Composer
Biography:
CHARLES UZOR was born in Udo Mbaise, Nigeria. At the age of seven, during the Biafra War, he came to Switzerland. After graduating from school, he studied music in Rome, then oboe and composition at the conservatories in Bern and Zurich.
In 1986 he met oboist Gordon Hunt in Assisi, who encouraged him to pursue postgraduate studies at the Royal Academy of Music in London. In 1990 Charles Uzor received his Recital Diploma and Masters in Composition from the University of London.
He returned to Switzerland and in 2005 finished a dissertation on melody and inner time awareness.
Charles Uzor's output spans opera, dance, orchestral and choral works, but his main interest is in works for smaller groups and voice.
From 1993 to 1998 he worked with the conductor Daniel Beriger and the ensemble La Notte, which specialized in his compositions, then with the guitar ensemble quasi fantasia, the percussion art ensemble Bern, the Carmina Quartet and the clarinettist Wolfgang Meyer. A fruitful collaboration also resulted with the artists Markus Eisenmann (painting), Philipp Egli (choreography) and Stefanie Kemper (poetry).
Uzor's works include Canto 1 (for ensemble and vocals), Notre Vie (for voices and ensemble), Ricercare (piano concerto), Go (ballet), Zimzum (for 2 guitars), several melodies, White Paperflowers descending on Tienanmen Sq. (for 5 cellos), Madrigal (for voices and percussion), Princess of Samarkand (for percussion), qui plus aime … (for percussion quartet and tape), Das sweetest life (songs based on texts by Novalis), Mother Tongue (based on Igbo- proverbs), Echnaton's Hymnos to Aton from the opera fragment Solar Eclipse and Black Tell, a joint work by four to five Swiss composers.
Albums:
