Joe Cutler (born

London London is the Capital city, capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of both England and the United Kingdom, with a population of in . London metropolitan area, Its wider metropolitan area is the largest in Wester ...

, 17 December 1968) is a British

composer A composer is a person who writes music. The term is especially used to indicate composers of Western classical music, or those who are composers by occupation. Many composers are, or were, also skilled performers of music. Etymology and def ...

who grew up in

Neasden Neasden is a suburban area in northwest London, England. It is located around the centre of the London Borough of Brent and is within the NW2 (Cricklewood) and NW10 (Willesden) postal districts. Neasden is near Wembley Stadium, the Brent Reserv ...

and studied music at the Universities of Huddersfield and Durham, before receiving a Polish Government Scholarship to study at the Chopin Academy of Music in

Warsaw Warsaw, officially the Capital City of Warsaw, is the capital and List of cities and towns in Poland, largest city of Poland. The metropolis stands on the Vistula, River Vistula in east-central Poland. Its population is officially estimated at ...

Poland Poland, officially the Republic of Poland, is a country in Central Europe. It extends from the Baltic Sea in the north to the Sudetes and Carpathian Mountains in the south, bordered by Lithuania and Russia to the northeast, Belarus and Ukrai ...

. He has taught composition at the

Royal Birmingham Conservatoire Royal Birmingham Conservatoire is a music school, drama school and concert venue in Birmingham, England. It provides education in music, acting, and related disciplines up to postgraduate level. It is a centre for scholarly research and docto ...

since 2000, and since 2005 he has been the Head of Composition there. In 2015 he was made Professor of Composition. He is also the co-founder of the instrumental ensemble ''Noszferatu''.

Influence

During the late 1980s and early 1990s, Cutler, like many of his generation, including Americans composers Michael Gordon and David Lang, and British composer

Steve Martland Steve Martland (10 October 1954 – 7 May 2013) was an English composer. He helped to curate the Factory Classical label of Factory Records, featuring contemporary British composers. Life and music Martland was born in Liverpool, and studied co ...

, was influenced by the minimalist music of

Louis Andriessen Louis Joseph Andriessen (; 6 June 1939 – 1 July 2021) was a Dutch composer, pianist and academic teacher. Considered the most influential Dutch composer of his generation, he was a central proponent of The Hague school of composition. Although ...

. Like Andriessen, Cutler rejected the

atonal Atonality in its broadest sense is music that lacks a tonal center, or key. ''Atonality'', in this sense, usually describes compositions written from about the early 20th-century to the present day, where a hierarchy of harmonies focusing on ...

inheritance of

Arnold Schoenberg Arnold Schoenberg or Schönberg (13 September 187413 July 1951) was an Austrian and American composer, music theorist, teacher and writer. He was among the first Modernism (music), modernists who transformed the practice of harmony in 20th-centu ...

in favour of the more rhythmically driving music of

Igor Stravinsky Igor Fyodorovich Stravinsky ( – 6 April 1971) was a Russian composer and conductor with French citizenship (from 1934) and American citizenship (from 1945). He is widely considered one of the most important and influential 20th-century c ...

. In these early works, Cutler showed influences ranging from

Minimalism In visual arts, music, and other media, minimalism is an art movement that began in the post-war era in western art. The movement is often interpreted as a reaction to abstract expressionism and modernism; it anticipated contemporary post-mi ...

and Andriessen to 1980s

avant-garde In the arts and literature, the term ''avant-garde'' ( meaning or ) identifies an experimental genre or work of art, and the artist who created it, which usually is aesthetically innovative, whilst initially being ideologically unacceptable ...

modernism Modernism was an early 20th-century movement in literature, visual arts, and music that emphasized experimentation, abstraction, and Subjectivity and objectivity (philosophy), subjective experience. Philosophy, politics, architecture, and soc ...

and even the rhythmic aspects of the

New Complexity New Complexity is a composition school in 20th-century classical music where composers seek a "complex, multi-layered interplay of evolutionary processes occurring simultaneously within every dimension of the musical material". Origins Though o ...

movement. This is seen in such works as ''Epitaph for Nebula'' (1989) and ''Blast!'' (1992), where atonality and complicated driving rhythms preside.

