JAZZIK #3

With a repertoire spanning centuries, continents and styles, Clark Rundell has established himself as a champion of music ranging from the 18th century to the current day, from Jazz to Kora, from Tango to European modernism and from large, multidimensional projects to music of complexity and intricacy.

He recently made his debuts with the Barcelona Symphony Orchestra, Klangforum Wien, the Gulbenkian Orchestra, Lisbon, the SWR-Sinfonieorchester Baden-Baden, NDR Orchestra Hannover and the Orchestre Philharmonique Royal de Liege all of whom immediately re-invited him to conduct over the next few seasons. He works regularly with orchestras and ensembles including all of the BBC orchestras, Britten Sinfonia, Royal Liverpool Philharmonic, Royal Northern Sinfonia, Ensemble 10/10 and Asko Schoenberg.

Opera world premieres include James MacMillan’s Clemency at the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, Orlando Gough’s Voices & Votes at the Bergen International Festival, Julian Joseph’s spectacular reimagining of Tristan and Isolde in London, Oscar Bettison’s The Light of Lesser Days in the Netherlands and the hugely anticipated opera Iphigenia by Wayne Shorter and esperanza spalding in Boston and at the Kennedy Centre, Washington, DC. Other opera performances include Albert Herring, The Turn of the Screw, Carmen, Katya Kabanova, Street Scene, L’Heure Espagnole, The Cunning Little Vixen, Greek and L’enfant et les sortilèges.

Deeply committed to the performance of new music, Clark Rundell has given world premières of works by composers such as Louis Andriessen, Steve Reich, Mark-Anthony Turnage, James MacMillan, Django Bates, Sir Richard Rodney Bennett, Oscar Bettison, Gary Carpenter, Trish Clowes, Tansy Davies, Tim Garland, Adam Gorb, David Horne, Julian Joseph, Steve Mackey, Steve Martland, Grace Evangeline Mason, Brad Mehldau, Martijn Padding, Gwilym Simcock, Joey Roukens, Wayne Shorter and Julia Wolfe.

As an arranger, he collaborated with Louis Andriessen on a suite from the late Dutch master’s opera Rosa, entitled Rosa’s Horses, which was premiered by Clark Rundell and the Netherlands Radio Chamber Philharmonic, at Het Concertgebouw, Amsterdam. The pair also collaborated on Vermeer Pictures, a suite from Andriessen’s opera Writing to Vermeer, which was also performed at Het Concertgebouw to great critical acclaim. Clark Rundell is working on further suites of Louis Andriessen’s more recent operas.

He has conducted extensive orchestral projects with artists such as Elvis Costello, the Wayne Shorter Quartet, esperanza spalding, Toumani Diabate, Brad Mehldau, Tim Garland, Trish Clowes, Julian Joseph, Abel Selaocoe, Gwilym Simcock and Pablo Ziegler. A highly versatile musician, Rundell has also performed with artists such as John Dankworth, Bob Brookmeyer, Victor Mendoza, Guy Barker, Julian Argüelles, Ed Thigpen, Cleo Laine, Andy Sheppard, Lew Tabakin and Michael Gibbs.

He is passionate about working with young people and is Professor of Conducting at the Royal Northern College of Music in Manchester, and has a close relationship with the Netherlands Orchestral Academy.

Clark Rundell spent much of his childhood in Bloomington, Minnesota. He studied conducting at Northwestern University, Chicago with John Paynter and trombone with Frank Crisafulli, and was subsequently awarded a Junior Fellowship to study conducting with Timothy Reynish at the RNCM.

One of the most lyrical and intimate voices of contemporary jazz piano, Brad Mehldau has forged a unique path, which embodies the essence of jazz exploration, classical romanticism and pop allure. From critical acclaim as a bandleader to major international exposure in collaborations with Pat Metheny, Renee Fleming, and Joshua Redman, Mehldau continues to garner numerous awards and admiration from both jazz purists and music enthusiasts alike. His forays into melding musical idioms, in both trio and solo settings, has seen brilliant re-workings of songs by contemporary songwriters like The Beatles, Cole Porter, Radiohead, Paul Simon, Gershwin and Nick Drake; alongside the ever-evolving breath of his own significant catalogue of original compositions. With his self-proclaimed affection for popular music and classical training, “Mehldau is the most influential jazz pianist of the last 20 years” (The New York Times).