index.htm

Welcome to the home page of www.petersculthorpe.com.au
The official website of The Sculthorpe Office last updated 19 May 2009

PETER SCULTHORPE

COMPOSER

"One of the world’s greatest living composers."

- Ivan Moody, Gramophone (July 2007)

"The most original sound to emerge from Australia since
Nellie Melba and the first to show awareness of
regional contexts; it established Sculthorpe as
musical figurehead for the entire Pacific basin."

- Norman Lebrecht

The internationally renowned Australian composer
PETER SCULTHORPE is celebrating his 80th birthday in 2009

SCULTHORPE on Talking Heads, ABC 1 (17 September 2007)
(photo: © ABC TV)

He was born in Launceston, Tasmania, Australia, on 29 April 1929 and began composing early in 1938, after his first piano lesson at the age of 9, 71 years ago!

SCULTHORPE first came to international attention with his
Sonatina for Piano, composed 55 years ago in 1954,
premiered at the 1955 ISCM Festival in Baden-Baden.
The following year saw the first of his Irkanda series of evocations of the great Australian outback

SCULTHORPE birth notice
The Launceston Examiner (4 May 1929)

Since then, each decade of SCULTHORPE's composing life has been distinguished by a
succession of notable works, all of them published exclusively by Faber Music

Thirties (1959-1969)

His early masterworks, the strongly Australian identified
Irkanda IV and the orchestral Sun Music series
and in chamber music the String Quartet No 6

Forties (1969-1979)

The cross-culturally path-breaking String Quartet No 8 and
Port Essington and the celebratory Love 200

Fifties (1979-1989)

Sculthorpe's composing fifties focused on our environmental future
bounded by the orchestral masterworks Mangrove and
Kakadu framing Earth Cry, the Piano Concerto
and the visionary opera Quiros

Sixties (1989-1999)

From the decade of his 60s came the guitar concerto Nourlangie, the
String Quartet No 11 (Jabiru Dreaming), the admonitory orchestral
Memento Mori and Great Sandy Island

Seventies (1999-2009)

In his 70s Sculthorpe composed his String Quartets Nos 15, 16 & 17
and the moving choral-and-orchestral Requiem

And now into his Eighties . . .

SCULTHORPE's latest work Song of the Yarra will have its
World Premiere in on 8 February 2009 at the grand opening
of the Melbourne Recital Centre’s Elizabeth Murdoch Hall
with violin soloist Gidon Kremer

In May Vladimir Ashkenazy will headline the
Sydney Symphony's Sculthorpe 80th Birthday Celebration
conducting Kakadu

The Australian premiere of the 1960 D. H. Lawrence
song cycle Sun and the premiere of the new
Mrs Fraser Songs to texts by Patrick White are
highlights of the 2009 Canberra Festival in May,
which will culminate in a concert performance of
SCULTHORPE's first opera Rites of Passage

And coming up, the yet to be completed
String Quartet No 18 will be premiered at the 2010
Edinburgh Festival

For further details see:

Main Menu . . .

SCULTHORPE: Djilile (for piano) (opening)
© 1997 FABER MUSIC LTD

This new official website was launched in 2008, its contents authorised by the composer and regularly updated on his behalf, as a definitive resource on his life and music, in print, performance, review, and on disc. But please bear with us! The site is still under construction.

On this page . . .

Peter Sculthorpe: The Making of an Australian Composer

A Selection of Recommended Sculthorpe Recordings on CD

Sculthorpe Online Resources (Links)

Sculthorpe Contacts (Print Music Inquiries, Sales & Hire)

Other pages onsite . . .

