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BioGRaPHieS & CoMPoSiTioNS |
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2000
Percussion
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"Colin Currie is an extraordinary and dynamic musician; a
percussionist of sensitivity with a finely honed sense of balance."
(The Scotsman)
Born in Edinburgh in 1976, Colin Currie came to national attention in 1992
at the age of fifteen, when he won the Gold Medal of the Shell/London
Symphony Orchestra Music Scholarship. In 1994, he became the first
percussion finalist in the BBC Young Musician of the Year competition,
giving the world premiere of Errollyn Wallen's Concerto for Percussion in
the final at London's Barbican Centre, televised live to an estimated eleven
million viewers.
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Since then, Currie has appeared as soloist twice with the Royal Scottish
National Orchestra, and with the London Symphony Orchestra, Scottish Chamber
Orchestra, BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra, Sinfonia 21, East of England
Orchestra, Cabrillo (California) Chamber Orchestra, Colorado Symphony and
Utah Symphony, working with conductors such as Paul Daniel, Marin Alsop,
David Robertson, and Martyn Brabbins. He has a particularly strong
relationship with James MacMillan's concerto Veni, Veni, Emmanuel,
with more than 30 performances of the work to date. He performed the West
Coast premiere of the work here at Cabrillo Music Festival in 1996. A
recording with the Ulster Orchestra for Naxos was released in July 1998.
Forthcoming engagements in 1999/2000 include the City of London Sinfonia,
Orchestre National de Lyon, Orchestre National de Capitole du Toulouse,
Royal Scottish Nation Orchestra, BT Scottish Ensemble, and a return to the
Colorado Symphony and the Cabrillo Festival.
As a recitalist, Currie has performed throughout the UK (including Wigmore
Hall), as well as in the Middle East, Belgium, France, Holland, Switzerland,
and Hong Kong. His first solo album, striking a balance: Contemporary
Percussion Music from EMI's Debut series for young artists, was released in
February 1998. He performed Berio Folk Songs with Dawn Upshaw at the
Barbican and Birmingham's Symphony Hall in May 1998, and appears on Viktoria
Mullova's crossover CD Through the Looking Glass for Philips (to be
released Autumn 2000). Currie is also a member of the Steve Martland Band,
with whom he has recorded and toured extensively in the UK and abroad.
New commissions form an important part of Currie's future artistic plans and
he will give the world premiere of Michael Torke's Percussion Concerto in
February 2001 with the Royal Scottish National Orchestra. Leonard Slatkin
and the National Symphony Orchestra (Washington, D.C.) have also
commissioned Steve Martland to write a piece for Currie which will be
premiered at the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C., in May 2001 as part of
a British Music Festival.
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