Shifting minds in composers training

Students composing are more and more focused on working with computers and samples instead of real instruments or voices. What is needed to make students composing aware of the power of the human voice in relation to music. How can we stimulate young composers to use the richness of the human voice to create music and write new compositions for the choral sector?

Panel members

Alfonso Guerra - moderator

Alfonso Guerra (Spain) received his early musical education at the age of 12. He studied piano with Ramona Herrero and composition with Francisco González Pastor in Granada. In 2016, he was conferred honours in orchestration by conductor Ángel Luis Pérez Garrido, and was granted with an Erasmus+ scholarship by his home institution to continue his studies at the Royal Conservatory of Brussels. There, he worked with composers such as Daniel Capelletti and Michel Lysight, and graduated with a Master’s degree in music composition in June 2019.

More

Sinta Wullur

Composer, singer and pianist Sinta Wullur (Indonesia/ The Netherlands) grew up with classical piano music. Her mother was a pianist who taught many students from their home in Bandung. At ten years old, the family moved to the Netherlands. Sinta studied piano and composition at the Conservatory of Amsterdam with Ton de Leeuw and The Hague with Louis Andriessen and Theo Loevendie.

More

Onur Türkmen

Onur Türkmen is a Turkish composer who studied composition at Berklee College of Music and İstanbul Technical University’s MIAM with Pieter Snapper and İlhan Usmanbaş. He is an assistant professor and assistant dean at Bilkent University’s Faculty of Music and Performing Arts in Ankara.

More

Josep Vila i Casañas

Conductor, composer and pedagogue, Josep Vila i Casañas (Spain) specializes in the a cappella repertoire, as well as choral and orchestral literature down the ages. As a choral conductor, he has worked alongside leading orchestral conductors on the international music scene, among them Daniel Barenboim, Daniele Gatti, Simon Rattle and Gustavo Dudamel.

More

Seán Doherty

Composer and musicologist Seán Doherty completed a PhD in musicology at Trinity College, University of Dublin. His choral works have received many international performances and have garnered numerous awards. Currently, Doherty is a lecturer in music in Dublin City University and active as a singer with the internationally acclaimed New Dublin Voices.