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Brian Current |
 Biography |
A 2005 Guggenheim Fellow and recipient of the 2003 Barlow Prize, Brian Current has established himself as one of North America's leading young composers. His music, lauded and performed internationally as well as broadcast in over 35 countries, is renowned for its energy, wit and daring bravado.
Raised in Ottawa, Brian Current studied music at McGill University in Montreal with Bengt Hambreaus and John Rea. He later completed his Ph.D. in composition on full fellowship from the University of California at Berkeley in 2002, where he was also active as a conductor. In 2000 he was chosen as a participant in the National Arts Centre's conductor training workshop with Jorma Panula and Pinchas Zukerman. He has since been featured conducting his own music and other works with New Music Concerts, Soundstreams, CBC’s In Performance and the Esprit Orchestra’s New Waves Festival. Recently, the Glenn Gould School appointed Brian as conductor and artistic director of its New Music Ensemble.
Brian Current’s music has been performed across North America and abroad by the Esprit Orchestra , the American Composers Orchestra (Carnegie Hall), the Oakland Symphony, the Indianapolis Symphony, the Winnipeg Symphony, the Warsaw National Philharmonic, the Deagu Ensemble (Korea), the CBC Radio Orchestra, the Nouvel Ensemble Moderne, Soundstreams, the Gryphon Trio and others. Upcoming performances are scheduled by the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (Faster Still) and the VOX festival of the New York City Opera, who will present a version of his chamber opera Airline Icarus.
In 2001, Brian won the Grand Prize in the CBC National Competition for Young Composers, for his piece For the Time Being, which then went on to win Selected Work (under 30) at the International Rostrum of Composers in Paris. In 2002 it opened the inaugural concert of the Warsaw Autumn Festival, conducted by Antoni Wit.
October 2006