Sculthorpe Recent News, Press, Events

2009 Sculthorpe Performances, Premieres, Events

Complete Chronological List of Musical Compositions

Short Biographical and Descriptive Notes

SCULTHORPE

ON DISC (selected titles)

The PETER SCULTHORPE COLLECTION
3CDS $39.95 from ABC Classics [AU] featuring the Sydney, Adelaide and Tasmanian Symphonies in
The Fifth Continent
Sun Music I - IV (complete)
Earth Cry
Irkanda IV
Kakadu
Mangrove
Order online from the ABC Shop:
http://shop.abc.net.au/browse/product.asp?productid=34540

PETER SCULTHORPE: SPIRITS OF PLACE
Ema Alexeeva (violin), David Apellániz (cello), Ananda Sukarlan (piano), on Verso CD VRS 2036 [ES] in
Irkanda I
From Irkanda III
Mountains & Night Pieces
From Saibai
Night Song
Djilile
Order online:
http://www.verso.es/detallesdisco.php?ref=VRS%202036&lang=en

SCULTHORPE ON NAXOS
William Barton (didjeridu), Tamara Anna Cislowska (piano)
New Zealand Symphony Orchestra, James Judd (conductor)
Naxos CD 8557382 [71:00] Issued 2004
Earth Cry
Kakadu
Piano Concerto
Memento Mori
From Oceania
Order online:
http://www.naxos.com/catalogue/item.asp?item_code=8.557382

SCULTHORPE: MUSIC FOR STRING ORCHESTRA
Richard Tognetti (violin & director), Emma-Jane Murphy (cello)
Australian Chamber Orchestra; Chandos [UK] CD CHAN10063 [66:10]
Irkanda I (for violin solo)
Irkanda IV
Lament for Cello and Strings
Second Sonata for Strings
Cello Dreaming
Djilile
Order online:
http://www.aco.com.au/?url=/shop/peter-sculthorpe-orchestral-music

"(A) superb new disc from the splendid Australian Chamber Orchestra ... focuses on pieces for strings and draws on a range of influences, but omnipresent is the Australian landscape as well as the birds encountered there. A disc well worth exploring for a powerful, haunting musical voice." - Editors Choice, Gramophone (August 2003)

"Peter Sculthorpe is Australia's senior composer, and his works are rooted in the landscape and culture of his country. Irkanda I for solo violin follows the contours of the hills around Canberra - Richard Tognetti's performance brings out the desolation of the music, as it does in Irkanda IV. Lament is a powerful piece for cello and strings, played with enormous intensity by Emma-Jane Murphy, and given a recording to match... this is a life-affirming disc." - Martin Cotton, BBC Music Magazine

SCULTHORPE REQUIEM
Adelaide Symphony Orchestra, Arvo Volmer & James Judd (conductors), ABC Classics 2CD 476 5692 (2006)
Requiem for chorus, didjeridu & orchestra
My Country Childhood
Earth Cry (abridged version)
Great Sandy Island
New Norcia
Quamby
Order online from the ABC Shop:
http://shop.abc.net.au/browse/product.asp?productid=375010

"The eagerly awaited Sculthorpe Requiem brings a further jewel to a wide audience ... An essential release from one of the world’s greatest living composers." - Ivan Moody Gramophone (July 2007)

SCULTHORPE

THE MAKING OF AN AUSTRALIAN COMPOSER

The SCULTHORPE authorised biography (Part 1, 1929-1974),
released in 2007, is on sale now at bookstores and online

GRAEME SKINNER
PETER SCULTHORPE
The Making of An Australian Composer
UNSW Press, Sydney, 2007
Hardback, 693 pages, illustrated, AU $59.95, ISBN 978 086840 2

"[An] absorbing ... carefully documented chronicle ... providing gracefully vivid descriptions of the music itself ... The author's manner is quiet, clear and unpartisan ... Skinner's mastery of his sources [...] sets high standards for biographical thoroughness and provides, in an attractively readable way, a vivid sense of Sculthorpe's day-to-day discovery of music and people in a significant period of our artistic history." - Roger Covell, The Sydney Morning Herald (1-2 December 2007)

"A significant authorised biography of Australia's best-known composer ... This book has been said to have comparable significance for music as David Marr's biography of Patrick White had for Australian literature."
- Blackwell [UK] online (January 2008)

