A recent symposium celebrated the growing profile of new music at the University of Ulster.

Held in the Great Hall on the Magee campus, Derry, a one-day composition symposium -- the second event of its kind -- was attended by alumni composers such as Ed Bennett and Frank Lyons. Representatives of professional bodies also attended, including John McLachlan of the Association of Irish Composers and funders such as the Arts Council Ireland/An Chomhairle Ealaíon.

The Music Department (part of the School of Creative Arts, based in the Foyle Arts Centre) works hard to maintain connections outside the academic world: a number of the composers who studied here and have since gone on to forge successful careers in the business are still associated with us, regularly participating in workshops and symposia. This collaborative relationship was especially significant in the context of the recent UK universities Research Assessment Exercise, in which the University included work by two outstanding Northern Irish composers, Ian Wilson and Brian Irvine, in its submission.

The theme of the symposium was the future of opera: the Arts Council of Northern Ireland has recently conducted a process of consultation regarding provision and funding of the art-form, and given that three University of Ulster composers are currently engaged in bringing new operas of their own to the stage, the time seemed right to debate what it needs to do to survive: stick to the classics? Adapt? Transform itself completely? Ian Wilson, Brian Irvine and Laurence Roman had very different answers.

Ian Wilson (who received his BMus and DPhil from the University, and who between 2000 and 2003 was an AHRB Fellow in the Creative Arts here) spoke about his second opera, Minsk. Commissioned by the Feldkirch Festival in Austria, it represents his second collaboration with Lavinia Greenlaw. The libretto began life as part of her collection of poems of the same name, and Ian stressed the importance of a heightened kind of language as a prompt for musical response -- although the story it tells begins mundanely enough, with a woman sitting on a tube-train. For further information about Minsk (and Ian's work generally) see www.ianwilson.org.uk/.

Brian Irvine (a DPhil of the University and recipient of the First Trust Bank/University of Ulster Distinguished Graduate Award 2006-07) and John McIlduff (librettist, stage director and long-time collaborator with Brian) showed material from their opera project-in-progress, Dumbworld, which was commissioned by Wexford Festival Opera and Opera Fringe, Downpatrick, with funds from the Arts Council/An Chomhairle Ealaíon. It is a devised piece, with scenes exploring the drama and poetry of everyday life, and one in which the instrumental accompaniment (provided by the composer's own well-established ensemble) is not accompanimental at all, but a fully theatrical element in its own right. To learn more about Dumbworld, visit www.brianirvine.co.uk/.

Finally, Dr Laurence Roman, a composition lecturer in the School of Creative Arts, played extracts from his opera Isabella and the Pot of Basil, which premiered at the Buxton Festival in 2006. It makes use of spoken dialogue, exploring the possibility of two equally dramatically powerful worlds (play and opera) existing in parallel. Laurence also announced the premiere of his opera Ulysses (winner of the Vivian Ellis prize), which will be produced in conjunction with the University next year in London's South Bank Centre. He may be contacted via www.ulster.ac.uk/staff/ls.roman.html.

For more information about research in music at the University of Ulster, or to be included in a forum for discussion of the ACNI opera review, contact Dr Cormac Newark at c.newark@ulster.ac.uk or on 00-44-28-7137 5139.

Posted: 22 December 2008