Biography
Patrick Nunn (b.1969, Kent, UK) studied composition with Frank Denyer at Dartington College of Arts, Gary Carpenter at the Welsh College of Music and Drama and with Simon Bainbridge and Jonathan Harvey whilst completing his PhD in composition at the Royal Academy of Music (funded by a PRS Scholarship).
He has been the recipient of many prizes and awards including the Alan Bush prize for Transilient Fragments (2006), a British Composers Award (solo/duet category) for Mercurial Sparks, Volatile Shadows (2005) and the BBC Radio 3 composing for children prize for Songs of Our Generation (1995).
Nunn’s music has been widely performed in the UK and on the continent and has featured at over forty festivals worldwide. He has written and worked with a diverse range of collaborators including Diego Masson, Composers Ensemble, Kreutzer Quartet, Piano Circus, Icebreaker, Sound Intermedia, Ballet Rambert, The Gogmagogs, Mark Simpson, Thalia Myers, Rarescale and New London Children’s Choir.
Under the auspices of Tod Machover (MIT) and in his role as Hyperbow Researcher at the Royal Academy of Music, Nunn wrote two new works incorporating Diana Young’s (MIT) Hyperbow design - Gaia Sketches for solo cello and live electronics (nominated work in the New Media category, British Composers Awards 2006) and Fata Morgana for cello, ensemble and live electronics. Young and Nunn documented the collaborative process between composer and engineer in a research paper presented at the 2006 NIME conference at IRCAM.
In addition to his extensive work as an educator, he has recently completed two ABRSM commissions for their Spectrum series and Intra aspicere for orchestra and live electronics based upon the spectral features of the bells at Cologne Cathedral. His work Music of the Spheres has been released on Red Sock Records and three further recordings of his work are currently being prepared. His work Prism was nominated for the solo/duo category for the 2009 British Composers Awards and his proposed work Sentiment of an Invisible Omniscience recently received the Birmingham New Millennium Composition Award and will be performed in 2011. His music is represented by the Sound and Music ‘New Voices’ scheme.
© Patrick Nunn (Nov 2009)