Robert Dow: biography

Robert Dow (Scotland, UK, 1964)
• composer

Robert Dow is a composer of acousmatic music working in Scotland. At the University of Edinburgh he studied for degrees in Science, Music and Law and has recently completed, and awaits a viva voce for, a PhD in composition at the University of Birmingham under Jonty Harrison. He has been a guest composer both at EMS, Stockholm funded by both the Swedish Institute and the Hinrichsen Foundation, and the Technische Universität in Berlin, funded by a University of Edinburgh Bucher/Fraser scholarship. Formerly, he was a member of BEAST—Birmingham ElectroAcoustic Sound Theatre—and with them, has participated in many concerts of electroacoustic music throughout Britain. He is also a founding member or InvisiblEARts: a group of electroacoustic composers whose primary aim is to nurture acousmatic music-making and performance within Scotland. At present he is a Research Fellow in the School of Arts, Culture and Environment at the University of Edinburgh, specialising in acousmatic composition and the development of computer based tools for use in this field.

His works, which are performed and broadcast internationally, include: the Edinburgh Contemporary Arts Trust commission When all is silent, premiered in the Traverse Theatre, Edinburgh in 1995; Season of Mists, realised with financial assistance from a Scottish Arts Council Creative Artists’ Bursary, and performed at the launch of Invisible Arts during 1996 in the Edinburgh Filmhouse; the BBC Radio Scotland commission Alluvion, broadcast during Spring 1998; and Litany, premiered in Florida during 2000.