University News Last updated 04 February 2011
Highly acclaimed composer and conductor, Oliver Knussen, will receive an honorary doctoral degree from Birmingham City University on Tuesday 8th February in recognition of his distinguished achievements as a composer.
Oliver was born in 1952 into a musical family and attended the Purcell School of Music, where he studied composition with John Lambert, who taught many of today’s gifted British composers.
By his early teens, Oliver was already making his mark on the musical world. He wrote his First Symphony circa 1967, later conducting the London Symphony Orchestra’s premiere of this work aged just 15. After his debut, he was invited to conduct the work in Carnegie Hall, New York.
In 1970, he won the first of three fellowships to the Tanglewood Music Center in Massachusetts. During this period, he divided his time between England and the US, while completing several works which were subsequently widely performed on both sides of the Atlantic. These works marked Oliver out as one of the leading lights of contemporary music, and included Hums and Songs of Winnie-the-Pooh, in 1970, Second Symphony, in 1971, Océan de Terre between 1972 and 1973, and Ophelia Dances in 1975.
He returned to the UK permanently in 1975 and subsequently wrote Coursing in 1979, and his Third Symphony from 1973 to 1979; pieces which placed him in the forefront of contemporary British music. The latter work enjoyed international success in the wake of its 1979 BBC Proms premiere, and is now regarded as a classic work of its period.
Oliver is widely acknowledged as a profoundly influential composer. He continued to compose during the 1980s, gaining further respect among his peers and, around the same time, began to establish his reputation as a conductor.
He subsequently conducted in many parts of the world including Canada, Holland, Germany and Finland and not least back in the US. As a conductor, he has recorded more than thirty CDs of contemporary music, several of which have won international awards.
His other activities have included Artistic Director of the Aldeburgh Festival from 1983 to 1998, and Head of Contemporary Music Activities at the Tanglewood Music Center between 1986 and 1993. From 1990 to 1992, he held the Elise L. Stoeger Composer's Chair with the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center and, in 1992, he established the Contemporary Composition and Performance courses at the Britten-Pears School in Suffolk in collaboration with Colin Matthews.
Oliver has won numerous awards including Honorary Memberships of the American Academy of Arts and Letters and the Royal Philharmonic Society. He was awarded an Honorary Doctorate from the Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama and also won the Association of British Orchestras Award and British Composer Award 2007 for his Requiem-Songs for Sue. He became a CBE in the 1994 Birthday Honours and most recently won the Royal Philharmonic Society Conductor Award.
His award is due to be conferred at 10.45am on Tuesday 8 February at the Awards Congregation ceremony which will celebrate the work and achievements of students graduating from Birmingham Institute of Art and Design (BIAD) and the Faculty of Performance, Media and English.