About the Composer
Matthew Dewey
Matthew Dewey is a freelance composer.
He creates powerful, lyrical music for the concert hall, the theatre and for film. His first chamber opera was written and staged when he was just 18 and at the age of 24, his first symphony and first orchestral suite were recorded in Moscow by the Russian Philharmonic Orchestra.
In 2013, the Queensland Symphony Orchestra and Queensland Music Festival jointly commissioned Dewey to write a double concerto for James Morrison (trumpet) and Julian Bliss (clarinet). The work, Ecstatic Visions, was received to acclaim: read more here.
ex Oceano – we are from the Ocean – the Ocean sustains us, the work Matthew composed for Lynchpin, is Dewey’s second Symphony. It was recorded by the Czech National Symphony Orchestra in Prague in September 2013.
A new work Symphony of the Inland Sea was premiered in 2015. Dedicated to Yvonne Moore and the Mount Isa community and Commissioned by Queensland Symphony Orchestra. First performance: by Mount Isa Community Ensembles (MICE) at Mount Isa Celebrates (Mount Isa Civic Centre) on 23 Jul 2015.
“The grand finale was a world premiere performance of Symphony of the Inland Sea by acclaimed Australian composer, Matthew Dewey. This evocative work was inspired by the extraordinary landscape in and around this iconic city.”
Catalogue of Works: Australian Music Centre, National Library of Canberra
Full Composer Bio.
Great music has the power to break through “the carapace of presumptions and defences to go to what is quite accurately called ‘the heart of the matter’” (1) – creating a hinge or pivot between the intellect and the world of the senses.
Reference: (1) Dowrick, Stephanie (2009), In the Company of Rilke, Allen & Unwin, p56
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