Richard Blackford: La Sagrada Familia Symphony & Babel, A Cantata

Richard Blackford’s music, which includes three operas, two ballets and many works for orchestra, chorus and chamber ensembles, has been performed and broadcast all over the world and has been recorded on Sony Classical, Warner Classics, Decca, Signum, Nimbus and Lyrita labels. He has composed over 200 film and television scores, including over 140 feature dramas for ZDF Germany, the award-winning Song For A Raggy Boy, and Fingersmith for BBC. His three critically acclaimed choral works Mirror Of Perfection, Voices of Exile and Not In Our Time were all subjects of television documentaries and have been frequently broadcast and performed around the world. Pietà, a joint commission from The Bournemouth Symphony Chorus and St Alban’s Choral Society, won the Ivor Novello Composer Award in 2020 in the Choral Category. In 2022 he conducted his second symphony La Sagrada Familia with BBC National Orchestra of Wales for Lyrita Records and has directed a film to accompany live performances. In 2023 his song cycle Songs of Nadia Anjuman, a Britten Sinfonia commission, with soloist Elizabeth Watts received 5- star reviews from The Times and The Guardian. He was awarded Best Creator at the 2023 National Federation For Music Societies Awards for his cantata Babel. His cello concerto, commissioned by the Czech Philharmonic, will be premiered in The Rudolfinum, Prague, by Alisa Weilerstein in 2024. Richard Blackford is a Trustee of The Bach Choir, a Trustee of Lyrita Nimbus Arts and is President of the Bournemouth Symphony Chorus. He is published by Novello and Nimbus Publishing.