Arvo Pärt

Arvo Pärt (Estonian pronunciation: [ˈɑrvo ˈpært]; born 11 September 1935) is an Estonian composer of classical and sacred music. Since the late 1970s, Pärt has worked in a minimalist style that employs his self-invented compositional technique, tintinnabuli. His music is in part inspired by Gregorian chant. Pärt has been the most performed living composer in the world for 5 consecutive years.

Life

Pärt was born in Paide, Järva County, Estonia, and was raised by his mother and stepfather in Rakvere in northern Estonia. He began to experiment with the top and bottom notes as the family's piano's middle register was damaged. His first serious study came in 1954 at the Tallinn Music Middle School, but less than a year later he temporarily abandoned it to fulfill military service, playing oboe and percussion in the army band. While at the Tallinn Conservatory, he studied composition with Heino Eller. As a student, he produced music for film and the stage. During the 1950s, he also completed his first vocal composition, the cantata Meie aed ('Our Garden') for children's choir and orchestra. He graduated in 1963. From 1957 to 1967, he worked as a sound producer for Estonian radio.

John Rutter

John Milford Rutter CBE (born 24 September 1945) is a British composer, conductor, editor, arranger and record producer, mainly of choral music.

Biography

Born in London, the son of an industrial chemist and his wife, Rutter grew up living over the Globe pub on London's Marylebone Road. He was educated at Highgate School, where his fellow pupils included John Tavener, Howard Shelley, Brian Chapple and Nicholas Snowman; he then read music at Clare College, Cambridge, where he was a member of the choir. He served as director of music at Clare College from 1975 to 1979 and led the choir to international prominence.

In 1981, Rutter founded his own choir, the Cambridge Singers, which he conducts and with which he has made many recordings of sacred choral repertoire (including his own works), particularly under his own label Collegium Records. He resides at Duxford in Cambridgeshire and frequently conducts many choirs and orchestras around the world.

In 1980, he was made an honorary Fellow of Westminster Choir College, Princeton, and in 1988 a Fellow of the Guild of Church Musicians. In 1996, the Archbishop of Canterbury conferred a Lambeth Doctorate of Music upon him in recognition of his contribution to church music. In 2008, he was made an honorary Bencher of the Middle Temple while playing a significant role in the 2008 Temple Festival.

Stephen Layton

Stephen Layton (born 23 December 1966) is an English conductor.

Layton was raised in Derby, where his father was a church organist. He was a chorister at Winchester Cathedral, and subsequently won scholarships to Eton College and then King's College, Cambridge as an organ scholar under Stephen Cleobury.

Whilst studying at Cambridge, Layton founded the mixed-voice choir Polyphony in 1986. He was appointed the musical director of the Holst Singers in 1993, replacing Hilary Davan Wetton, who had founded the group in 1978. Layton has served as assistant organist at Southwark Cathedral and musical director of Wokingham Choral Society. Beginning in 1997, he served as organist and subsequently director of music at the Temple Church. From 1999-2004 he was Chief Conductor of the Netherlands Kammerkoor. From 2000-2012 he was Chief Guest Conductor of the Danish National Vocal Ensemble. In 2006, he became Director of Music at Trinity College, Cambridge. In November 2009, the City of London Sinfonia announced the appointment of Layton as its second Artistic Director, effective with the 2010-2011 season, for an initial contract of 3 years. Layton is also to have the title of Principal Conductor.

City of London Sinfonia

The City of London Sinfonia (CLS) is an English chamber orchestra based in London. In London, the CLS performs regularly at Cadogan Hall and St Paul's Cathedral. It is also the resident orchestra at Opera Holland Park. The CLS has annual residencies in four towns in Southern England: Ipswich, King's Lynn, High Wycombe and Chatham. It records regularly and makes an overseas tour every year. The CLS performs chamber orchestra and ensemble repertoire from the Baroque period to the present day, and has a particular reputation for its programming focus on the human voice.

Richard Hickox founded the CLS in 1971 and remained its music director and artistic director until his death in November 2008. Past principal guest conductors have included Marin Alsop and Douglas Boyd. In November 2009, the CLS announced the appointment of Stephen Layton as its second Artistic Director, effective with the 2010-2011 season, for an initial contract of 3 years. Layton is also to have the title of Principal Conductor. Simultaneously, the CLS announced the appointment of clarinetist Michael Collins also as Principal Conductor, effective in September 2010, for an initial period of 3 years.

City of London

The City of London is a city and county within London. It constituted most of London from its settlement by the Romans in the 1st century AD to the Middle Ages, but the agglomeration has since grown far beyond the City's borders. The City is now only a tiny part of the metropolis of London, though it remains a notable part of central London. It is one of two districts of London to hold city status; the other is the adjacent City of Westminster.

The City of London is widely referred to simply as the City (often written as just City and differentiated from the phrase "the city of London" by capitalising City) and is also colloquially known as the Square Mile, as it is 1.12 sq mi (2.90 km²) in area. Both of these terms are also often used as metonyms for the United Kingdom's trading and financial services industries, which continue a notable history of being largely based in the City.

The name London is now ordinarily used for a far wider area than just the City. London often denotes the sprawling London metropolis, or the 32 London boroughs, in addition to the City of London itself. This wider usage of London is documented as far back as the 16th century.