Shaun Rigney: Carl Orff Competition 2018 Orpheus, Eurydike, Hermes

Shaun Rigney Shaun Rigney is a composer, teacher, video artist, writer, musician, audio producer and orchestrator. His music includes concertos, chamber music, solo pieces, songs, film scores, electronica, and works composed for radio. Shaun has collaborated with fine musicians from all over the world, including Slava Grigoryan, Leonard Grigoryan, Michael Kieran Harvey, Edin Karamazov, the Guitar Quartet of Versailles, Australian String Quartet, Queensland Symphony Orchestra and many others.

Shaun’s musical friendship with the Grigoryan Brothers has led to collaborations featuring Shaun as producer on no fewer than six Grigoryan Brothers releases. In June 2014 Shaun worked with legendary recording engineer Jan Erik Kongshaug (veteran of over 800 ECM recordings) to produce the Grigoryan Brothers CD This Time at Rainbow Studio, Oslo.

CDs featuring Shaun’s music include Afterimage – Slava Grigoryan plays the music of Shaun Rigney (ABC Classics); The three-cornered hat by the Southern Cross Soloists featuring Slava Grigoryan (ABC Classics); Distance by the Grigoryan Brothers (WhichWay Music/Material); and Hush 10 – Songs with Strings (Hush Music Foundation), featuring the Grigoryan Brothers and the Hush Chamber Strings conducted by Benjamin Northey.

Production credits include Distance by the Grigoryan Brothers, Mozart Horn Concerti for ABC Classics (with Barry Tuckwell conducting), Afterimage – Slava Grigoryan plays the music of Shaun Rigney (nominated for the ARIA Classical Album of the Year 2005) and Impressions by the Grigoryan Brothers (nominated for the ARIA Classical Album of the Year 2007). Shaun is the producer of Slava’s recordings of the Bach cello suites on baritone guitar for ABC Classics. This recording broke new ground by spending 13 weeks at number 1 in the ARIA classical chart in 2016.

In 2009, Shaun worked as orchestrator on Peter Weir’s film The Way Back. In 2007 and 2008, Shaun was artistic director and composer for the Aquamarine Project. Inspired by the Great Barrier Reef and its people, the Aquamarine Project helped create two new orchestral works (Shaun’s solo guitar concerto Ultramarine and his duo guitar concerto Aquamarine), as well as musical collaborations with Kuku Yalanji elder Bennett Walker. The Aquamarine Project was supported by the Christensen Fund, a Californian philanthropic organisation supporting cultural and environmental conservation.

In 2006, Shaun travelled with the West Australian Symphony Orchestra as the ABC’s recording producer on WASO’s first tour of China.

Shaun has also created an extensive catalogue of works for ABC radio, as composer, producer, scriptwriter and director.