Robert Saxton

Robert Saxton (b 1953) studied with Elisabeth Lutyens, Robin Holloway and Luciano Berio, after early advice from Benjamin Britten. He read Music at Cambridge and was then a postgraduate at Oxford. He won First Prize in 1975 at the Gaudeamus Composition Competition in Holland and was a Visiting Fellow at Princeton USA as recipient of the Fulbright/Schirmer Award (1985-86).

He was Head of Composition at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama, the Royal Academy of Music (London), then Professor of Composition at Oxford University and tutorial fellow in music at Worcester College until his retirement in 2021. He is an Hon Fellow at St Catharine’s College, Cambridge, Hon Research Fellow at the Royal Academy of Music and has been Composer-in-Association at the Purcell School since 2013.

Selected commissions include works for the BBC (Proms, TV and radio), the ECO, ESO and Kenneth Woods, LSO, LPO, London Sinfonietta, Nash Ensemble, Opera North, St Paul’s Sinfonia and Andrew Morley, Aldeburgh, Cheltenham, Leeds, Lichfield and Presteigne festivals and for the Arditti, Chilingirian and Kreutzer string quartets, Richard Rodney Bennett and Susan Bradshaw, Teresa Cahill, Fidelio Piano Trio, Leon Fleisher, Clare Hammond, Steven Isserlis, Mstislav Rostropovich, Clerks Group, Christ Church Cathedral Oxford, Peter Sheppard Skærved, James Turnbull, John Wallace, and Raphael Wallfisch.

Recent major works include the opera The Wandering Jew, Hortus Musicae for solo piano, Resurrection of the Soldiers for string orchestra, and Scenes from the Epic of Gilgamesh for orchestra. Works are recorded on Sony Classical, EMI, Hyperion, NMC, Metier, and published by Wise Music, Ricordi (Berlin), UYMP and Viola Viva (Switzerland).

Robert is married to the soprano, Teresa Cahill.

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