Bushra El-Turk

Last updated
Bushra El-Turk
Bushra El-Turk.png
Background information
Born(1982-11-10)November 10, 1982
London, United Kingdom
Genres contemporary classical music
Occupation(s)composer, researcher and music educator
Years active2002 - present
Website www.bushraelturk.com

Bushra El-Turk (born 1982 in London, UK) is a British composer and contemporary music educator of Lebanese parents. Named by the BBC as "one of the most inspiring 100 Women of today", she has written numerous compositions for live concerts, dance, theatre and multi-media performances, performed and broadcast on radio and television by prestigious musicians in various countries of Europe and the Middle East.

Contents

Life and career

El-Turk studied composition at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama for five years. [1] In 2017, she graduated with a PhD in Musical Composition at the University of Birmingham, having been supervised by Michael Zev Gordon, with her thesis focused on the relation of Middle-Eastern and Western classical music. Up to 2023, her more than 60 musical works include a wide variety of styles and influences. Among others, she has composed vocal music for soloists and choirs, accompanied by piano, non-western musical ensembles or symphony orchestra. Her works often integrate musical traditions and musicians from different cultural backgrounds. [2] They have been performed in live performances, film scores and programmes on radio and TV, and often include elements of dance, theatre and multi-media. [3] In an interview with Classical Music magazine, El-Turk stated: "I’m very interested in exploring the spectrum between the written and the improvised, between the spoken and the song and between music and theatre." [4]

As a researcher and educator of contemporary music, El-Turk's areas of interest include contemporary composition, cross cultural collaborations and the integration of composition and improvisation. Besides programmes for young composers at the Tŷ Cerdd in Wales, the National Concert Hall Ireland Creative Lab Programme, and the Alternative Conservatory in London, [5] she has given courses at the junior department of the Royal College of Music. [6]

El-Turk's works have been performed by the London Symphony Orchestra, BBC Symphony Orchestra, London Sinfonietta, Orchestre National de Lorraine, the Latvian Radio Choir, Lebanese Philharmonic Orchestra and others. Her compositions have been performed at venues including Lincoln Center NYC, Deutsche Oper Berlin, Konzerthaus in Vienna, Birmingham Symphony Hall, Bridgewater Hall Manchester, the Southbank Centre and Barbican Centre in London. In 2018, she had her BBC Proms debut with a work performed by the soprano Carly Owen of National Opera Studio and Babylon Orchestra of Berlin. [3]

Composed for the London Symphony Orchestra and conducted by Simon Rattle, El-Turk’s composition Tuqus had its world premiere in June 2019, including students from the Guildhall School of Music and 55 young musicians from East London, who were taking part in LSO's On Track free concert on Trafalgar Square. The piece is inspired by a Middle-Eastern ritual performed by women. According to El-Turk, “Tuqus means ‘ritual’ in Arabic and it evokes the spirit of zaar, which is a community healing, trance-like ritual of drumming and dance.” [7]

Excerpts of El-Turk's multi-media opera Woman at Point Zero were first performed as a work in progress at the 2017 Shubbak festival of contemporary Arab culture in London. [8] In 2020, this piece was awarded the Fedora-Generali Prize for Opera, allowing it to be subsequently fully produced for the stage. [9] The complete version was first performed as a production of the Belgian LOD Music Theatre, with stage direction by Egyptian theatre director Laila Soliman, and conducted by Kanako Abe at the 2022 Aix-en-Provence Festival. [10] Other performances in 2023 included venues in London, various cities in Belgium, Luxembourg, and Valencia, Spain. [11] Further, El-Turk is artistic director and leader of musical Ensemble Zar that collaborated in these performances. [6] It received an Ivor Novello Award nomination at The Ivors Classical Awards 2024 for Best Stage Work Composition. [12]

In 2014, El-Turk was named by the BBC as one of the most inspiring 100 Women of today. [13] Her activities for contemporary music awards include having been a member of the jury for the British Ivors Composer Awards, as well as adjudicator for the Commonwealth Young Composer Awards and member of the board of directors at the Independent Society of Musicians. [14]

In October 2023 El-Turk received an Ivor Novello Award nomination at The Ivors Classical Awards. Her work Ka, composed for percussion soloist and string orchestra, was nominated for Best Large Ensemble Composition. [15]

Critical reception

Referring to El-Turk's work Tmesis performed at the first night of the BBC Proms Dubai 2019, music critic Fiona Maddox remarked the "idea of home in her music, but home is “in a constant state of flux”. [16]

In his review of the performance her opera Woman at Point Zero at the 2017 Shubbak Festival, music critic Bill Barclay called it the "centrepiece of this Shubbak festival concert" and "an arresting new piece of music theatre." [8] Writing for The Observer's classical music reviews, Fiona Maddox said about the 2023 performance at the Royal Opera's Linbury Theatre in London: [17]

El-Turk’s music, striking and distinctive, conducted by Kanako Abe and played by Ensemble Zar, drives the emotional energy, shedding light and shade on the text’s bleakness. The whispers, crunches and urgent rhythms were part written, part improvised, for instruments including cello, accordion, Korean transverse flute, Iranian bowed kamancha and more.