"Graeme Skinner’s superb new biography ... [a] meticulously researched book, drawing on copious archival
material such as letters and press notices, as well as interviews both with Sculthorpe and many of his associates,
has the feel of a grand symphony, its peculiar music made audible by fact rather than intrusive
authorial interpolation." - William Yeoman The West Australian (3 January 2008)

Order online: http://www.unswpress.com.au/isbn/0868409413.htm

SCULTHORPE

ONLINE RESOURCES (web links/web addresses)

Faber Music SCULTHORPE print music editions Main Page:
http://www.fabermusic.co.uk/serverside/composers/Details.asp?ID=SCULTHORPE,%20PETER

Faber Music SCULTHORPE 28-page current colour Brochure (PDF, 217Kb):
http://www.fabermusic.com/resources/pdfs/19-brochure.pdf

Faber Music SCULTHORPE current Worklist by genre (PDF, 284Kb):
http://www.fabermusic.co.uk/resources/pdfs/19-worklist.pdf

Australian Music Centre SCULTHORPE main page (including short biography, and a complete list of Sculthorpe scores, recordings and other resources held at the AMC):
http://www.amcoz.com.au/composers/composer.asp?id=241

Tasmanian Composers Collective SCULTHORPE page:
http://www.tasmanianmusic.com/composer.php?composerid=petersculthorpe

National Library of Australia (NLA) SCULTHORPE online exhibition:
http://www.nla.gov.au/epubs/sculthorpe/

Search the NLA's SCULTHORPE Collection (Canberra, NLA, MS 9676) and score, recordings and resources in other Australian libraries via MusicAustralia:
http://www.musicaustralia.org/

Australian Broadcasting Corporation's ABC Classic FM "Sculthorpe at 70" 1999 online exhibition: http://www.abc.net.au/classic/sculthorpe/

ABC TV's Peter Thompson interviews SCULTHORPE on "Talking Heads" (17 September 2007) (transcript):
http://www.abc.net.au/talkingheads/txt/s2038458.htm

Film Australia “Australian Biography" SCULTHORPE interview (video & transcript, 1998:
http://www.australianbiography.gov.au/sculthorpe/index.html

SCULTHORPE

CONTACTS (print music, publishing inquiries, sales & hire)

General international inquiries concerning the composer and his music, hire and sale:
Faber Music Limited
Bloomsbury House, 74-77 Great Russell Street, London WC1B 3DA, United Kingdom
Telephone: +44 (0) 20 7908 5311/2 Fax: +44 (0) 20 7908 5339
http://www.fabermusic.com

All general enquiries (including any personal correspondence addressed to the composer), requests for perusal scores & recordings, photographs, program notes, &c.:
Email: promotion@fabermusic.com

All hire inquiries for non-Australian territories:
Email: hire@fabermusic.com

Australian sales inquiries to Faber Music's Australian Sales Agent:
Email: sales@alfredpub.com.au

Australian hire inquiries (including all classical hire and grand rights enquiries) to
Faber Music's Australian Hire Agent:
Hal Leonard Australia Pty Ltd, 4 Lentara Court, Cheltenham VIC 3192 Australia
Telephone: +61-3-9585-3300 Fax: +61-3-9585-8729
http://www.halleonard.com.au/
Email: ausclassical@halleonard.com.au

www.petersculthorpe.com.au

This is the official website of THE SCULTHORPE OFFICE, authorised and published on behalf of the composer,
Peter Sculthorpe, Sydney, Australia, by Graeme Skinner, last updated 19 May 2009

Verbal and visual materials and extracts from the composer's writings published here that are not restricted by other copyright may be copied and reproduced for non-commercial and fair commercial use, with due acknowledgement.

Permission to copy and/or reuse copyright materials included here should be sought from the copyright owner as indicated.

Website inquiries may be directed to the Website Editor Graeme Skinner: gski1960@bigpond.net.au