Geoff King is a composer and theorist interested in narrative concert music
Following from his PhD thesis which consisted mainly of four song cycles setting the work of Frank O'Hara, Derek Jarman, Nick Blackburn, and the pseudonymous Paul Pry, Geoff's work considers song cycles and similar works as an underutilised and tremendously potent source of musical expressivity, historical documentation, and pragmatic art making.
His compositional now consists primarily in works for small groups of performers with a strong emphasis on narrative and historical place, including a wordless setting of the Seven Last Works for harp and live electronics, and a musical portrait of the Baroque soprano Francesca Cuzzoni for soprano and Baroque ensemble.
Geoff has released a disc of new arrangements of Isabella Leonarda's sonatas and new music for wind quintet and piano, as well as a paper at the Royal Musical Association's conference on the concept of Metamodernism in music, co-delivered with composer Robert Laidlow.
Geoff's music has been performed by major UK ensembles like the London Symphony Orchestra and London Philharmonic Orchestra. He has also had major collaborations with harpist Parker Ramsay, pianists XinRu Chen and Mark Rogers, singers Victoria Hodgkinson and David Jones, and others.
Image credit: Ashil Mistry