Omar Daniel

Biography

Sample Works

Omar Daniel has composed extensively in solo, chamber and orchestral idioms, and was the 1997 recipient of the Jules Léger Award for New Chamber Music, for 'Zwei Lieder nach Rilke', a work for soprano and large ensemble. Other composition awards include the SOCAN National Competition for Young Composers, the CBC National Radio Competition for Young Composers, and the Toronto International Guitar Festival. He has been Guest Composer at the Winnipeg Symphony du Maurier New Music Festival, the Canada Capital Saõ Paulo Festival (Brazil), as well as the composer in residence during the Windsor Symphony’s Festival of Canadian Music (1998) and the upcoming Vancouver Recital Society Chamber Music Festival in 2003. As well, his works have been featured at many national and international festivals, including Open Ears (Kitchener-Waterloo), the Vancouver International New Music Festival, the Made in Canada Festival (Toronto) and the Kanada Muusika Päevad (Estonia).

Mr. Daniel has received performances of his works frequently throughout Canada, as well as in Brazil, Great Britain, The Netherlands, Belgium, Hungary, Poland, Ireland, the United States, and his ancestral Estonia. A skilled pianist, he regularly performs and conducts his own works. He holds a Doctor of Music degree in Composition from the University of Toronto, and his studies include work with John Beckwith and Chan Ka Nin (Canada), Leo Brouwer (Cuba) and Alexander Goehr (U.K.).

Past commissions include works for The Toronto Symphony, Vancouver New Music, New Music Concerts, The Gryphon Trio, The Winnipeg Symphony, CBC Radio II, Conaccord, The Hannaford Street Silver Band, The Esprit Orchestra, guitarist Rachel Gauk, The National Youth Orchestra of Canada, The Elora Festival and Festival of the Sound, The Guelph Spring Festival, Continuum New Music and flutist Robert Cram.

Significant projects of the recent past include his 1998 commission to write 'Double Concerto', a work for violin, cello and orchestra, in celebration of both the Musical Instrument Bank and the 40th anniversary of the Canada Council. This work was premièred by James Ehnes, Dennis Brott and the the Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra conducted by Bramwell Tovey. The Winnipeg Symphony has programmed Mr. Daniel's works during their new music festivals in 1991, 1997, 1998, 2000 and 2001 As part of the Windsor Symphony's 1999 New Music Festival, he had the unique experience of having two orchestral works premièred on the same concert: 'Elegies', with guitar soloist Rachel Gauk, and 'The Mechanical Advantage', with percussionist Beverley Johnston. He has an ongoing desire to work in a collaborative way with other artists, and in 2000 commissioned lyrics from Canadian author Anne Michaels to create 'All Night I Travel You'. In the Spring of 2000, he conducted the première of this work for soprano and chamber ensemble, a Guelph Spring Festival commission made possible by the MusicCanadaMusique 2000 foundation. In the summer of 2000, the National Youth Orchestra of Canada toured Canada with his 26 minute 'Concerto for Orchestra'. As part of Toronto's Massey Hall New Music Festival (November 2000) Alex Pauk and the Esprit Orchestra premièred 'Trope' for orchestra. Maestro Pauk has commissioned Mr. Daniel on two previous occasions, in 1996 and 1994. Kitchener-Waterloo's Canadian Chamber Ensemble gave the première of 'Love-God-Murder' in March 2001. Commissoned for mezzo-soprano Anne Marie Donovan, this work is an original set of prison songs and gospels based upon texts from the southern United States. In the summer of 2001, he attended the première of his 'El Corazón y el Tigre', a chamber work commissioned by CBC radio, written for percussionist Sal Fererras and the Vancouver Recital Society.

In the spring of 2002, several new compositions were premièred. His twelve-minute horror opera, 'Lisa', was presented to a full house by Tapestry New Opera on a program of four short operas in April. 'The Growth of Music and the Invention of Storytelling' was presented on a prestegious Encounters series concert in Toronto, a concert that featured the music of Mr. Daniel. This work was a collaboration between the composer, the Gryphon Trio, and Giller short-listed author Michael Redhill. Also included on the concert was Mr. Daniel's innovative electro-acoustic work 'The Flaying of Marsyas', in which the composer, while hung upside down in a metal cage, manipulates a violinist's sound through control devices attached to his body. Currently he is composing a work for six pianos and two percussionists for the 2003 Winnipeg New Music Festival, and a new chamber work for the 2003 Vancouver Chamber Music Festival.

His music can to be found on three current compact discs: 'My Angel; Rachel Gauk plays works by Omar Daniel (EMI)', 'Book of Mirrors; Popov and Vona Piano Duo (Novadisc)' and 'Heavy Metal: The Hannaford Street Silver Band with Bramwell Tovey' (Opening Day). He is an Associate Composer of the Canadian Music Centre, and a member of the Canadian League of Composers. Since 2000, he has held the position of Assistant Professor at the Department of Music Theory and Composition at the University of Western Ontario. As well, he is the director of the Composition, Electroacoustic Research and Performance Facility (CEARP) at UWO.

2002

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