Rebecca Saunders

The music of Rebecca Saunders is characterised by extremely differentiated sonic complexity. Tonal colouring with a transition into extraneous noise is aptly expressed in work titles such as “Blue and Gray” (2005) for two double basses and “Vermilion” (2003) for B flat clarinet, electric guitar and violoncello. Further inspiration is provided by texts by Samuel Beckett and James Joyce whose stream of consciousness technique Saunders has transformed into a compositional method, for example in “Yes” (2017) from the novel “Ulysses”, based on Molly Bloom’s inner monologue which Saunders has focused on in a number of compositions since “Crimson – Molly’s Song” (1995).

Saunders utilises small-scale instrumentation in her compositions, including instrumental solos and duos as modules in spatial compositions and concert installations. These include compilations such as “Chroma” (2003–21) and the concert collage “Rockaby” (2017–24) for five instruments and 200 musical boxes within which Saunders intersperses her own compositions, for example “Blaauw” (2004) for Marco Blaauw’s double-valved trumpet and “Breath” (2020) for two violins, to form a spatial concert installation in which the solo pieces are both spatially positioned and compiled in a temporal sequence with overlaps. Here the musical boxes provide a sound texture formed by numerous melodies sounding simultaneously but not synchronised. They are activated by both musicians and members of the audience and either spread out on the floor or arranged in a wall sculpture as in “Myriad” which is in turn intended to be played in the concert installation “Myriad II” alongside solo pieces played in various spaces around the room. Saunders has also combined her music collage “Hauch” (2021) with optional dance consisting of a variety of instrumental solos which can be interwoven with dance solos. Since her work “Insideout” (2003), Saunders has repeatedly collaborated with choreographers including Sasha Waltz, developing the spatial aspects in the interaction between dance and music. Her music theatre composition Lash will be premiered at the Deutsche Oper in Berlin in 2025.

The British-born Rebecca Saunders (*1967) studied with Nigel Osborne in Edinburgh and Wolfgang Rihm in Karlsruhe before settling in Berlin. Since 2010, she has taught regularly at the Darmstadt Summer Course and has given additional master classes. She has worked in intensive collaborations with orchestras, for example during her phases as capell-compositrice with the Staatskapelle Dresden in 2009/10 and composer in residence at the Konzerthaus Dortmund in 2005/06. In 2019, she became the first female composer to be awarded the Ernst von Siemens Music Prize and in 2024 the Golden Lion for Music at the Venice Biennale. She has received several Royal Philharmonic Society Awards and British Composer Awards and was presented with the Mauricio Kagel Music Prize by the German arts foundation Kunststiftung NRW. She was awarded an honorary doctorate by the University of Huddersfield. Saunders is a member of the Berlin Academy of the Arts, the Saxon Academy of the Arts in Dresden and the Bavarian Academy of the Fine Arts.