Jay Richardson wins John Golland Award

Composer and organist Jay Richardson from Cambridge is the fourth recipient of the triennial John Golland Award since it was established by Paul Hindmarsh, Artistic Director of the RNCM Brass Band Festival in 2009.

Jay’s winning work, Clamour, impressed a distinguished jury, Professor Edward Gregson and Dr Martin Ellerby, for its resourceful approach to the brass band sound. The composer describes his piece as a ‘tribute to all those thunderous and clamourous voices of sea and sky and is inspired particularly by the work of the Bernie Krause, the American musician and soundscape ecologist, who in 1968 founded Wild Sanctuary, and has recorded and archived thousands of hours of natural soundscapes’.

Clamour is Jay’s first work for brass band and the performance by Fairey Band (Garry Cutt) has encouraged him to investigate the medium further: ‘The John Golland Award has opened a new and really exciting musical world to me. It’s given me the chance not only to work with an incredibly high-performing professional group, the Fairey Band, but also to form relationships with leading lights in the brass world who have really enriched my abilities as a composer. I’m now really looking forward to exploring more of the great opportunities which brass band writing holds.’

Jay studied composition and piano at the Junior Guildhall School of Music and in the Aldeburgh Young Musicians programme and is a recent music graduate of Cambridge University. His orchestra work Here I go was performed last year by the RPO as part of Cambridge Live, which also saw the first performances of a piece for Alison Balsom and 70 local musicians and a brass quintet for the brass section of the RPO. In 2015, 16 and 17 Jay curated the annual Young Composers’ Network concert as part of Cambridge Music Festival and is a currently the Organ Exhibitioner at Peterhouse College.

Jay receives a cash award of £500 from the John Golland Trust and has accepted an invitation to compose a new work for brass band to be premiered at the 2020 RNCM Brass Band Festival.

31 January 2019