Gavin Wayte
Fellow in Creative and Professional Practice and Contemporary Music Lead Junior RNCM
PhD, MusM, BMus(Hons),
Email: [email protected]
- Module Leader Artist Development 1 and 2
- Creative Project and Professional Placement teaching and mentoring
- Various further modules teaching and mentoring, see below.
I am a composer, conductor and pianist working in a variety of genres from opera to multimedia performance. I favour in particular collaborating with other artists, and my work has been performed nationally and internationally, at, among other places, the Royal Opera House, Linbury Theatre, Teatro de la Fenice, Venice, HIP festival, North Carolina, USA, as well as at the opening night of the BBC Philharmonic Studio, MediaCity UK, Salford. Typical works include Hot To Trot Love Bot for actor-harpsichordist, Arrival at the Engine Room for cello and live multi-media, Bones of Spring for dancers, harpist and live multi-media and Revolve, for dancers and instruments, performed on location in Manchester City Centre as part of Urban Moves festival.
Competition successes include being shortlisted for the Henri Dutilleux Composition Competition, Joint Winner Sligo International Composition Competition, Sound and Music (SPNM) promoted composer.
My PhD in Composition was from the University of Manchester (2007), after which I took training at the Centre Acanthes and worked on the Royal Opera House’s VOX opera writing scheme. As a conductor, I have worked with Psappha, Manchester Camerata and BBC Philharmonic ensemble and with freelance, project-specific ensembles. I have previously taught composition, conducting and musicology at the University of Nottingham and Salford University.
As a champion for creativity for all, I teach composition and musical skills at summer schools and have previously been a music tutor for the Open College of Arts. In addition to my Fellow role at the RNCM, I am contemporary music lead and composition tutor for the RNCM junior department.
Current and Future Research
Dr Gavin Wayte collaborates with flautist Dr Martyn Shaw (Leeds Conservatoire) to investigate how joint research into historically informed performance practice and historical cultural contexts and contemporary composition and contexts might lead to new insights and usable knowledge in musical performance, composition and creativity. This has led to a series of composition and improvisation performances, often involving electronics, for an original flute from 1839, the ‘Nicholson’s “Improved” Flute’. Recent trajectories of investigation include exploring how aspects of materiality may provide a lens to lead to new creative work and insights into contemporary and historical performance practices.
Since 2018 Gavin has focused on musical creativity connected to nature. This has produced a series of compositions ranging from piano and electronics to video pieces and has recently developed into creative collaborations with other artists including percussionist Delia Stevens and the Royal Academy of Music’s Professor of Low Flutes, Dr Carla Rees. Allied with these musical creative outputs, Gavin has led research projects connected to contemporary issues concerning the natural world including ‘How May Music Projects Enable Positive Environmental Action’. Supported by an RNCM research grant, this project brought together RNCM student focus groups, RNCM postgraduate performers and students from Ashton Sixth Form College, Tameside in creative workshops and think tank scenarios.
Broader aspects of research which feed into the above primary routes of investigation include sonic spatialisation and the creation of sonic space in live instrumental and electronic performance, contemporary improvisation, and ensemble and performer interaction in the performance of notated scores.
Research Areas
- Music and Nature
- Creative collaboration
- Present day creative engagement with historical instruments and historical instrument performance
- Creative approaches to music career development in the contemporary world
External Research Roles
Independent reviewer of output for The University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg’s regarding funding status for South African Department of Higher Education and Training’s Creative Research Subsidy, 2022.
Journal article pre-publication reviewer, Exchanges: The Interdisciplinary Research Journal, Institute of Advanced Study, University of Warwick, UK. 2021
Research Funding
I have received Arts Council England funding and RNCM research grants in connection to research projects such as ‘How May Music Projects Enable Positive Environmental Action?’ and ‘Crossing 2′.
