 |
Michel Van der AaDutch composer
Date of Birth: 10.03.1970
Country:  Netherlands |
Biography of Michel van der Aa
Michel van der Aa, a Dutch composer, was born on March 10, 1970, in Oss, a major city in North Brabant, a province in the south of the Netherlands. He studied sound engineering at the Royal Conservatory of The Hague and composition under the guidance of composers and musicologists Diderik Wagenaar, Gilius van Bergeijk, and Louis Andriessen.
In 2002, van der Aa completed a short program in filmmaking at the New York Film Academy, and in 2007, he participated in an intensive course in theater direction at the Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts in New York. His music has been performed by ensembles and orchestras around the world. Some of these include the chamber ensembles Asko Ensemble and Schönberg Ensemble, who frequently perform and record together; Freiburger Barockorchester and Ensemble Modern; Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra; Melbourne Symphony Orchestra; Dutch National Opera Orchestra; Mozarteum Orchestra of Salzburg; Seattle Chamber Players; Japanese Ensemble Nomad Tokyo; Continuum Ensemble Toronto; SWR Orchestra Baden-Baden & Freiburg; Netherlands Radio Orchestra; and Norrköping Symphony Orchestra. His music is recorded on labels such as Harmonia Mundi, Col Legno, Composers' Voice, BVHaast, and VPRO Eigenwijs.
Works by Michel van der Aa for musical theater, including the chamber opera "One" (2002) and the opera "After Life" (2006), premiered in Amsterdam, have received international acclaim from critics and audiences. These works incorporate elements of cinema and soundtracks, combining theater, film, and music to create a unique collage of transparent layers, resulting in a new theatrical genre. Van der Aa has also directed a television production of the opera "One" for the Dutch broadcasting company NPS. His short film "Passage" (2004) has been screened at several international festivals and broadcasted on Dutch national television.
Van der Aa has participated in the Perth Tura New Music Festival in Australia and the Holland Festival, the oldest performing arts festival in the Netherlands. He has collaborated with choreographers such as Kazuko Hirabayashi, Philippe Blanchard, Ben Wright, and Annabelle Lopez Ochoa. In 1999, he received the Gaudeamus International Composers Award. In 2004, his opera "One" earned him the prestigious Matthijs Vermeulen Award. In 2005, van der Aa was awarded the Siemens Composers Prize, and for his work as a director and the interdisciplinary nature of his art, he received the Charlotte Köhler Prize. In 2006, he was honored with the Paul Hindemith Prize at the Schleswig-Holstein Musik Festival.
Currently, the composer is working on a new 3D film-opera titled "Zela Law" and continues his collaboration with the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, with whom he has maintained a long-standing partnership.
