Oliver Weeks (born in

Gloucester Gloucester ( ) is a cathedral city, non-metropolitan district and the county town of Gloucestershire in the South West England, South West of England. Gloucester lies on the River Severn, between the Cotswolds to the east and the Forest of Dean ...

Gloucestershire Gloucestershire ( , ; abbreviated Glos.) is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in South West England. It is bordered by Herefordshire to the north-west, Worcestershire to the north, Warwickshire to the north-east, Oxfordshire ...

) is an English composer, arranger, and guitarist.

Education

Weeks grew up in

Frome Frome ( ) is a town and civil parish in Somerset, England, on uneven high ground at the eastern end of the Mendip Hills and on the River Frome, south of Bath. The population of the parish was 28,559 in 2021. Frome was one of the largest tow ...

Somerset Somerset ( , ), Archaism, archaically Somersetshire ( , , ) is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in South West England. It is bordered by the Bristol Channel, Gloucestershire, and Bristol to the north, Wiltshire to the east ...

, and developed an early interest in classical music and '50s and '60s rock 'n' roll. He attended

Frome Community College Frome Community College, styled as Frome College, is a comprehensive school in Frome, Somerset, England for students aged 13 to 18. Approximately 1,200 were enrolled in December 2021, within the three tier system. Students' studies at the coll ...

and then

Clare College, Cambridge Clare College is a Colleges of the University of Cambridge, constituent college of the University of Cambridge in Cambridge, England. The college was founded in 1326 as University Hall, making it the second-oldest surviving college of the Unive ...

, where he read music and received a starred First. A school visit to

Kolkata Kolkata, also known as Calcutta ( its official name until 2001), is the capital and largest city of the Indian state of West Bengal. It lies on the eastern bank of the Hooghly River, west of the border with Bangladesh. It is the primary ...

in 1996 led to a deep engagement with Bengali poetry and music. Weeks wrote his undergraduate dissertation on

baul The Baul () are a group of mystic minstrels of mixed elements of Sufism and Vaishnavism from different parts of Bangladesh and the neighboring Indian states of West Bengal, Tripura and Assam's Barak Valley and Meghalaya. Bauls constitute bot ...

music and

Rabindra Sangeet ''Rabindra Sangeet'' (; ), also known as Tagore Songs, are songs from the Indian subcontinent written and composed by the Bengalis, Bengali polymath Rabindranath Tagore, winner of the 1913 Nobel Prize in Literature, the first Indian and also the ...

. He also created classical works based on original Bengali source material. He remained at Cambridge to complete an MPhil under

Robin Holloway Robin Greville Holloway (born 19 October 1943) is an English composer, academic and writer. Early life Holloway was born in Leamington Spa. From 1953 to 1957, he was a chorister at St Paul's Cathedral and was educated at King's College School, ...

, and subsequently received his PhD in composition from the

Royal Academy of Music The Royal Academy of Music (RAM) in London, England, is one of the oldest music schools in the UK, founded in 1822 by John Fane and Nicolas-Charles Bochsa. It received its royal charter in 1830 from King George IV with the support of the firs ...

, London, studying with

Simon Bainbridge Simon Bainbridge (30 August 1952 – 2 April 2021) was a British composer. He was also a professor and head of musical composition, composition at the Royal Academy of Music, London, and visiting professor at the University of Louisville, Kentu ...

and

Philip Cashian Philip Cashian (born 1963) is an English composer. He is the head of composition at the Royal Academy of Music. Early life and education Philip Cashian was born in Manchester in 1963 and studied at Cardiff University and the Guildhall School o ...

Compositions

Orchestras and ensembles who have performed his work include the

London Philharmonic Orchestra The London Philharmonic Orchestra (LPO) is a British orchestra based in London. One of five permanent symphony orchestras in London, the LPO was founded by the conductors Thomas Beecham, Sir Thomas Beecham and Malcolm Sargent in 1932 as a riv ...

, the

Philharmonia The Philharmonia Orchestra is a British orchestra based in London. It was founded in 1945 by Walter Legge, a classical music record producer for EMI. Among the conductors who worked with the orchestra in its early years were Richard Strauss, ...

, the ensemble

Endymion Endymion primarily refers to: * Endymion (mythology), an Ancient Greek shepherd * ''Endymion'' (poem), by John Keats Endymion may also refer to: Fictional characters * Prince Endymion, a character in the ''Sailor Moon'' anime franchise * Ra ...

, the Royal Academy Soloists, and the

City of London Sinfonia City of London Sinfonia (CLS) is an English chamber orchestra based in London. CLS is orchestra-in-residence at Opera Holland Park since 2004 and holds a residency at St Paul's Cathedral. CLS also performs regularly across the city of London i ...

Non-classical work and collaborations

After fieldwork on the

Baul The Baul () are a group of mystic minstrels of mixed elements of Sufism and Vaishnavism from different parts of Bangladesh and the neighboring Indian states of West Bengal, Tripura and Assam's Barak Valley and Meghalaya. Bauls constitute bot ...

musicians (mystic poets and singers) of

Bengal Bengal ( ) is a Historical geography, historical geographical, ethnolinguistic and cultural term referring to a region in the Eastern South Asia, eastern part of the Indian subcontinent at the apex of the Bay of Bengal. The region of Benga ...

, Weeks collaborated with the Bengali singer Moushumi Bhowmik to form the syncretic group Parapar. He also plays in the

instrumental An instrumental or instrumental song is music without any vocals, although it might include some inarticulate vocals, such as shouted backup vocals in a big band setting. Through Semantic change, semantic widening, a broader sense of the word s ...

metal A metal () is a material that, when polished or fractured, shows a lustrous appearance, and conducts electrical resistivity and conductivity, electricity and thermal conductivity, heat relatively well. These properties are all associated wit ...

band Astrohenge and formed the band Khiyo with singer

Sohini Alam Sohini Alam () is a British singer of British Bangladeshi, Bangladeshi descent who sings in the bands Khiyo, Lokkhi Terra, and GRRRL. She has performed internationally on stage, radio, and television and worked on music for dance, theatre, and ...

in 2007.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Weeks, Oliver 1978 births Living people 21st-century English classical composers People from Frome English male classical composers 21st-century British male musicians