Anita Mawhinney is an award-winning composer based in County Down, Northern Ireland. She was educated at the universities of Oxford and York. She has been composing since childhood and has worked with many ensembles, choirs and soloists from Ireland, England and Poland and her compositions have been supported by ACNI and PRSF, amongst others. Anita is also a pianist and music educator.
In 2021, she won the Peter Rosser Foundation/Hard Rain SoloistEnsemble Composition Award with her ensemble piece, Dark Measures. This established a longstanding relationship with the ensemble, and she has now written five pieces for them. In 2023, she won the Charles Wood Composers’ Competition with her unaccompanied choral work, Hail Gladdening Light, chosen by judges Sir John Rutter, Bob Chilcott and David Hill.
In March 2025 she won a commission for the St Endellion Festival in Cornwall to write a work for solo SATB voices and violin, The Forsaken Merman. This was premiered by soloists at the festival, including award-winning violinist, Kerenza Peacock.
Anita’s compositions are often inspired by mythological characters, particularly from Ireland, as well as beautiful poems, landscapes and art. Her music is full of complex colours, textures and intricate harmonies. Sir John Rutter said of her, “Anita is a composer who has already found her voice.”
Her recent pieces include Macalla Mhacha for Hard Rain ensemble, which has been performed multiple times in Ireland and also at the Modern Music Festival in Beijing, China; it was also recorded for broadcast by Lyric FM. She has also recently completed several choral commissions, as well as a chamber opera. Her recent commission, Pierrette, for flute, clarinet, violin, cello, piano and percussion, was performed in March 2025 by members of Hard Rain SoloistEnsemble and Hastag Ensemble (Warsaw, Poland) and was broadcast on BBC Radio 3.
