Seán Doherty wins Scotland's Fragments composition competition

Young Irish composer Seán Doherty has been announced as the winner of the Fragments Composition prize, with his work Fragment: Et Clamabant for unaccompanied SATB choir.

Fragments is a music and art project based on the Scottish borders, and encouraging the creation of new music and art inspired by the discovery of a rare fragment of a medieval manuscript known as the Hawick Missal Fragment. The project explores the spirituality encapsulated in the fragment through music and art in the 'expression of the divine'. Fragments is run jointly by Historic Scotland and The Red Field with funding from Creative Scotland and Historic Scotland, and will be host to a range of events across the borders.

Seán Doherty is a composer from Derry, who studied at St. John's College, University of Cambridge and Trinity College Dublin, where he lectures in counterpoint and Baroque music history. His research focusses on 17th-century music theory. He has been awarded the Jerome Hynes, Feis Ceoil, St. Giles Cathedral and Choir and Organ Magazine composition competitions and the West Cork Chamber Music Festival Young Composers' Bursary.

Doherty's winning work, Fragment: Et clamabant, will be the first musical element in the project. Dr. Matthew Cheung Salisbury, director of music at Fragments, has said that 'Seán's composition stands out because of his attention to the concept of the Fragments project, his innovative and striking employment of text and music from the fragment, and his use of a sympathetic compositional style which echoes our missal fragment’s origins.'

Find out more about Fragments at www.fragmentsproject.co.uk.