A much commissioned and frequently performed composer, a highly creative teacher and an original programmer, John Woolrich is an important figure in British musical life. His successful collaborations with the Birmingham Contemporary Music Group led to his appointment in the 2002-03 season as their Artistic Associate, and from 2004 he has been the Associate Artistic Director of the Aldeburgh Festival. In 1991 he founded the Composers Ensemble, of which he continues to be the driving force.
A number of preoccupations thread through his varied output: the art of creative transcription (Ulysses Awakes, for instance, is a recomposition of a Monteverdi aria, and The Theatre Represents a
Garden: Night – a work for the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment – is based on fragments of Mozart), a fascination with machinery and mechanical processes (heard in many pieces including The Ghost in the Machine and The Barber’s Timepiece), a love of song and a passionate interest in literature.
Throughout the 1990s, Woolrich had a string of prestigious orchestral commissions which resulted in some of his most important works: his concertos for viola, oboe and cello. A CD of the viola and oboe concertos on the NMC label attracted particular attention and was acclaimed as the BBC’s ‘Record of the Week’. Other orchestral pieces written during this period include The Ghost in the Machine, premiered in Japan with Andrew Davis and the BBC Symphony Orchestra and Si Va Facendo Notte which the Barbican Centre commissioned to celebrate the Mozart European Journey Project. In 2001, Woolrich undertook a music theatre commission from Birmingham Contemporary Music Group and Trestle Theatre Company which resulted in Bitter Fruit, a masque for mime actors and ensemble.
Recent pieces include Between the Hammer and the Anvil for the London Sinfonietta, a violin concerto for the Northern Sinfonia featuring Carolin Widmann and a double-bassoon concerto commission by the Feeney Trust for the CBSO and Margaret Cookhorn.
Woolrich was born in 1954 in Cirencester.