David Owen Norris

David Owen Norris, (born 1953) is a British pianist, composer, academic, and broadcaster.
Early life
Norris was born in 1953 in Long Buckby in Northamptonshire, England, later attending Daventry Grammar School. He took lessons locally from composer Trevor Hold
before going on to study music at Keble College, Oxford where he was organ scholar; he is now an Honorary Fellow of the college.
Career
After leaving Oxford, he studied composition and worked at the Royal Opera House as a repetiteur. As a pianist, he has accompanied soloists such as Dame Janet Baker, Larry Adler and John Tomlinson, and his solo career has included appearances at the Proms and performances with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra and Detroit Symphony Orchestra.
He has also presented the Playlist Series for BBC Radio 4, and appeared in a number of television documentaries.
Academia
He is a professor at the Royal College of Music, the University of Southampton where he is head of keyboard, and a visiting tutor at the Royal Northern College of Music. He has also been Gresham Professor of Music and a professor at the Royal Academy of Music (having earlier been a student there).
Composition
Norris has enjoyed success as a composer in a wide range of musical styles. His Piano Concerto and Symphony were first performed at Dorchester Abbey by the English Music Festival, as was his oratorio Prayerbook, which has been frequently performed and studied subsequent to its premiere.
His song cycles Think Only This (settings of war poetry) and Tomorrow Nor Yesterday (settings of the poetry of John Donne) have been released on a disc entitled Fame's Great Trumpet. His operas and operettas, including Die! Sober Flirter and The Jolly Roger, have been performed on BBC Radio and around the UK and Europe, as have several pastiches of Mozart.
Honours
In 1991, Norris received the prestigious Gilmore Artist Award.
Recordings
(* = Premiere recordings)
Piano concertos
Constant Lambert, Rio Grande (Gilmore Festival Records) Yoshimi Takeda KSO 1996
Constant Lambert, Piano Concerto (ASV CD WHL 2122) Barry Wordsworth BBCCO* 1999
The World's First Piano Concertos [on Square Piano] (Avie AV0014) Sonnerie 2003
Edward Elgar, Piano Concerto realised Walker (Dutton CDLX 7148) David Lloyd-Jones BBCCO* 2005
Joseph Horovitz, Jazz Concerto (Dutton CDLX 7188) Horovitz Royal Ballet Sinfonia 2007
Richard Arnell, Piano Concerto (Dutton CDLX 7184) Martin Yates RSNO* 2007
Montague Phillips, Piano Concertos in F# minor and in E (Dutton CDLX 7206)*Gavin Sutherland BBCCO 2008
Victor Hely-Hutchinson, Jazz Concerto 'The Young Idea: cum grano salis’ (Dutton CDLX 7206)* 2008
Solo piano
Edward Elgar/Sigfrid Karg-Elert, First Symphony (AVM AVZ-3024)* 1990
Elgar, Sketches for Third Symphony (NMC D052)* 1998
Peter Maxwell Davies, Farewell to Stromness (MPR 203) 1998
Elgar, Complete Piano Music (Elgar Editions EE 002)* 2003
George Dyson, Complete Piano Music (Dutton CDLX 7137)* 2004
Elgar, Songs & Piano Music played on Elgar's 1844 Broadwood (Avie AV2129) Amanda Pitt, Mark Wilde, Peter Savidge (Two world premieres*) 2007
Audio-guide to the Cobbe Collection of Composer-related instruments at Hatchlands, playing pianos formerly belonging to J. C. Bach, Charles Dibdin, Johann Baptist Cramer, Frédéric Chopin, Sigismond Thalberg, Franz Liszt, Georges Bizet, Edward Elgar etc. 2008
Elgar/Karg-Elert/Norris, Symphonic Study Falstaff, Pomp & Circumstance (Elgar Editions EECD009)* 2009
Giles Easterbrook, The Moon Underwater: Chamber music and piano solo (Prima Facie PFCD002)* 2010
Roger Quilter, Complete Piano Music (EMR CD02)* 2011
