Dr Paul Newland

Biography

Paul Newland is a composer and performer with interests in acoustic, collaborative, interdisciplinary and site-specific work which invites close listening to sound through patterning, extended duration, amplification and slowing of often sparse, pared down material, making use of both traditionally notated and open scores. The work draws on continuing interests in contemporary visual arts, dance and Japanese culture.

His work has been performed internationally by artists such as; [rout], 175 East, Apartment House, Arditti Quartet, Asko Ensemble, BBC Symphony Orchestra, Ilan Volkov and the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra, London Symphony Orchestra, Quatuor Bozzini, Elias Quartet, An Assembly, Ensemble xy, Jack Sheen, Thallein, Jane Chapman, exquisite corpse, Rolf Hind, Richard Casey, Philip Howard, Huuj Ensemble, Jonathan Powell, Ito Noritaka, Ryusuke Koarashi, Ives Ensemble, Ixion, Audrey Riley, Mieko Kanno, Darragh Morgan and Mary Dullea, Tim Parkinson and James Saunders, Radius, London Sinfonietta, Okeanos, Noszferatu and Psappha as well as performances at and broadcasts by BBC Radio 3, ResonanceFM, Music We’d Like to Hear, Beaconsfield Gallery London, Bermondsey Street Festival, Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival, Ocean Hackney, Kettle’s Yard Cambridge, Ultima (Norway), Gaudeamus (Holland), The Incubator Arts Project the Bowery New York City and Sonorities Festival Montpellier. His music has been released by NMC, Divine Art and BML.

He is a founding member of the ensemble [rout] and the free-improvising electric guitar duo exquisite corpse (Paul Newland/David Arrowsmith). exquisite corpse have featured at venues such as London’s Vibe Bar, Café Oto Dalston, Old Fire Station Oxford, Audiograft, Crondell St. Underground Car Park Shoreditch Festival, The Book Club Spitalfields, The Old Police Station Deptford, Cakey Muto Hackney, sssh BOOM The Rag Factory Brick Lane, Greenwich Dance Agency, and Resolutions at The Place.

He has a longstanding creative partnership with choreographer Marina Collard with whom he has generated more than eleven new dance works. He studied composition with Anthony Gilbert and Sir Harrison Birtwistle at the Royal Northern College of Music in Manchester and with Michael Finnissy at the Royal Academy of Music in London.

In 1993 he received the Paul Hamlyn Award for Composition. In 1999 he was awarded a Japanese Government Monbusho Scholarship and from 1999-2002 he studied in Japan with composer Jo Kondo.

He completed his doctorate in 2005 at Royal Holloway University of London under the supervision of composer Simon Holt.

He has taught composition at Guildhall School of Music since 2006 and was appointed Associate Head of Composition in 2012 with responsibility for directing the Department’s Masters programme. He is a Fellow of the Higher Education Academy.