Brian Ferneyhough: Life and Works

The project will produce the first comprehensive critical profile in English of British composer Brian Ferneyhough (b. 1943), whose considerable output and controversial musical style have been relatively neglected in musicology until comparatively recently. The many international and national events focused on the composer's music and aesthetics, his profile as a teacher and the number of conservatoire students now engaging with performance of this repertoire as part of their training, testify to the impact of his music on current and future music professionals. The need for consolidated and rigorous consideration of the composer and his aesthetics is pressing as his music reaches wider audiences and greater prominence than ever before.
The research involves, primarily, a two-pronged approach: first, the extant output will be examined both contextually (relative to contemporary developments in New Music, its cultural context and performance practices) and analytically, grouping and considering the works in according to sets or themes (for example 'works in series', 'chamber works', 'solo works', 'works for large ensemble and orchestra' etc.); second, issues central to Ferneyhough's theoretical writings, which capture the reality of the composer's imagination and musical personality as acutely as the notes themselves, will be considered. These include his engagement with Continental philosophical figures (e.g. Adorno, Benjamin and Deleuze), mysticism and alchemy, visual imagery, language/poetry, or his attention to the listener's experience and composition-as-performance. Behind the impressive edifice of the compositions and theoretical essays and interviews are rich sketch materials, many of which are held in the Paul Sacher Stiftung, Basel. These will provide an important insight into the artistic motivations as they develop through the composer's career. In addition, travel to Stanford University to view materials, including sketches, that Ferneyhough has not placed in the Sacher archive, will form an important and original contribution to the research preparatory to the publication of a monograph in 2013. The composer has granted me the unique opportunity to view these materials and question him on a number of key issues.
A key task in my research will be to draw together diverse and substantial materials, to select the key issues for scrutiny and to appraise them appropriately for a range of users.
It is also important to maintain close links to musical practice throughout the course of the research, since the monograph and other outcomes are intended, primarily, to contribute to a community that experiences the music at first hand (as listeners, performers, composers, analysts, etc.). I am invited to speak alongside prominent composer Julian Anderson, who is presenting the BBC programme, and Professor Arnold Whittall at a Ferneyhough symposium in London (IMR) designed to complement and support the BBCSO Total Immersion event in February 2011. The research for this project is already underway, and the timing of the public events and Ferneyhough's visits to UK Conservatoires is particularly apt as a means of beginning to disseminate the information and perspectives that will ultimately be reflected in the book, enhancing the impact that the composer is having on the musical community, both in Britain and internationally. The scale of the works now being performed by major international cultural institutions (large orchestral works, the substantial opera which received performances in New York, Munich, Paris and London and elsewhere), and the award of the Siemens Musikpreis for Lifetime Achievement in 2007 suggests that the composer has acquired a level of international recognition that is not yet mirrored in Musicology. My monograph will address this lack of critical contextualisation at an important stage in the composer's career and life in which his prominence within his generation of musicians is clear.

Composers and performers of New Music represent a group of beneficiaries who will also, in their respective work and _its_ dissemination, further disseminate my research to more users as they draw on the knowledge and context that my work (the first such study in English) provides on a composer whose international profile is rising and generating interest both within and outside academe. I have many personal contacts with ensembles and individuals actively engaged in concert life, and although some hold academic positions, their professional practice outside academe seeks to engage with Ferneyhough scholarship-hence the reason for my invitation to the IMR, London in February 2011, to participate in a symposium aimed at both academics and non-academics, in tandem with the BBCSO Total Immersion event. For a major cultural institution such as the BBC to take on some of Ferneyhough's largest orchestral pieces is a significant event. The composer himself is currently having an impact on the nation's cultural life through these high-profile public events, to which my research will contribute in the months leading up to the proposed research period. This will generate interest in the project amongst significant potential non-academic beneficiaries, notably the listeners to the BBC events intending to inform themselves about what they will experience. I will be able to capitalise on links made through this event and others (such as Ferneyhough's residency at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama (GSMD) and the RNCM in the same month, which also includes public concerts and workshops) to promote my forthcoming work.
Up until now, Ferneyhough has been a prominent figure in contemporary music, but the lack of a major critical assessment in the English language has meant his music has generally been accessible only to specialists with experience in New Music repertoire and its particularities. However, my own experience (particularly when surveying virtual social networks such as Facebook) is that often the most open-minded users are those who find their way to this music from without academe, for example through attendance at concerts and festivals (such as the Huddersfield Festival for Contemporary Music). Other users are coming to Ferneyhough's music via arts venues and conservatoires such as the RNCM and GSMD, which already have strong audiences for New Music, curious to expand their range of experience. Even the controversy that surrounded Ferneyhough in his earliest career, owing to the formidable complexity of his musical expression, inspires curiosity amongst the general public. Recent performances I attended of his opera in Paris and London were at capacity in sizeable theatres: although some of the audience were academics, a larger proportion were not, but were key to debates that followed in social networks, particularly online. At the present time, these non-academic communities are key to the dissemination of informed debate, as much as traditional conference delegates. I can tap into this curiosity and authoritatively contribute to current debates, through my research. Also students of performance and composition form one of the obvious groups of beneficiaries. My work is relevant to them as they prepare pieces for dissemination. I am ideally placed to engage with them as music educator.
With Ferneyhough's 70th birthday in 2013 (the publication of my book will coincide with it), the need for an up-to-date, comprehensive assessment of his work and ideas is evident when one considers the extent of his reputation as one of the most significant creative figures of our time. The award in 2007 of the Siemens Musikpreis (widely regarded internationally as equivalent to a Nobel prize for music) and his exposure through major cultural bodies such as the BBCSO, and international opera venues suggests that now is the right time t