"...this piece was deeply touching, beautiful, emotive, joyful, liberating and bespoke. The work clearly showed a deep level of connection between the composer and participants, demonstrating a symbiotic, creative flow."
Ivors Academy Award Judges on The Umbrella
Liam Taylor-West is a composer and audiovisual artist who works primarily with live musicians and new technology. His compositions and artworks are built around the resulting behaviour of large numbers of active elements, often featuring audience interaction and random events. Liam is interested in colour, light, rhythm and movement.
In 2018, Liam received the Ivors Composer Award in the Community or Educational Project category for The Umbrella, performed by the National Open Youth Orchestra. He holds a doctoral degree in composition from the Royal College of Music, in London, and has worked with several orchestras including regular collaborations with the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra and the BBC Concert Orchestra.
Liam's two-volume composition Backdrops is used to underscore the BBC Radio 3 show Night Tracks, presented by Sara Mohr-Pietsch and Hannah Peel, and his orchestral piece A Slow Breath appears as part of the BBC Sounds podcast The Music and Meditation Podcast.
Liam is an advocate of the use of creative technology in composition and performance, and is a Resident at Watershed’s Pervasive Media Studio, in Bristol.
"Liam Taylor-West’s Turning Points was an impressively fluent three-minute orchestral workout, with a definite transatlantic twang to its rhythms..."
Andrew Clements for The Guardian 31/01/20
Liam has worked as a freelance Arranger, Editor, Copyist, Librarian, and Facilitator for a large number of composers, orchestras and organisations, including: Anna Meredith, Eleanor Alberga, Charlotte Harding, Benji Bower, the CBSO, BBC Symphony Orchestra, Paraorchestra, BBC Concert Orchestra, RPO, Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra, National Open Youth Orchestra, Kneehigh Theatre, and Faber Music. He has held several roles with BBC Radio 3, including Assistant Producer on In Tune and Record Review, and Production Coordinator on Breakfast.
Liam builds his artworks in code using languages including C, Python, Javascript, and the visual programming language Max. His Doctoral Commentary Modularity, Technology, and Geometry in Compositional Practice was published in 2023 by the Royal College of Music, in London, and can be read here.