About Ryan Wigglesworth

Wigglesworth writes music stamped with iridescent hues, instrumental finesse, shapely ideas and a lyrical impulse that stays within reach even when textures turn prickly… [his] bright ear for glinting textures, his flair for taut motivic interplay, his conjuror’s ability to cast a spell. - The Times

Leading composer, conductor and pianist Ryan Wigglesworth was born in Yorkshire in 1979. Educated at Oxford University and the Guildhall School of Music and Drama, between 2007 and 2009 he was a Lecturer at Cambridge University and a Fellow of Corpus Christi College. In 2019 Wigglesworth was appointed the Richard Rodney Bennett Professor of Music at the Royal Academy of Music in London.

His orchestral work, Sternenfall, written for the BBC Symphony Orchestra and premiered under the composer’s direction in February 2008, firmly established Wigglesworth as one of the leading composers of his generation. Augenlieder, an orchestral song cycle for soprano Claire Booth, was premiered by Wigglesworth with the BBC SO in November 2009, and went on to receive the vocal prize at the 2010 British Composer Awards. Another orchestral work, Locke's Theatre, was commissioned for the BBC SO and Aldeburgh to celebrate Benjamin Britten's 100th birthday on 22 November 2013 and Echo and Narcissus, a dramatic cantata for mezzo, baritone, three female voices and piano co-commissioned by Aldeburgh, Wigmore Hall and Musik im Reisen and premiered at the 2014 Aldeburgh Festival by Pamela Helen Stephen, Mark Padmore and the composer.

Ryan Wiggesworth was Daniel R. Lewis Composing Fellow with The Cleveland Orchestra 2013-2015, for whom he wrote Études-Tableaux, premiered in 2015 under Franz Welser-Möst. As Composer in Residence at the 2018 Grafenegg Festival, Wigglesworth wrote Till Dawning for soprano and orchestra, premiered at the festival by Sophie Bevan and the Tonkünstler Orchestra under the composer’s direction. Wigglesworth’s Piano Concerto (2018-19) for the 2019 BBC Proms was be given its world premiere in August by Marc-André Hamelin and Britten Sinfonia. It received its US premiere with Seattle Symphony in February 2020.

In 2017 Wigglesworth’s opera, The Winter's Tale (2015-16) opened at English National Opera in a production directed by actor Rory Kinnear with a cast including Iain Paterson and Sophie Bevan in the main roles. Clocks from a Winter’s Tale, an orchestral work inspired by themes from his opera, was premiered by the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra in May 2017 and co-commissioned with Bergen Philharmonic.

Recent engagements as a conductor include the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, Chamber Orchestra of Europe, the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra, the Finnish Radio Symphony, Netherlands Radio Philharmonic, Bamberg Symphony Orchestra, DSO Berlin, Bergen Philharmonic, City of Birmingham Symphony, London Philharmonic, Philharmonia, BBC Symphony, BBC Scottish Symphony, and the BBC National Orchestra of Wales at the BBC Proms. He has conducted over forty premieres, introducing major works by Harrison Birtwistle, Elliott Carter and Alexander Goehr, and is a champion of the music of Oliver Knussen, with whom he worked closely. Forthcoming engagements sees debut visits to the Swedish Radio Symphony, RSO Vienna, Tokyo, Melbourne and Seattle symphony orchestras, Frankfurt Opera for The Cunning Little Vixen, as well as a return to the Hallé and the BBC Proms with both the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment and Britten Sinfonia.

Wigglesworth's recording of orchestral works by Harrison Birtwistle with the Hallé for NMC won awards from Gramophone and BBC Music magazines. NMC released a portrait disc of his own works, Echo and Narcissus, in October 2015.

Ryan Wigglesworth is represented as a conductor by Groves Artists.