Selected as part of the 2018 Picture Gallery Composer-in-Residence scheme.
Adrian So has shown his interest in the field of composition when he was young, he composed his first piece for choir and instrumental ensemble to celebrate the centenary of his church at the age of ten. He has also rearranged a number of hymns for acappella singing for his fellow students to facilitate them winning numerous prizes in the Inter-Class Hymn Singing Contest in the college.
Adrian continued his studies in music at Royal Holloway, University of London where he studied composition with Samantha Fernando, Mark Bowden, John Traill, and Aaron Holloway-Nahum. His works have been performed by various professional players and ensembles in different workshops, including the Riot Ensemble and Sarah Dacey from the Juice vocal ensemble. Adrian’s compositions attempt to explore the possibility of incorporating Eastern and Western musical styles. For instance, adopting Chinese and Japanese folk-tune as an idiom, experimenting the sound of Chinese musical instruments on the Western ones and using Chinese poems as the text and literature source.
His recent works include ‘Thinking of You’ (a piece based on Chinese lyrical poem for Mezzo-soprano, clarinet, cello and piano), ‘Awakening of the Ancient Creature’ (a five-movement work for solo trombone and piano), ‘The Festival of Obon’ (for woodwind quintet) and ‘Daybreak on the Peak of Phoenix’ (for solo viola).
