The music of Sydney-based composer Damien Ricketson is characterised by colourful sound-worlds, novel forms and is often multisensory in nature. Large-scale staged works have included: The Howling Girls (2018), an opera co-created with director Adena Jacobs presented by Sydney Chamber Opera which won the international ‘Music Theatre Now’ prize; The Secret Noise (2014), a hybrid music-dance work that was awarded ‘Instrumental Work of the Year’ in the Art Music Awards and featured in the Melbourne Festival; and Fractured Again (2010), a multimedia production, which toured China and premiered in the Sydney Festival. Ricketson studied with renowned Dutch composer Louis Andriessen and has a PhD from the Sydney Conservatorium of Music. Ricketson co-founded, and for 20 years was Co-Artistic Director of Ensemble Offspring, a unique arts company dedicated to adventurous new music through whom much of his music has been performed. He is currently the Program Leader of Composition and Music Technology at the Sydney Conservatorium of Music, University of Sydney.
