SALLY BEAMISH OBE, FRSE

Sally Beamish was born in London. She began her career as a viola
player with the Raphael Ensemble, Academy of St Martins and London
Sinfonietta, before moving to Scotland in 1990 to focus on composition.
She was appointed a fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh in 2015,
and of the Royal Swedish Academy in 2022. In 2018 she won the
Award for Inspiration at the British Composer Awards, and in 2020 was
awarded an OBE in the Queen’s birthday honours.

She has written three major oratorios. Knotgrass Elegy (text by Donald
Goodbrand Saunders) was premiered by the BBC Symphony Orchestra
and chorus in the BBC Proms 2001, and has recently been named in
BBC Music Magazine as one of the top 6 oratorios of the 20th and 21st
century. Equal Voices (text by Sir Andrew Motion) was premiered by the
LSO with Gianandrea Noseda in 2014. The Judas Passion (text by
David Harsent) was commissioned by the Orchestra of the Age of
Enlightenment and premiered in the UK and USA in 2018.

She is known for her many concertos for internationally-renowned
soloists, including Branford Marsalis, Dame Evelyn Glennie, Håkan
Hardenberger, Steven Isserlis and Tabea Zimmermann. Her harp
concerto, Hive, was premiered at the BBC Proms in 2022, by Catrin
Finch, with BBCNOW conducted by Ariane Matiakh, and shortlisted for
a South Bank Sky Arts Award.

Her recent concerto, Distans, for violinist Janine Jansen and clarinettist
Martin Fröst, was co-commissioned by the Concertgebouw, LSO,
Swedish Radio Symphony (who gave the premiere in 2021) and Oslo
Philharmonic. It received its Dutch premiere in Amsterdam with the
Concertgebouw conducted by Klaus Mäkelä in April 2023, and the
London premiere at the Barbican will be in June 2024, with the LSO
conducted by Gianandrea Noseda.

In June 2023 Roderick Williams performed her Four Songs from Hafez,
with the Sinfonia of London conducted by John Wilson.
Her third full-length ballet, A Christmas Carol, with choreographer Sir
David Bintley, for Finnish National Ballet, received its premiere run in
December 2023, to considerable critical acclaim.

She returned to performing in 2015, when her daughter, luthier
Stephanie Irvine, made her a viola. Since then she has returned to live
in England, and has performed regularly with chamber ensembles
including Divertimenti, and as a guest with the Elias and Chilingirian
quartets. She has performed at Musikdorf Ernen, in the Ryedale,
Trondheim and Oxford Festivals, and in the Australian Festival of
Chamber Music, amongst others, as well as giving solo recitals in
London and Brighton.

Future commissioned works include a piano quartet and several
concertos, and she was recently appointed Composer in Residence
with the Yehudi Menuhin School, where she mentors composers and
performs her works with staff and pupils. Her Partita for string octet will
be included in the 2024 centenary celebrations of Sir Neville Marriner at
the Wigmore Hall, London, performed by the Academy of St Martin-in-
the-Fields.