Felix Mendelssohn, Complete Songs Without Words (not yet released)
Vocal
Roger Quilter, Songs (Hyperion A 66208) David Wilson-Johnson, baryton
Percy Grainger, Songs (Pearl SHE 572) David Wilson-Johnson, baryton
Franz Schubert, Winterreise (Hyperion A66111) David Wilson-Johnson 1984
Arthur Somervell, Songs (Hyperion CDA 66187) David Wilson-Johnson 1986
Benjamin Britten, The Turn of the Screw (Collins 70302) Bedford, Lott, Langridge 1993
Gerald Finzi, Songs (GMN CO116) David Wilson-Johnson]] 1996
Britten, Saint Nicolas, Steuart Bedford, Philip Langridge Naxos 8.557203 1996
Schubert, Songs by Ludwig Gotthard Kosegarten and Johann Wolfgang von Goethe [including the only recording of Schubert's first song-cycle] (Dogstar DS001) Ian Partridge, Jennifer Bates, Ruth Peel* 2000
Granville Bantock, Songs (Dutton CDLX 7121) Jean Rigby, Peter Savidge 2002
London Pride (Song Recital), Catherine Bott (Hyperion CDA67457)* 2004
Quilter, Complete Duets and Traditional Song Arrangements (Naxos 8.557495) Amanda Pitt, Joanne Thomas, Philip Langridge, David Wilson-Johnson, baryton* 2005
Edward Elgar, Songs & Piano Music played on Elgar's 1844 Broadwood (Avie AV2129) Amanda Pitt, Mark Wilde, Peter Savidge (Two world premieres*) 2007
Music of the Pleasure Gardens (Signum Classics SIGCD101) Philip Langridge 2007
Trevor Hold, Song Cycles (Dutton CDLX 7213) Amanda Pitt, David Wilson-Johnson* 2008
Victor Herbert, Songs (Linn CKD335) James Gilchrist* 2009
Priez pour paix War-Songs (Prelude CDPR2550)* Philip Langridge, Jennifer Langridge 2010
Entertaining Miss Austen (Dutton Epoch CDLX 7271) Amanda Pitt, John Lofthouse * 2011
Britten in Scotland (Naxos 8.572706) Mark Wilde 2011
Mr. Hook's Original Christmas Box (Dogstar DS010) Highcliffe Junior Choir* 2011
Chamber music
Arnold Bax, Piano Quintet (Chandos CHAN 8795) Mistry Quartet 1990
Edward Elgar, Piano Quintet (Argo 433 312–2) Mistry Quartet 1991
Camille Saint-Saëns, The Carnival of the Animals (Chandos 9244) I Musici di Montreal
Norris, All Together Now (Gilmore Festival Records)* 1996
Frank Bridge, Viola Music (ASV CD DCA 1064) Louise Williams 1999
George Dyson, Complete Chamber Music (Dutton CDLX 7137)* 2004
Ludwig van Beethoven, Viola Arrangements (Toccata TOCC 0108)* Paul Silverthorne 2010
Francis Poulenc, Babar the Little Elephant; Saint-Saëns, The Carnival of the Animals (the latter with David Coram at the Organ of Romsey Abbey, and both with narration by Richard Briers) Cathedral Classics CCCD101 2011
Percy Sherwood, Music for cello & piano (Toccata) Joseph Spooner *Feb 2012
John Blackwood McEwen & Arnold Bax, Viola Sonatas (EM Records) Louise Williams* Feb 2012
Alan Rawsthorne, Kenneth Leighton, Elizabeth Maconchy, Gordon Jacob, Viola Music (EM Records) Louise Williams* Summer 2012
Radio programmes
A History of Private Life (BBC Audio 2010 . – 6 CDs)
References
External links
Official website
Interview with David Owen Norris, August 10, 1992
Living people
1953 births
Alumni of Keble College, Oxford
Alumni of the Royal Academy of Music
Academics of the Royal Academy of Music
Academics of the Royal College of Music
Academics of the University of Southampton
British classical pianists
Male classical pianists
British classical composers
British male classical composers
British male pianists
Fellows of the Society of Antiquaries of London
20th-century classical composers
21st-century classical composers
People from Long Buckby
Piano pedagogues
Professors of Gresham College
20th-century British composers
Sydney International Piano Competition prize-winners
21st-century classical pianists
20th-century British male musicians
21st-century British male musicians