Undergraduate Teaching
- Artist Development
- Composition (Theory and Musicianship pathway)
- Professional Placement – Seminars and Tutorials
- Creative Project – Lectures, Seminars, Tutorials
- Performing Contemporary Music
- Performance Studies
- Research Elective – Cinematic Alchemy: Alfred Hitchcock and Bernard Herrmann
- Research Elective – Improvisation: Past, Present and Future
- RNCM Junior Department – Contemporary Music Lead; Conductor of New Music Ensemble; Tutor in Composition
Postgraduate Teaching
- Freelance Musician
Research Supervision
External examiner for Ivan Karst’s PhD, A Study in Clarity: Josef Suk ‘Asrael’ re-envisioned via Schoenberg, University of Salford, July 2020.
Selected Outputs
Compositions:
Gavin Wayte, Eotvos for solo piano (2024).
Gavin Wayte, Eco-Sketches for clarinet and electronic track (2023).
Performances:
Gavin Wayte, Movement for Piano Trio: 0.2 to 150,000, performed by Cetacean Ensemble (Jocelyn Lau, Claudia Kuner, Gavin Wayte), Royal Northern College of Music, Manchester, UK
(22nd April, 2024).
Gavin Wayte, Soliloquy, Martyn Shaw (playing Nicholson’s ‘Improved’ Flute), Schola Cantorum Basiliensis, Basel, Switzerland (23rd April, 2022).
Gavin Wayte, Prism, Martyn Shaw (playing Nicholson’s ‘Improved’ Flute), live online performance as part of Material Encounters Symposium, co-hosted by University of Johannesburg, Wits Art Museum, and Wits School of Arts Division of Music, Johannesburg, South Africa (20th July, 2023).
Recordings:
Gavin Wayte, Hot to Trot Love Bot, Elaine Funaro (Harpsichord) on Shadow Journey (21st Century Harpsichord Music), 2015, Prima Facie, PFCD036, 2015, CD and streaming platforms.
Public Presentations:
Dr Gavin Wayte, Dr Cameron Harris, Professor Alison Kearney, ‘Creating Encounters with and Across the Arts’, in Essential not Optional – Music HE joint subject conference, Lincoln University, Lincoln, UK (26th June 2024).
Dr Gavin Wayte, Josh Slater, ‘HE Creative Arts in Action: Collaboration in Context’, in Essential not Optional – Music HE joint subject conference, Lincoln University, Lincoln, UK (26th June 2024).
Dr Gavin Wayte, ‘Sounding the Call: Releasing Music’s Potential for Climate Action’ panel member, RNCM Earth Day symposium, Royal Northern College of Music, Manchester, UK (22nd April 2024).
Dr Gavin Wayte, Dr Martyn Shaw,’Nicholson’s Improved Flute: (Im)Material inspiration for interdisciplinary collaboration’, in Material Encounters Symposium, co-hosted by University of Johannesburg, Wits Art Museum, and Wits School of Arts Division of Music, Johannesburg, South Africa (20th July, 2023).
Dr Gavin Wayte, Dr Martyn Shaw, ‘Soliloquy: The ‘Nicholson’s “Improved” Flute’ as an inspiration for interdisciplinary collaboration’, in The Flute in the 19th Century – An Instrument in Transition conference, Schola Cantorum Basiliensis, Basel, Switzerland, (23rd April, 2022).
Dr Gavin Wayte, Dr Martyn Shaw, ‘A Prelude to the Future: Early Nineteenth-Century Musical Innovation as a Catalyst for Interdisciplinary Collaboration’, Noisefloor conference, Staffordshire University, Stoke on Trent, UK, (11th May 2021).
Professional Activity
Gavin has worked as an Artistic Quality Assessor for Arts Council England and was a Cultural Recovery Fund bid assessor for Arts Council England during the Covid pandemic.
Gavin has served on various competition juries including the BASCA British Composer Awards and the eFlute Composition Competition.
Gavin’s evidence was used in the UK Government music streaming enquiry which led to legislative reforms and regulatory interventions.
