Draft:Timothy Blinko

Timothy Blinko (born 21 February 1965) is a British composer of concert and film music. He is currently professor of music at the University of Hertfordshire.

Career
From 1983 to1988, Blinko studied composition at the Royal College of Music (RCM) with Justin Connelly, Joseph Horovitz, Timothy Salter and Jeremy Dale Roberts, and had masterclasses with George Benjamin, Steve Reich and Peter Maxwell-Davies. At the RCM he was awarded the R.O. Morris and the Ousley prizes for composition, and an additional scholarship from the Ralph Vaughan Williams Trust; he was also Bliss Composition Scholar, becoming a junior professor there while a student. He also studied piano with Peter Wallfisch and conducting with Christopher Adey. His works were first published from 1987 by R.Smith and Company, now distributed by Boosey and Hawkes and studio music.

His three-movement work, Sculptures for saxophone quartet, was commissioned for the first British Saxophone Congress in 1990 and has subsequently been recorded by eight quartets including the Morpheus Saxophone Quartet. The Daily Telegraph music critic wrote: "In the first performance of Blinko's deftly crafted Sculptures, their sound argued as eloquently for the music as for the acceptance of the saxophone quartet medium. If the shade of Adolphe Sax smiled down at any time during the Saxophone Congress, it may have been then." [Daily Telegraph, 1990]

From 1989 to 1995, Blinko helped establish the new musical theatre department at the Mountview Academy of Theatre Arts: "I look forward to many more generations of students receiving a magnificent start and training for theatre when their tomorrow comes at Mountview in the future." Cameron MackIntosh, 2021.

In 1994 Blinko became Head of Composition and Musicianship Studies at the Royal College of Music, Junior Department, and in 1995 joined the Music Department at the University of Hertfordshire, becoming Head of Department there in 2006 and also Professor of Music later that year.

Other key roles include Visiting Professor for the State University of New York Piano Summer School 1992-1997 (UK) and Director of Choral Conducting Masterclasses at University of Cambridge, Faculty of Education 1999-2009.

In 2008 Blinko collaborated with Professor Richard Wiseman, writing the music for the World’s Most Relaxing Room. The Times said the music was "euphoric", while The Telegraph described Blinko's music as "the dulcet tones of a low frequency lullaby capable of soothing the most savage of beasts". Science Daily detailed Blinko's approach of using the solo soprano voice and Tibetan singing bowl used in meditation together with the key elements Professor Wiseman asked him to feature: "slow and distinct rhythm, low frequency notes, and no sudden changes in tempo," while The Guardian interviewed users of the room: "Tobi Alli-Usman, 21, is a prime candidate for enforced relaxation: he juggles three mobile phones and three email addresses while running an events organisation. "Right now I just processed my thoughts into an order," he said, sounding surprised and exceedingly calm. "It's the music that probably helps. It's very soothing." '

Since 2018 Blinko has also composed the music for six films, including the feature film Mates (2023) staring James Wiles and Rafe Bird which is available on Amazon Prime Video.

In 2023, Blinko was appointed as a lead assessor for the Office for Students.

Selected works
• The Gemini Concerto was commissioned by the pianist duo the Cann Twins and the English Sinfonia and funded by Arts Council England. A large-scale work in three movements lasting 35 minutes, it is a postmodern, postminimalist composition, drawing from a wide range of influences. It explores an interest in Gestalt psychology, with a nexus of connections lying beneath an often bright, colourful and pluralistic surface. It was first performed at the Castle in Wellingborough (2003), with further performances at the Gordon Craig Theatre in Hertfordshire and in Hull.

• Memorare, a choral work, was commissioned by the Musica Deo Sacra festival and was first performed in 2004 in Tewkesbury Abbey. The piece exploits the limits of the human voice with sustained top Cs for the solo soprano and bottom Cs for the second basses and has five part multi-divisi soprano textures. The solo soprano lines are nuanced by sustained hummed tones which isolate specific pitches creating a high tessitura/texture, almost on the edge of audibility and perception. The work was written to exploit the acoustic properties of cathedrals, abbeys and churches with the harmony designed to exploit the sustaining and transforming qualities of these acoustics. The Medieval Latin text of the Memorare was popular during the Medieval period, though despite its powerful and resonant imagery, it had not been set to music before. Subsequent performances have been given in Hereford Cathedral, Milan Cathedral, Lugano Cathedral, Disentis Abbey and Christchurch Cathedral, Oxford.

