Richard Ayres

Richard Ayres (born 29 October 1965, Cornwall) is a British composer and music teacher.

Richard Ayres followed Morton Feldman’s classes at the Darmstadt and Dartington summer schools. He studied composition, electronic music, and trombone at Huddersfield Polytechnic until 1989, graduating with Distinction in 1989. Since September 1989, Ayres has lived and worked in the Netherlands. He studied postgraduate composition course at the Royal Conservatory of The Hague, studying with Louis Andriessen, and graduating in 1992.

From 1990 Richard Ayres has worked as composer receiving performances from among others the ASKO Ensemble, the Schönberg Ensemble, Ives Ensemble, Orkest de Volharding, Maarten Altena Ensemble, The Netherlands Ballet Orchestra, Netherlands Radio Symphony Orchestra, City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra, Apartment House, London Sinfonietta, Klangforum Wien, MusikFabrik, Continuum (Canada) as well as writing for ensembles with more unusual instrumentations formed for specific projects.

Ayres received the Gaudeamus International Composers Award for composition in 1994. His piece No.31 (for trumpet and ensemble) received a recommendation at the UNESCO Rostrum of Composers in Paris in 1999. He received the Matthijs Vermeulen Award in 2003.

He was Featured Composer at the Huddersfield Festival in 2003 and his music has been heard at the Aldeburgh Festival: his first opera, The Cricket Recovers was premiered there in 2005. It has since had new productions in Stuttgart, Weimar and Braunschweig. He is currently writing his second opera, Peter Pan.

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