Sir Harrison Birtwistle and Sir Peter Maxwell Davies at 80

2014 sees the 80th birthday of two towering figures of British contemporary music: Sir Harrison Birtwistle and Sir Peter Maxwell Davies.

Published: 24 April 2014

Fellow students at the Royal Manchester College of Music in the 1950s, Davies and Birtwistle, together with Alexander Goehr, Elgar Howarth and John Ogdon became known as ‘The Manchester School’. 

The Proms celebrates the music of Davies and Birtwistle in two Proms Plus Portraits (14 August and 10 September) and across a number of performances, including a Late Night Prom dedicated to Davies on his birthday (8 September).

Other British composers celebrating 80th birthdays at the 2014 Proms are John McLeod, whose work The Sun Dances receives it London premiere (3 August) and Bernard Rands whose Concerto for Piano and Orchestra is given its UK premiere by pianist Jonathan Biss and the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra under Markus Stenz (15 August) 

Sir Harrison Birtwistle at the Proms

Night’s Black Bird

  • BBC Philharmonic/Juanjo Mena (30 July)

Endless Parade

  • Lapland Chamber Orchestra/John Storgårds (PSM, 9 August)

Sonance Severance 2000

  • National Youth Orchestra of Great Britain/Edward Gardner (10 August)

Verses for Ensembles / Dinah and Nick’s Love Song / Meridian 

  • Christine Rice mezzo-soprano
  • Exaudi and Birmingham Contemporary Music Group/Oliver Knussen (PSM, 6 September) 

Harrison Birtwistle's Proms Plus Composer Portrait at the Royal College of Music (10 September)

Exody

  • BBC Symphony Orchestra/Andrew Litton (10 September)

Sir Peter Maxwell Davies at the Proms

Sinfonia

  • Lapland Chamber Orchestra/John Storgårds (PSM, 9 August)

Caroline Mathilde – suite from Act 2

  • Mary Bevan soprano
  • Kitty Whately mezzo-soprano
  • BBC National Orchestra of Wales/Thomas Søndergård (12 August)

Sir Peter Maxwell Davies Proms Plus Composer Portrait at the Royal College of Music (14 August)

Symphony No. 5

  • BBC Philharmonic/John Storgårds (14 August)

Linguae ignis / A Mirror of Whitening Light / Revelation and Fall 

  • Timothy Gill cello
  • Rebecca Bottone soprano
  • London Sinfonietta/Sian Edwards (PSM, 30 August)

Concert Overture ‘Ebb of Winter’ (London premiere) / An Orkney Wedding, with Sunrise / Strathclyde Concerto No.4 

  • Dimitri Ashkenazy clarinet
  • Scottish Chamber Orchestra/Ben Gernon (8 September)