PROFESSORS OF V ACADEMY
Beat Furrer
Beat Furrer (1954) is one of the most important composers today. His first opera, Die Blinden, was commissioned by the Wiener Staatsoper and premiered in 1989 at Wien Modern. Under the baton of Claudio Abbado, Face de la Chaleur was performed in Vienna in 1991. Narcissus was premiered in Steirischen Herbst at the Graz Opera in 1994, and, in 1996, the concerto for two pianos and orchestra,nuun, was premiered at the Salzburger Festspielen, while, in the same year, Furrer was Composer in residence at the Lucerne Festival. Premieres followed for, among others, spur for piano and string quartet in Vienna, and still for ensemble and piano (1998) in Zürich. Premieres in 2001 includedOrpheus Bücher in Donaueschingen and a work for music and theatre, Begehren, at Steirischen Herbst in Graz. A piece for Hörtheater entitled FAMA, premiered in 2005 at the Donaueschinger Musiktagen in a specially-constructed acoustic room, was enthusiastically received at its debut and first run of performances (Vienna, Paris, Venice Biennale). A concerto for piano and orchestra was premiered in 2007 at the WDR in Cologne. Furrer’s newest opera, Wüstenbuch, premiered in March 2010 at the Opera House of Basel, and was soon after presented in Berlin at the Festival Märzmusik and in Vienna at the Wiener Festwochen.
In 1992, Furrer received the Grant-in-aid from the Siemens Foundation. He was honoured with composition prizes from the cities of Duisburg ( 1994) and Vienna (2003), and has been a member of the Akademie der Künste in Berlin since 2005. Beat Furrer was awarded the ”Golden Lion” at the Venice Biennale 2006 for his work FAMA and for his contribution to this innovative form of music theatre.
Since Autumn 1991, Beat Furrer has served as Professor of Composition at the University for Music and Performing Arts in Graz.
Furrer was born in Schaffhausen, Switzerland, and studied conducting with Otmar Suitner and composition with Roman Haubenstock-Ramati.
In 1985, he founded the Ensemble Klangforum Wien. he remained its director until 1992. Currently, he continues his connection with the ensemble as conductor.
Raphael Cendo
Raphael Cendo was born in 1975, studied piano and composition, first at Paris Ecole Normale de Musique, then at Conservatoire National Supérieur and completed the program for composition and electronic music at IRCAM in 2006. He studied composition with Allain Gaussin, Brian Ferneyhough, Fausto Romitelli and Philippe Manoury. Raphaël Cendo has written compositions for internationally renowned ensembles such as L’Itinéraire, the National Orchestra of Île de France, Ensembe Intercontemporain and Ensemble Modern.
Many of his compositions have been played at important festivals such as Mito Festival in Milano, Biennale di Venezia, Radio France – Montpellier Festival, Voix Nouvelles Festival in Royaumont, Ars Musica in Brussels, Musica in Strasbourg, Why Note in Dijon, Donaueschingen and the Darmstadt Summer Course.
In 2007 Raphaël Cendo was awarded the Prix Espoir of the Francis and Mica Salabert Foundation of for Orchestre Symphonique du Montréal. Since 2008 he teaches composition at Conservatoire de Nanterre. From 2009 to 2011 Raphaël Cendo was resident at the Académie de France in Rome (Villa Médici), received the Prix Hervé Dugardin of Sacem in 2011 and the Prix Pierre Cardin in 2013.
After 2012 Raphaël Cendo will be composition tutor in Darmstadt for the second time.
Peter Ablinger
Peter Ablinger was born in Schwanenstadt, Austria in 1959. He first studied graphic arts and became enthused by free jazz. He completed his studies in composition with Gösta Neuwirth and Roman Haubenstock-Ramati in Graz and Vienna. Since 1982 he has lived in Berlin, where he has initiated and conducted numerous festivals and concerts. In 1988 he founded the Ensemble Zwischentöne. In 1993 he was a visiting professor at the University of Music, Graz. He has been guest conductor of ‘Klangforum Wien’, ‘United Berlin’ and the ‘Insel Musik Ensemble’. Since 1990 Peter Ablinger has worked as a freelance musician. Since 2013 research professor at the University Huddersfield.
Festivals at which Peter Ablinger’s compositions have been performed include the Berlin and Vienna Festwochen, Darmstadt, Donaueschingen, and festivals in Istanbul, Los Angeles, Oslo, Buenos Aires, Hong Kong, London, New York.
The Offenes Kulturhaus Linz, the Diözesanmuseum Köln, Kunsthalle Wien, Neue Galerie der Stadt Graz, the Kunsthaus Graz, the Akademie der Künste Berlin, the Haus am Waldsee Berlin, the Santa Monica Museum of the Arts have showed his installation work over the last few years.
Peter Ablinger is one of the few artists today who uses noise without any kind of symbolism – not as a.signifier for chaos, energy, entropy, disorder, or.uproar; not for opposing something, or being.disobedient or destructive; not for everything, for.eternity, or for what-have-you. As in all these cases.of music deliberately involving noise, noise is the.case, but for Ablinger: this alone. Peter Ablinger has.also come a long way in questioning the nature of.sound, time, and space (the components usually thought.central to music), and his findings have jeopardized.and made dubious conventions usually thought.irrefutable. These insights pertain to repetition and.monotony, reduction and redundancy, density and.entropy.