 1912 – August 10, 1997) was an American-Mexican composer who lived and worked in Mexico for most of his life. Nancarrow is best remembered for his ''Studies for Player Piano'', being one of the first ...

; New Zealanders Anthony Watson, Samuel Holloway and Eve de Castro-Robinson. Taylor also writes poetry and specialises in setting words to music. He also composes for small ensembles, orchestras and choirs. In New Zealand the NZSO and ensemble 175 East have performed his music. In 2012 the National Youth Orchestra premiered his work ''feel'' commissioned when he was the orchestra's Composer-in-Residence. It features viola and cor anglais solos. The third movement of the work is 'inner''which was his winning entry in the NZSO Todd Corporation Young Composers Award in 2011. Taylor has been commissioned by Westlake Boys High School to write pieces which have been performed by them: ''two years later'' (2013) for male voice choir and ''a summoning'' (2016) for the concert band. In 2016 he attended the

Darmstadt Darmstadt () is a city in the States of Germany, state of Hesse in Germany, located in the southern part of the Frankfurt Rhine Main Area, Rhine-Main-Area (Frankfurt Metropolitan Region). Darmstadt has around 160,000 inhabitants, making it the ...

new-music/avant garde festival where he presented a show ''The Unauthorised History of New Zealand Music'' with New Zealand composer Celeste Oram. Taylor is currently studying for a PhD at the University of California San Diego under

Lei Liang Lei Liang (Chinese: 梁雷; pinyin: Liáng Léi; born November 28, 1972, in Tianjin, China) is a Chinese-born American composer who was a winner of the Grawemeyer Award and a Finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in Music. He is Chancellor's Distingu ...

Awards and honours

In 2012 Taylor won the SOUNZ Contemporary Award at the APRA New Zealand awards for 'inner'' He was the youngest person to receive the award. He won the Composers Association of New Zealand Trust Fund Award in 2013. In 2016 Taylor was the recipient of an Arts Foundation New Generation Awards.

Selected works

Poetry

* ''Seven prose poems'' * ''For John Cage'' * ''Sym phony; Industrial popping sounds'' * ''How to listen to a piece of music'' * ''Close /d Park bench; Outside, a cold day''

Articles

* "Strange loops : circular narratives and ambivalence in Samuel Holloway’s “Impossible Songs.”" ''Canzona'', 2009; v.30 n.51, 32–37 * "A discourse around music." ''Applause (Wellington, N.Z.)'', Nov 2016; n.22, 16–17

Music

* ''Four landscapes'' (2008) – for string quartet * 'inner''(2011) – a mini viola concerto * ''Study of two pears'' (2011) – a song cycle for mezzo-soprano and chamber ensemble * ''Burlesques mecaniques'' (2012) – for piano trio * ''Feel'' (2012) – for full orchestra * ''two years later'' (2013) – for male voice choir * ''Horn concerto : hydraulic fracture'' (2015) – for horn and orchestra * ''a summoning'' (2016) – for concert band * ''Four little pieces'' (2017) – for cello and piano * ''Night'' (2018) text by H.D. (Hilda Doolittle), 'Night' from her 1916 collection Sea garden * ''Assemblage'' (2019) – for orchestra with painting machine * ''On what grounds'' (2021) – a suite for violin, cello and theorbo * ''Asymptote'' (2021) – for piano trio * ''Obtuse strategies'' (2023) – for piano

References

External links

Alex Taylor – biography on Pantographic PunchAlex Taylor's websitePhotographs of Alex Taylor
2011 in Alexander Turnbull Library {{DEFAULTSORT:Taylor, Alex 21st-century New Zealand male composers University of Auckland alumni People educated at Westlake Boys High School 1988 births Living people