Flautist, composer and conductor; born 1930 in Vienna.
Biography
Michael Graubart was born in Vienna in 1930 and came to England as a refugee in 1938. He studied physics at Manchester University, but spent most of his time there composing and playing the flute. He graduated in 1952 and worked as a development engineer in electronics at EMI for several years and then as a teacher and lecturer in maths, physics and music. During this time, he also studied composition with Mátyás Seiber, flute with Geoffrey Gilbert and conducting with Lawrence Leonard, playing the flute and conducting various amateur and professional choirs and orchestras. In 1966 he became a tutor and conductor, and from 1969 to 1991 the Director of Music (Head of Department), of Morley College in London, where he developed the performance of 20th century music, taught electronic music composition and conducted first performances, including the première of Elisabeth Lutyens’s last opera Isis and Osiris and the first British production of Viktor Ullmann’s opera The Emperor of Atlantis. From 1962 to 1972 he was the Musical Director of Focus Opera Group, conducting many British premières of modern operas and music-theatre works.
From 1991 to 1996 he was a Senior Lecturer and Director of Akanthos, the College’s contemporary-music ensemble, at the Royal Northern College of Music in Manchester. Michael Graubart’s compositions have been performed and broadcast in Britain, the U.S.A., Canada, Austria and Italy. He has also edited early music from original sources, including the operas La favola d’Orfeo (Monteverdi) and Livietta e Tracollo (Pergolesi).
Links and sources
Elsewhere in this resource
Michael Graubart interview