• Glory to Thee is a choral piece commissioned by the BBC in 2005 utilising the Canon melody by Renaissance composer Thomas Tallis. The solo part was performed by tenor and former boy chorister, Aled Jones, with the Ealing Abbey Choir, conducted by Blinko. A second work,The Seasons (I See the Light) by Blinko was also selected for broadcast on BBC1 Songs of Praise (May, 2005) with an estimated world-wide audience of 41 million people.

• Reflection is an album including several choral works by Blinko recorded in 2008 with Ealing Abbey Choir and organist Thomas Wilson in Ealing Abbey. It has received multiple broadcasts on BBC Radio 3 and broadcasts in the USA and Germany.

•  A New Song is a choral work commissioned by the Christ Church Cathedral Choir in 2012 for the two busiest events in the cathedral year; the two Christmas carol services. It is however, far from being a Christmas carol, being universal in approach and reaching beyond the Christian context. It combines aspects of synaesthesia evoking touch, taste and smell through novel vocal sounds, with cosmology. It also deploys Blinko's invented harmonic system 'Interchords' (devised as a teenager) where harmonies are built from intervals that successively augment by a semitone (augmenting interchords) or successively diminish by a semitone (diminishing interchords). They mirror aspects of the harmonic series and a reversed form of harmonic series and create what Blinko describes as 'logical dissonance'.

‘Thank you for writing such a wonderful piece. It caused a stir for all the right reasons, and will certainly hold a place in our repertoire.’ – Professor Stephen Darlington, Director of Music and Choragus of the University of Oxford [24 Dec 2012]

‘It was wonderful and even better on a second hearing. Words as well by Blinko. Definitely the high point of our Nine Lessons and Carols.’ – Canon Professor Sarah Foot, Regius Professor of Ecclesiastical History, Oxford University [24 Dec 2012]

‘I was thrilled by a stunning performance of an astonishing new piece by Blinko at the Christ Church Carol Service.’ – Revd John Paton, Precentor of Christ Church Cathedral [24 Dec 2012]

• Cartographies is a three movement work for saxophone quartet commissioned by the German ensemble Clair-Obscur in 2013 and performed extensively by them throughout Europe, including at the Ballhaus Berlin, broadcast on Studio Neue Musik and recorded on the album Berlin Counterpoint: Solo Musica - Spektral Classics, Berlin/Naxos.

• Anima 2013 [for solosits, choir, Tibetan singing bowl and handbells] is a choral work published by Music Haven. Anima interrogates several cosmological concepts and applies them within a musical domain, sparked by ancient and ongoing notions of the 'Music of the Spheres.' The sense of time moving, standing still and fluctuating are conveyed in the piece and Anima also gives an imagined glimpse into the 'missing' seven dimensions of String Theory.

• Neon Noir is an album of nine songs, one instrumental piece and eight videos released in 2017 and supported by the University of Hertfordshire. The album artwork for Neon Noir was created by Timothy Blinko's brother, outsider artist Nick Blinko.

• In Lucem is a synaesthetic choral work written for the Archbishop of Jerusalem, Suheil Dawani and the University of London Church Choir. Its world premiere was in St George’s Cathedral, Jerusalem; the second performance in the Basilica of the Nativity, Bethlehem and the London Premiere in Southwark Cathedral (all in 2018). In Lucem is concerned with peace and the longstanding troubles in Jerusalem and US President Trump’s inflammatory decision to recognise Jerusalem as the capital of Israel at the time of writing the work. Reception of the work:

‘In Lucem was written by Blinko specifically for Jerusalem, for the Archbishop and the people of the Holy Lands. We thank you very, very much for this wonderful work and for your presence here with us this evening.’

– The Very Reverend Hosam Naoum, Dean of St Geroge’s Cathedral, Jerusalem (Ash Wednesday, 14 Feb 2018)

Dedicatee, Archbishop of Jerusalem Suheil Dawani (an Arab Christian interviewed by the BBC on Christmas day, 2017 about the troubles in Jerusalem) expressed that he ‘is delighted with the thought at the heart of the composition and is very moved.’ (30 Jan 2018)

• Since 2018 Blinko has written the music for six films. Euphony is a feature film written and directed by Indian-British director, Sunny Seth. In the narrative, Italian actress, Beatrice Grannò’s character, Olivia, slowly emerges from the most severe form of PTSD and agoraphobia.

Family
Blinko's brother is the outsider artist and punk rock musician Nick Blinko.