Michel van der Aa

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Michel van der Aa (born March 10, 1970) is a Dutch composer.

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[edit] Early years

Michel van der Aa was born in Oss, Netherlands on March 10, 1970. He trained as a recording engineer at the Royal Conservatory of The Hague. He studied composition with Diderik Wagenaar, Gilius van Bergeijk and Louis Andriessen.

[edit] Career

The music of Van der Aa has been performed by ensembles and orchestras internationally. Those includes the ASKO/Schoenberg Ensemble, Freiburg Baroque Orchestra, Melbourne Symphony Orchestra, De Nederlandse Opera, Mozarteum Orchestra Salzburg, Seattle Chamber Players, Ensemble Nomad Tokyo, musikFabrik, Continuum Ensemble Toronto, SWR orchestra Baden-Baden & Freiburg, Netherlands Radio Orchestras, Norrköping Symphony Orchestra Sweden, and the Helsinki Avanti Ensemble.

He completed a program in film directing at the New York Film Academy in 2002. He also participated in the Lincoln Center Theater Director's Lab, an intensive course in stage direction in 2007.

One of his most successful work is One, a chamber opera for soprano, video and soundtrack. The opera attracted excellent critical acclaim following its performances in cities like Berlin, Budapest, Paris, Oslo, St. Petersburg, and Warsaw. He directed the television production of One for the Dutch national broadcasting company NPS. Passage, a short film by Van der Aa, has been shown at several international festivals and has been aired on Dutch national television.

He has been a featured artist at the Perth Tura New Music Festival and Holland Festival. He has collaborated with Hal Hartley and Peter Greenaway, both directors, and also with choreographers such as Kazuko Hirabayashi, Philippe Blanchard, Ben Wright and Annabelle Lopez Ochoa.

His music theatre works, including the chamber opera One, composed in 2002, and After Life, whose world premiere took place in Amsterdam on June 2, 2006, have received international critical and public acclaim.

[edit] Awards

Van der Aa was recipient of the Gaudeamus International Composers Award in 1999. He also received the prestigious Matthijs Vermeulen Award for One in 2004. He received a Siemens Composers Grant awarded by the Ernst von Siemens Foundation in 2005. He also received the Charlotte Köhler Prize for his directing work and the interdisciplinary character of his oeuvre in the same year. He was awarded the Paul Hindemith Prize in 2006.

[edit] Current projects

Van der Aa's current projects include a new song cycle for mezzo-soprano, orchestra and soundtrack, commissioned by the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, the Orchestre Nationale de France and the NDR Orchestra in Hamburg and the work's premiere is scheduled for the 2008-09 season.

His music is recorded on the Harmonia Mundi, Col Legno, Composers’ Voice, BVHaast, and VPRO Eigenwijs labels.

[edit] References

[edit] External links


Persondata
NAME Aa, Michel van der
ALTERNATIVE NAMES
SHORT DESCRIPTION Dutch composer
DATE OF BIRTH March 10, 1970
PLACE OF BIRTH Oss, Netherlands
DATE OF DEATH
PLACE OF DEATH