EVIS SAMMOUTIS
Cyprus-born composer Evis Sammoutis (1979) is a multi-award-winning artist, who has received numerous accolades and distinctions and over 40 international compositional awards, prizes, and scholarships, such as the prestigious Royal Philharmonic Society Award (England), and the Irino Prize (Japan).
Sammoutis' works have been commissioned by festivals and organizations, such as the Venice Biennale, Klangspuren, Royaumont, Barlow Endowment, Ernst von Siemens Foundation, Chamber Music America and Internationaler Musikwettbewerb der ARD München (twice); performed at leading festivals and contemporary music series, such as Tanglewood, MusicNOW, Gaudeamus, Music of Today and ISCM, in more than 45 countries, and broadcast on several national radio stations, such as BBC Radio 3, SWR2, Radio France and RAI3.
Performers include leading ensembles and specialists in new music such as the Ensemble Modern, Klangforum Wien, the Arditti Quartet, Les Percussions de Strasbourg; orchestras such as London Symphony Orchestra, Holland Symfonia, the Orchestra of Opera North; and soloists such as Peter Sheppard Skaerved, David Alberman, Alan Thomas, Rohan de Saram, Hélène Fauchère and Uli Fussenegger to name a few. Conductors include Christoph Poppen, Elgar Howarth, Kasper de Roo and Franck Ollu, among others.
Sammoutis' music predominantly explores the relationship between timbre and harmony, frequently using unorthodox methods of playing musical instruments to create unusual and highly virtuosic musical landscapes. Creating a context where extended instrumental and vocal techniques, as well as sounds traditionally associated as non-musical, are naturally fused with more traditional features of expression is central to his aesthetic.
Sammoutis often makes use of new technology to assist the compositional process by employing a variety of tools to analyze, categorize and structure sounds. Through his creative oeuvre, the composer aims to find common ground for the symbiosis of traditionally Western classical music features and non-traditional Western features that exist in the music of his home country, Cyprus.
Sammoutis is currently Associate Professor of Composition and Director of the Electronic Music Studios at Ithaca College, NY. He is the Co-founder and Artistic Director of the Pharos Arts Foundation International Contemporary Music Festival, established in 2009.
Evis Sammoutis graduated from the University of Hull with a first-class degree (BMus) in all disciplines and the Departmental Prize, and completed his PhD studies in Musical Composition at the University of York under the supervision of Dr Thomas Simaku in 2006. He has furthered his studies at world-renowned festivals, seminars and workshops, including Darmstadt, IRCAM, Royaumont and Tanglewood as a composition fellow, and worked with leading composers such as Brian Ferneyhough, Georges Aperghis and George Benjamin.
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