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Martin Butler was born in Romsey, England, in 1960 and studied at the University of Manchester and the Royal Northern College of Music. In 1983 he received a Fulbright Award for study at Princeton University, USA, where he was resident until 1987, and in 1985 he received the Master of Fine Arts.
In 1988 he was awarded the Mendelssohn Scholarship which enabled him to spend several weeks at Tempo Reale, Berio's studio in Florence, and in 1994 was awarded an Honorary Fellowship of the Royal Northern College of Music. From September 1998 to July 1999 Martin Butler was Composer-in-Residence at the Institute for Advanced Study at Princeton in the United States. He is currently Professor of Music at the University of Sussex.
Butler’s works are widely performed and broadcast both in the UK and abroad. He has received commissions from, amongst others, the BBC (O Rio was first performed at the 1991 Proms), the London Sinfonietta (Concertino and Jazz Machines, the latter of which was played at the 1995 Venice Biennale), and the Cheltenham and Canterbury festivals. In June 1994 Mecklenburgh Opera premièred the operatic adventure story Craig's Progress, with a libretto by Stephen Pruslin, which was adapted for radio broadcast by BBC Radio 3. Butler was Featured Composer at the 1995 Vale of Glamorgan Festival where his Clarinet Quintet was premièred, and of the Park Lane Group’s January 2002 concert series.
A CD of chamber music featuring Tin Pan Ballet, Bluegrass Variations, On the Rocks, Jazz Machines, and Going with the Grain has been issued on the Lorelt label. Two discs of Butler’s music have been released by NMC: the String Quartet, Songs and Dances from a Haunted Place, performed by the Bingham Quartet, and two orchestral pieces (O Rio and Fixed Doubles) played by the BBC Symphony Orchestra.
In 1998, Martin Butler composed Carillon for the Composers’ Ensemble at the Brighton Festival; American Rounds, written for the Schubert Ensemble was premièred at the 1998 Cheltenham Festival; and Suzanne’s River Song for violin and piano was commissioned by the BBC for the 1999 Proms. Butler’s Percussion Concerto was premièred by the Paragon Ensemble in Glasgow in October 2000. His chamber opera A Better Place, commissioned by the ENO Studio, was premièred by ENO at the Coliseum in London in July 2001, conducted by Paul Daniel, and a substantial work entitled Two Rivers was premièred by the Oxford Bach Choir and Britten Sinfonia in December 2001.
Recent works by Butler include the Concertino for piano and chamber orchestra, written for Murray McLachlan and the Chetham’s Symphony Orchestra in 2002, and Sequenza Notturna, a piano quartet composed for the Schubert Ensemble which was premièred in 2003, and has subsequently been toured around the UK, USA, Canada, and Romania. The Schubert Ensemble marked the start of a 'Composer Portrait Series' with a programme of works by Martin Butler at the Purcell Room in June 2005. Two new works received premières in May 2006: Sentinels for string quartet and viola was premièred by the Brodsky Quartet and John Metcalfe at the 2006 Brighton Festival, and William Howard gave the première of Funérailles, a substantial new work for piano, at the Norfolk and Norwich Festival.
Since 2006, Martin Butler has been the Brighton Philharmonic Orchestra's first ever 'Composer in Focus'. The orchestra has already performed several large-scale works during this period, including a performance of the Concertino for piano and chamber orchestra, with the composer as pianist. His tenure culminated in two major performances of a new commission for the orchestra, From the Fairground of Dreams in January and March 2008 at Brighton Dome Concert Hall, conducted by Barry Wordsworth.
Forthcoming concerts in 2008 include a tour of Dirty Beasts by Ensemble 360 and performances by the Schubert Ensemble of Sequenza Notturna at the Cheltenham Festival and American Rounds at the King’s Place opening ceremony in October.
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