The Irish composer Greg Caffrey read music at Queen’s University Belfast where he studied composition under Piers Hellawell and James Clarke. He was awarded a B.Mus. in 1995 and completed a PhD in 2002. He has won a number of awards and scholarships that include the Hamilton Harty Scholarship, MayTurtle Award and an award from the Harrison Foundation. He was a finalist in the ISME- IVME 2nd International Composition Contest in Brussels in 2008, in the Taukay Edizioni Musicali International Composition Prize in 2012 and in the Musica Domani International Composition Prize (USA). He took first prize at the Concorso Counterpoint, Italy in May 2012.
His compositions have been performed in Britain, Ireland, France, Germany, Austria, Argentina, Italy, Belgium, Holland, Sweden, Czech Republic, Estonia, U.S. Bangkok, China and Brazil, receiving critical acclaim.
His music has been recorded on the Meridian, Naturalstudio, Cactus, CMC, Diatribe, Edition 7 and RTÉ lyric fm record labels. The formation of his own ensemble, “Greg Caffrey Circle”, in 2000, allowed him to release an album of his own compositions entitled “Child’s Play”. His latest album, “Ogden Caffrey – First Construction in Nylon”, is a collection of his music for guitar performed by Australian guitarist Craig Ogden. Classical Guitar Magazine described the album as “contemporary music at its very best”.
He has received commissions from many performers and ensembles at home and abroad as well as from BBC Radio 3, RTÉ and The Ulster Orchestra. His music has been represented at important international festivals: Musica Nova Festival in Sao Paulo, Brazil, Zwischen den Horizonten, Germany, Forfest Festival, Czech Republic and the 45th Parallele, Valence, France among others.
More recently he has been responsible for the artistic directorship of Hard Rain SoloistEnsemble, Northern Ireland’s only ensemble entirely devoted to contemporary and 20th Century music repertoire. Hard Rain SoloistEnsemble is a charitable not for profit organization that seeks to promote Irish new music at home and abroad. http://www.hardrainensemble.com
Greg Caffrey is represented by the Contemporary Music Centre, Dublin and is a member of the Association of Irish Composers.
I believe that what is most interesting about every composer is their unique perspective, the collation of their experiences and how this informs their art.I have come to see my music as an amalgam of all my experiences, not as the grafting of one experience on the other, but as the natural subconscious fusion of disparate elements of my art.