INDEPENDENT OPERA at Sadler's Wells

Pelléas et Mélisande

Orchestrator

Stephen McNeff

Stephen studied composition at the Royal Academy of Music and did post-graduate research at Exeter University. He has worked extensively in opera and music theatre and held residences at Contact Theatre in Manchester, the Banff Centre and Comus Music Theatre in Canada. His music has won awards in Toronto and the Edinburgh Festival and been widely recorded and broadcast. He is known for his operas Clockwork (based on the novel by Philip Pullman) and Gentle Giant, commissioned by the Royal Opera House. He was composer in residence for three seasons with the Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra for whom he wrote four major orchestral works, Heiligenstadt, Secret Destinations and the Sinfonia (all premiered by Marin Alsop), and the choral work, Weathers, conducted by David Hill. He won the British Composer Award for best stage work in 2007. Plans include an opera based on Giles Foden’s novel The Last King of Scotland and a double percussion concerto commissioned by the Borletti-Buitoni Trust for O Duo.