Colin Currie

Percussionist Colin Currie has established a unique reputation for his charismatic and virtuosic performances of works by today's leading composers, and has appeared with many of the world's most important orchestras - the London Symphony Orchestra, Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra and Philadelphia Orchestra among them.

Regularly commissioning and recording new works, Colin has made an inspirational and innovative contribution to percussion repertoire.

At the age of fifteen Colin Currie won the Shell/LSO prize, and subsequently was the first percussion finalist in the BBC Young Musician competition. He was awarded the Royal Philharmonic Society's Young Artist Award in 2002 for his outstanding role in contemporary musicmaking and was a Borletti-Buitoni Trust award winner in 2005. Colin was selected as a BBC New Generation Artist from 2003-2005, and as part of the scheme performed a variety of concerto and recital engagements with the BBC orchestras and in major festivals and concert halls. He is currently Visiting Professor of Solo Percussion at the Royal Academy of Music in London and at the Royal Conservatoire in The Hague.

Colin is deeply committed to the development of new repertoire for percussion in its widest form - orchestral, solo and in chamber music. He has premiered works such as Michael Torke's Rapture, Thea Musgrave's Wood, Metal & Skin, three works by Joe Duddell including the concerto Ruby at the BBC Proms in 2003, and many solo and ensemble works by Dave Maric, a composer with whom he collaborates on a regular basis. Colin recently premiered two further concerti which were both written for him: with the Philadelphia Orchestra and Eschenbach a new Percussion Concerto by Jennifer Higdon with performances at Carnegie Hall, in Washington and Philadelphia; and for chamber orchestra he premiered Time Release, a concerto by Steven Mackey with the Scottish Chamber Orchestra, Swedish Chamber, Ensemble Orchestral de Paris and the Residentie Orkest.

During the 2007/8 season Colin performs with the London Philharmonic Orchestra and Marin Alsop in the European premiere of the Higdon Concerto, following his successful debut with the orchestra last season. Other premieres this season include the world premiere of a new concerto by Simon Holt with the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra, the US premiere of Steven Mackey's Time Release at Carnegie Hall with the Baltimore Symphony and Alsop and the UK premiere of Michael Nyman's marimba concerto gdm with the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic. He also performs this season with the Minnesota Orchestra, Gürzenich-Orchester, Malaysian Philharmonic, Orchestre National Bordeaux Aquitaine, Milwaukee Symphony, Netherlands Radio Chamber Orchestra, Bournemouth Symphony and with the Utah, Kansas City, Long Beach and Santa Barbara Symphonies, with conductors including Andreas Delfs, Kwame Ryan, Osma Vanska, Douglas Boyd, Edwin Outwater, Martyn Brabbins, Paul Mann, Thierry Fischer, Michael Stern and Enrique Diemecke.

Colin has performed extensively as recitalist in London and across Europe as well as in Tokyo and the USA. Recent highlights include the Lucerne Festival, Verbier Festival, Wigmore Hall, Bridgewater Hall Manchester, Paris Présences Festival, Klavierfest am Ruhr, London's Spitalfields Festival, Queen Elizabeth Hall, Aldeburgh Festival, Palais des Beaux Arts, Concertgebouw Amsterdam, Hamburg Musikhalle and Vienna Konzerthaus. An active chamber musician, Currie has also collaborated with artists such as the Labèque sisters, Petersen Quartet, Dawn Upshaw, Viktoria Mullova, Pierre-Laurent Aimard, Josh Bell, Steven Isserlis, Barnabás Kelemen and Jazz musicians Peter Erskine, Kenny Wheeler and John Taylor.

Following the successful launch of his duo recital project with trumpeter Hakan Hardenberger last season, the pair look forward to building on performances at the Verbier Festival, LSO St Luke's London and Glasgow's Royal Scottish Academy with concerts planned in San Francisco, at the Bridgewater Hall and at Concertgebouw Brugges in a programme including a newly commission work by Dave Maric and music by Jolivet and Börtz.

Colin Currie's first solo album, Striking a Balance, was released on EMI in February '98. Since then he has recorded Michael Torke's concerto Rapture with the Royal Scottish National Orchestra / Marin Alsop and James MacMillan's Veni, Veni Emmanuel with the Ulster Orchestra, both for Naxos. This season sees the release of Currie's recital disc Borrowed Time on the Onyx label - the disc features music by British composer Dave Maric with Currie performing material for solo and sampled percussion and electronics, as well as collaborating with musicians including Hakan Hardenberger and Clive Driskill Smith.

Visit Colin's new website and blog at colincurrie.net.

Colin Currie is a Marimba One artist and plays Zildjan cymbals; he is represented by Intermusica.

Photo: Chris Dawes