Composer Lyle Chan is known for his socially-conscious works combining powerful emotional impact and intellectual rigour. His most personal and confronting work is his 90-minute String Quartet, a memoir of his years as an AIDS activist in the 1990s. It was hailed by American composer John Corigliano as “a serious and deeply felt work of art born out of a seemingly endless plague.”
He was awarded the Orchestral Work of the Year prize in Australia’s Art Music Awards for his orchestral song cycle My Dear Benjamin, which Chan wrote upon meeting a 95-year old Wulff Scherchen living in Australia and discovering he was the little-known war-time love interest of composer Benjamin Britten.
Lyle Chan’s most notorious composition is Wind Farm Music, commissioned by human rights lawyer Julian Burnside and dedicated to Australia’s unpopular then-Prime Minister Tony Abbott in protest against the government’s anti-renewable energy stance. The work that first brought him widespread recognition was Rendezvous With Destiny for narrator and musicians – based on US political history – commissioned by the Art Gallery Society of NSW and performed by Bob Carr, former Foreign Minister of Australia and NSW Premier.
His recent major commissioners include Sydney Symphony Orchestra for its 50 Fanfares project. For the Debussy Centenary in 2018, he was commissioned by the Australian National Academy of Music to compose three diversely-scored Sonatas to fulfil Debussy’s final project that he left unfinished on his early death. Also in 2018 he was commissioned by the Art Gallery of NSW Foundation for a work to be performed during the exhibition of The Lady and the Unicorn, the famed 16th century tapestry making only its third ever trip outside of France.
His work has been programmed at major arts institutions such as Sydney Opera House, Australian Broadcasting Corporation, Brisbane Festival, National Gallery of Victoria, Art Gallery of NSW, Melbourne Recital Centre, Queensland Performing Arts Centre and others.
Lyle Chan spent over a decade at ABC Classics, where as Artists & Repertoire Manager he spearheaded the production of over 200 recordings, including every winner of the Best Classical category of the ARIA Awards between 1998 and 2008.
He is co-founder of Extended Play, the acclaimed festival of new music that ran in 2018-19 at Sydney’s City Recital Hall. He is currently a member of the 6-person international panel curating performances and conference papers for Classical:Next, the global annual meeting of classical music professionals in Rotterdam.
Photo credit – Philippa Horn