Works

During the 1990s, as Cutler's mature style developed, the complicated rhythms were gradually replaced with simpler, but still motoric,

jazz Jazz is a music genre that originated in the African-American communities of New Orleans, Louisiana, in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Its roots are in blues, ragtime, European harmony, African rhythmic rituals, spirituals, h ...

inspired rhythms whilst the atonal element lost ground to allusions to Eastern-European

modality Modality may refer to: Humanities * Modality (theology), the organization and structure of the church, as distinct from sodality or parachurch organizations * Modality (music), in music, the subject concerning certain diatonic scales * Modalit ...

and jazz. This is seen in one of his most popular works, '' Sal's Sax'' (1996), written for the De Ereprijs Ensemble. In more recent years, Cutler has developed a more lyrical side along with his influences from

postminimalism Postminimalism is an art term coined (as post-minimalism) by Robert Pincus-Witten in 1971Chilvers, Ian and Glaves-Smith, John, ''A Dictionary of Modern and Contemporary Art'', second edition (Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 2009), p ...

, which led to works such as ''Awakenings'' (1998), ''Sikorski'' (2005) and ''Hawaii Hawaii Hawaii'' (2019). Cutler has been commissioned by Opera 21, BBC Proms, BBC Radio 3, London Symphony Orchestra, BBC Concert Orchestra, Scottish Chamber Orchestra, Swedish Chamber Orchestra, London Sinfonietta, Sage Gateshead, Birmingham Contemporary Music Group, Seoul National University, Orkest de Ereprijs, Orkest de Volharding, Royal National Theatre, HCMF, Spitalfields Festival, Orchestra of the Swan, London Cultural Olympics, Scottish Ensemble, Schubert Ensemble, International Guitar Foundation a.o. He received a Special Mention at the 1997 Gaudeamus Music Week, and 2nd Prize in the 2000 Toru Takemitsu Award. In 2008, Cutler won the Chamber Music Category in the BBC Composer Awards with his piece, 'Folk Music'. In 2016, he also received a British Composer Award in the Jazz Category for ‘Karembeu’s Guide to the Complete Defensive Midfielder’. In 2023 he was shortlisted for a Royal Philharmonic Society Award in the Large Scale Work Category for ‘Concerto Grosso�

In 2010, Cutler was one of twenty composers commissioned to write a piece for the London 2012 Olympic

Recordings

Cutler has released four albums of his work. Bartlebooth was released on NMC in 2008 and was one of Gramophone's Top 20 releases of 2008. Boogie Nights was released in 2012 on Birmingham Record Company. Elsewhereness was released on NMC Recordings in 2018, reaching number 10 in the Classical Specialist Charts. His most recent release is Hawaii Hawaii Hawaii which was released on Birmingham Record Company in 202

Selected works

*''Epitaph for Nebula'' (1989), for mixed ensemble *''Blast!'' (1992), for clarinet, violin, cello and piano *''Gaia'' (1993), for viola solo *''Shamen'' (1994), for trombone solo *'' Sal's Sax'' (1996), for mixed ensemble *''Awakenings'' (1998), for large orchestra *''Urban Myths'' (1999), for saxophone and piano *''Five Mobiles after Alexander Calder'' (2000), for soprano saxophone (or clarinet), viola and piano *''Without Fear of Vertigo'' (2001), for mixed ensemble *''Music for Cello and Strings'' (2005), for cello and string orchestra *''In Praise of Dreams'' (2005), for soprano and piano *''Sikorski'' (2005), for mixed ensemble *''Folk Music'' (2007), for string quartet *''Music for Sunflowers'' (2009), for viola and string orchestra *''Ping!'' (2012), for string quartet and four table tennis players *''Boogie Nights'' (2012), for mixed ensemble and mechanical organ *''Karembeu’s Guide to the Complete Defensive Midfielder'' (2015), for improvising duo and mixed ensemble *''McNulty'' (2016), for piano trio *''Elsewhereness'' (2018), for symphony orchestra *''Hawaii Hawaii Hawaii'' (2019), for saxophone and orchestra *''Just Passing Through'' (2020), for solo piano and large ensemble *''Concerto Grosso'' (2022), for solo ensemble and string orchestra/timpani *''Painted Time'' (2023), for piano trio

References

BMIC profile

Scotsman article SCO premiere of ''Cinnamon Street''

"Tinkle, tinkle little star" ''The Guardian''

External links

Official site

Birmingham Conservatoire profile
{{DEFAULTSORT:Cutler, Joe 1968 births Living people British male classical composers 20th-century British classical composers 21st-century British classical composers 20th-century British male musicians 21st-century British male musicians Academics of the Royal Birmingham Conservatoire Alumni of Durham University