— Fiona Maddox, music critic, The week in classical: Don Carlo; Woman at Point Zero; History of the Present – review

In Gramophone magazine's Opera Now newsletter, Owen Mortimer wrote: [18]

El-Turk specialises in integrating music from diverse cultural traditions, often with surprising results. This score is no exception and features an extraordinary line-up of instruments from around the world. [...] This unique palette allows for some fascinating sonic combinations that run the gamut from slowly shifting cluster harmonies to passages of beguiling rhythmic complexity.

— Owen Mortimer, Opera Now magazine, 2023, Bushra El Turk: Woman at Point Zero at ROH Linbury Theatre | Live Review

Selected works

Discography

2016 Tmesis, François-Xavier Roth / London Symphony Orchestra [20]

2020 Tik Tak, on Fadia Tomb El-Hage's album Masarat

2023 Mendelssohn / Tailleferre / Canat de Chizy / Clyne / El-Turk / Holmès / Pépin, Orchestra Pasdeloup [21]

Related Research Articles

Brian Irvine is a composer from Northern Ireland. His work has been characterized as avant-garde, incorporating elements of "free jazz, rock, rap, thrash, tango, lounge and contemporary classical" music. Irvine was Associate Composer with the Ulster Orchestra (2007–2011) and Professor of Creative Arts at the University of Ulster.

Sir George William John Benjamin, CBE is an English composer of contemporary classical music. He is also a conductor, pianist and teacher. He is well known for operas Into the Little Hill (2006), Written on Skin (2009–2012) and Lessons in Love and Violence (2015–2017)—all with librettos by Martin Crimp. In 2019, critics at The Guardian ranked Written on Skin as the second best work of the 21st-century.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Thomas Adès</span> British composer, pianist and conductor

Thomas Joseph Edmund Adès is a British composer, pianist and conductor. Five compositions by Adès received votes in the 2017 Classic Voice poll of the greatest works of art music since 2000: The Tempest (2004), Violin Concerto (2005), Tevot (2007), In Seven Days (2008), and Polaris (2010).

<span class="mw-page-title-main">James MacMillan</span> Scottish composer and conductor

Sir James Loy MacMillan, TOSD is a Scottish classical composer and conductor.

Julian Anderson is a British composer and teacher of composition.

Dame Judith Weir is a British composer. She served as Master of the King's Music from 2014 to 2024. Appointed by Queen Elizabeth II, Weir was the first woman to hold this office.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Teatro Real</span> Opera house in Madrid, Spain

The Teatro Real is an opera house in Madrid, Spain. Located at the Plaza de Oriente, opposite the Royal Palace, and known colloquially as El Real, it is considered the top institution of the performing and musical arts in the country and one of the most prestigious opera houses in Europe.

Richard Blackford is an English composer.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Hilda Paredes</span>

Hilda Paredes is one of Mexico's leading contemporary composers, and has received many prestigious awards for her work. She currently resides in London, and is married to the noted English violinist, Irvine Arditti.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Kenneth Hesketh</span> British composer

Kenneth Hesketh is a British composer of contemporary classical music in numerous genres including dance, orchestral, chamber, vocal and solo. He has also composed music for wind and brass bands as well as seasonal music for choir.

Cevanne Horrocks-Hopayian is a British composer, singer, and harper. She is considered one of today's leading emerging composers.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Stacy Hardy</span> South African writer

Stacy M. Hardy is a writer, a teacher, a researcher, and an editor at Chimurenga, a pan-African journal.

Edith Canat de Chizy is a French composer, born in Lyon and now based in Paris. She was the first female composer to be elected a member of the Académie des Beaux-Arts.

Gabriel Prokofiev is a Russian-British composer, producer, DJ, and founder of the Nonclassical record label and nightclub. He has been nominated for two Ivor Novello Awards and his works have been performed internationally by orchestras such as BBC Philharmonic, St Petersburg Philharmonic, Seattle Symphony, Detroit Symphony, MDR Leipzig, Buenos Aires Philharmonic and Royal Seville Symphony Orchestra.

Dima Orsho is a Syrian-American mezzosoprano singer and composer. She studied first at the Damascus Higher Institute for Music and later at the Boston Conservatory at Berklee. Since 2003, she has been a member of the Syrian Hewar ensemble, alongside Kinan Azmeh, Issam Rafea and others. In July 2022, Orsho sang and played the role of the prisoner Fatma in the premiere of Bushra El-Turk's multi-media opera Woman at Point Zero at the Aix-en-Provence Festival in France.

