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Edwin Roxburgh

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Edwin Roxburgh (born 1937) is an English composer, conductor and oboist.

Roxburgh was born in Liverpool. After playing oboe in the National Youth Orchestra, he won a double scholarship to study composition with Herbert Howells and oboe with Terence MacDonagh at the Royal College of Music. He also studied composition with Nadia Boulanger in Paris and Luigi Dallapiccola in Florence.[1]

After his studies he became principal oboist of the Sadler's Wells Opera and taught composition and conducting at the Royal College of Music, where he founded the RCM's Twentieth Century Ensemble. Together with Leon Goossens he wrote the Menuhin Music Guide for the oboe in 1977.

In 2004, Roxburgh became the acting Head of Composition at the Birmingham Conservatoire and from 2005 has acted as visiting tutor in composition and conducting, as well as workshop leader. In 2007 his 70th birthday was celebrated in a series of concert performances showcasing a selection of his works. In 2008 he received the Royal Philharmonic Society Elgar Bursary.

He is also Associate Composer of the London Festival Orchestra.

Music

The orchestral piece Montage was premiered at the BBC Proms in 1977.[2] His Clarinet Concerto (1995), structured as a 30 minute single movement, and the nine movement orchestral work Saturn from 1982 (a tribute to Holst, depicting each of the planet’s nine satellites) have been recorded.[3][4] His 2003 opera Abelard has been published but awaits a full staging.[5] The 2006 Oboe Concerto, An Elegy for Ur, won a British Academy Award.[6] An opera, Her War, for soprano and trumpet with words by Jonathan Ruffle, was premiered by soprano April Fredrick and trumpeter Simon Desbruslais in London in September 2020.[7]

Further reading

Edwin Roxburgh (2014) "Conducting for a New Era". London: Boydell & Brewer/Boydell & Brewer Ltd. ISBN 9781843838029

References

  1. ^ Potter, C. (2016). Nadia and Lili Boulanger. Taylor & Francis. p. 138. ISBN 9781317090793. Retrieved 16 August 2021. A Cambridge graduate who had also trained at the Royal College of Music with Herbert Howells, and in Italy with Luigi Dallapiccola, Roxburgh was already technically accomplished when he came to Boulanger.
  2. ^ BBC Proms performance archive, 23 July, 1977
  3. ^ NMC D119 (2006)
  4. ^ Gramophone review, September 2006
  5. ^ Abelard, United Music Publishing
  6. ^ An Elegy for Ur, Trevco Music
  7. ^ Her War (Live Performance), The Cockpit