Biography
Glen Downie is a composer of instrumental and vocal music originally from Aotearoa, where he studied up until Masters at Te Koki New Zealand School of Music (Victoria University of Wellington) with Michael Norris & Dugal McKinnon. He was the young composer representative at the 2022 Asian Composers League Festival, held the NZSO National Youth Orchestra Composer in Residence (2019), and recieved commisions from Chamber Music New Zealand, and taken part in the 2017 tactus composers forum with the Brussels Philharmonic and Ensemble Musiques Nouvelles, and the Palendriai INternational Composers Course, 2016.
He has a wide range of aesthetic interests and is equally inspired by music from across history, with a particular fondness for early & late 20th century composition, jazz and freely improvised musics (of which he also engages as saxophonist), and contemporary music. His research is primarily looking at self-borrowing and the re-use of material as part of the compositional process.
Research
Composition, Free Improvisation, 20th and 21st Century Music, New Zealand Music
Publications
Suite for Solo Viola - Wai-te-ata Music Press, Victoria University of Wellington, 2021
'Screens: Carefully Arranged Windows into Delicate Rituals of Sound' BLOT, Issue 2, March 2024: Liveness [Review/Response of Screens, Octandre Ensembles portrait album of Frank Denyer's music]