Oliver Leith is a British composer of classical and electronic music. His work has been commissioned and performed by many international ensembles including Apartment House, BBC Symphony Orchestra, Plus Minus and Philharmonia Orchestra. He was appointed Doctoral Composer-in-Residence at the Royal Opera House in 2019.

Gavin Higgins is a British composer who resides in London.

Zaid Jabri is a Syrian-Polish composer, conductor and music educator, who works at the intersection of Western and Middle Eastern musical traditions. He is one of the representatives of the so-called second generation of Syrian composers of the turn of the 20th to the 21st century. This generation also includes Syrian musicians and composers such as Shafi Badreddin, Kareem Roustom, Raad Khalaf, Kinan Azmeh, Hassan Taha and Basilius Alawad and has been characterized as "transforming modern Arab music into a contemporary space for experimentation."

Woman at Point Zero is an English and Arabic language multimedia opera in one act, with music by British composer Bushra El-Turk and libretto by South African writer Stacy Hardy. It is based on the 1975 novel of the same name by Nawal El Saadawi.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Kanako Abe</span> Japanese conductor, composer and pianist

Kanako Abe is a Japanese conductor, composer and pianist. Based in The Hague, Netherlands, she has performed works by contemporary composers, including Tōru Takemitsu, Michaël Levinas, Régis Campo and Bushra El-Turk.

References

  1. ↑ "Composer focus: Bushra El-Turk". ISM. Retrieved 2023-09-14.
  2. ↑ "The Alternative Conservatoire - Faculty".
  3. 1 2 "Bushra El-Turk". British Music Collection. 2018-08-09. Retrieved 2023-09-12.
  4. ↑ "Bushra El-Turk on cross-culture collaboration". Classical Music. Retrieved 2023-09-13.
  5. ↑ "The Alternative Conservatoire". thealternativeconservatoire.org. Retrieved 2023-09-13.
  6. 1 2 Royal College of Music London. "Dr Bushra El-Turk". www.rcm.ac.uk. Retrieved 2023-09-12.
  7. ↑ "Simon Rattle to conduct the LSO in free concert in London's Trafalgar Square". Classic FM. 2019-05-30. Retrieved 2023-09-13.
  8. 1 2 Barclay, Bill (2017-07-16). "Woman at Point Zero review – compelling music from unfamiliar sources as Arab voices thrill". The Guardian. ISSN   0261-3077 . Retrieved 2023-09-12.
  9. ↑ "FEDORA - Premiere of the FEDORA - GENERALI Prize for Opera's Winner 2020". Fedora Platform. Retrieved 2023-09-09.
  10. ↑ Naylor, Gary. "Review: WOMAN AT POINT ZERO, Royal Opera House". BroadwayWorld.com. Retrieved 2023-09-09.
  11. ↑ "Glowing Reviews for Bushra El-Turk Opera". Composers' edition. 2023-08-31. Retrieved 2023-09-14.
  12. ↑ Taylor, Mark (2024-10-15). "Nominations for The Ivors Classical Awards 2024 announced". The Ivors Academy. Retrieved 2024-10-15.
  13. ↑ "Who are the 100 Women 2014?". BBC News. 2014-10-26. Retrieved 2023-09-13.
  14. ↑ "Bushra El-Turk - Composer - Bio". bushraelturk.com. Retrieved 2023-09-13.
  15. ↑ Taylor, Mark (2023-10-18). "Nominees announced for The Ivors Classical Awards 2024". The Ivors Academy. Retrieved 2023-10-18.
  16. ↑ Maddocks, Fiona (2019-03-31). "Home listening: Chausson, Ben-Haim and Bushra El-Turk". The Guardian. ISSN   0261-3077 . Retrieved 2023-09-12.
  17. ↑ Maddocks, Fiona (2023-07-08). "The week in classical: Don Carlo; Woman at Point Zero; History of the Present – review". The Observer. ISSN   0029-7712 . Retrieved 2023-09-13.
  18. ↑ "Bushra El Turk: Woman at Point Zero at ROH Linbury Theatre | Live Review". Gramophone. Retrieved 2023-09-13.
  19. ↑ 2023-03-22T14:01:00+00:00. "The Strad - Inclusive and brave programming: Solem Quartet and Bushra El-Turk". The Strad. Retrieved 2023-09-14.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link)
  20. ↑ "Bushra El-Turk". Discogs. Retrieved 2023-09-13.
  21. ↑ "Release group "Mendelssohn / Tailleferre / Canat de Chizy / Clyne / El-Turk / Holmès / Pépin" by Mendelssohn, Tailleferre, Canat de Chizy, Clyne, El-Turk, Holmès, Pépin; Orchestre Pasdeloup, Sora Elisabeth Lee, Monika Wolińska, Chloé Dufresne, Kanako Abe - MusicBrainz". musicbrainz.org. Retrieved 2023-09-13.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.