Biography

Born in Glasgow

Glasgow

Glasgow is the largest city in Scotland and third most populous in the United Kingdom. The city is situated on the River Clyde in the country's west central lowlands...

, he attended Knightswood Secondary School

Knightswood Secondary School

Knightswood Secondary School or KSS is a secondary school located in Knightswood in the west-end of Glasgow, Scotland.The school is one of the city's largest secondaries with a roll of approximately 1500 pupils. KSS is co-educational, non-selective and non-denominational, and provides education for...

. He studied the clarinet

Musical composition

Musical composition can refer to an original piece of music, the structure of a musical piece, or the process of creating a new piece of music. People who practice composition are called composers.- Musical compositions :...

 and composition

Musical composition

Musical composition can refer to an original piece of music, the structure of a musical piece, or the process of creating a new piece of music. People who practice composition are called composers.- Musical compositions :...

 at the Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama

Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama

The Royal Conservatoire of Scotland is a conservatoire of music, drama, and dance in the centre of Glasgow, Scotland. Founded in 1845 as the Glasgow Educational Association, it is the busiest performing arts venue in Scotland...

 from 1967 to 1970, and at the Royal Academy of Music

Royal Academy of Music

The Royal Academy of Music in London, England, is a conservatoire, Britain's oldest degree-granting music school and a constituent college of the University of London since 1999. The Academy was founded by Lord Burghersh in 1822 with the help and ideas of the French harpist and composer Nicolas...

 from 1970 to 1973, where his teachers included Alan Hacker and Harrison Birtwistle

Harrison Birtwistle

Sir Harrison Paul Birtwistle CH is a British contemporary composer.-Life:Birtwistle was born in Accrington, a mill town in Lancashire some 20 miles north of Manchester. His interest in music was encouraged by his mother, who bought him a clarinet when he was seven, and arranged for him to have...

. He went on to teach woodwind instruments, and then composition at the University of Glasgow

University of Glasgow

The University of Glasgow is the fourth-oldest university in the English-speaking world and one of Scotland's four ancient universities. Located in Glasgow, the university was founded in 1451 and is presently one of seventeen British higher education institutions ranked amongst the top 100 of the...

. An early influence was the European avant-garde

Avant-garde

Avant-garde means "advance guard" or "vanguard". The adjective form is used in English to refer to people or works that are experimental or innovative, particularly with respect to art, culture, and politics....

, particularly Karlheinz Stockhausen

Karlheinz Stockhausen

Karlheinz Stockhausen was a German composer, widely acknowledged by critics as one of the most important but also controversial composers of the 20th and early 21st centuries. Another critic calls him "one of the great visionaries of 20th-century music"...

, though he returned to tonal

Tonality

Tonality is a system of music in which specific hierarchical pitch relationships are based on a key "center", or tonic. The term tonalité originated with Alexandre-Étienne Choron and was borrowed by François-Joseph Fétis in 1840...

 composition in the mid-1970s.

His work is strongly influenced by traditional Scottish folk music

Folk music

Folk music is an English term encompassing both traditional folk music and contemporary folk music. The term originated in the 19th century. Traditional folk music has been defined in several ways: as music transmitted by mouth, as music of the lower classes, and as music with unknown composers....

; in particular, he has utilised the heterophonic style of Gaelic

Goidelic languages

The Goidelic languages or Gaelic languages are one of the two branches of the Insular Celtic languages, the other consisting of the Brythonic languages. Goidelic languages historically formed a dialect continuum stretching from the south of Ireland through the Isle of Man to the north of Scotland...

 psalm-singing, and the piobaireachd

Piobaireachd

Pibroch, Piobaireachd or Ceòl Mór is an art music genre associated primarily with the Scottish Highlands that is characterised by extended compositions with a melodic theme and elaborate formal variations...

 form; he varies melodies

Melody

A melody , also tune, voice, or line, is a linear succession of musical tones which is perceived as a single entity...

 through ornamentation

Ornament (music)

In music, ornaments or embellishments are musical flourishes that are not necessary to carry the overall line of the melody , but serve instead to decorate or "ornament" that line. Many ornaments are performed as "fast notes" around a central note...

, as in traditional pibroch, and in their contour; he modifies instruments' tone-colours through alternative fingerings. He has a strong regard for the music of Leoš Janáček

Leoš Janácek

Leoš Janáček was a Czech composer, musical theorist, folklorist, publicist and teacher. He was inspired by Moravian and all Slavic folk music to create an original, modern musical style. Until 1895 he devoted himself mainly to folkloristic research and his early musical output was influenced by...

. He has also addressed the reconciliation of classical and traditional music with jazz

Jazz

Jazz is a musical style that originated at the beginning of the 20th century in African American communities in the Southern United States. It was born out of a mix of African and European music traditions. From its early development until the present, jazz has incorporated music from 19th and 20th...

, using improvisation

Improvisation

Improvisation is the practice of acting, singing, talking and reacting, of making and creating, in the moment and in response to the stimulus of one's immediate environment and inner feelings. This can result in the invention of new thought patterns, new practices, new structures or symbols, and/or...

al techniques and sometimes combining the two idioms. He has been influenced by ancient Greek

Ancient Greek

Ancient Greek is the stage of the Greek language in the periods spanning the times c. 9th–6th centuries BC, , c. 5th–4th centuries BC , and the c. 3rd century BC – 6th century AD of ancient Greece and the ancient world; being predated in the 2nd millennium BC by Mycenaean Greek...

 poetry, and Indian and Arab traditions in his use of ostinato

Ostinato

In music, an ostinato is a motif or phrase, which is persistently repeated in the same musical voice. An ostinato is always a succession of equal sounds, wherein each note always has the same weight or stress. The repeating idea may be a rhythmic pattern, part of a tune, or a complete melody in...

 and other techniques of varied repetition.

Selected works

Opera

• An Turus, Opera in 3 acts, 1997; libretto by Aonghas Macneacail

Orchestral

• Maqam, 1984
• Glasgow, 1985
• Sunset Song, 1986
• Cumha, 1987
• Seann Orain, 1989
• Air, Strathspey and Reel, 1990
• Concerto Grosso: 9 clarinets, strings and timpani
  Timpani
  Timpani, or kettledrums, are musical instruments in the percussion family. A type of drum, they consist of a skin called a head stretched over a large bowl traditionally made of copper. They are played by striking the head with a specialized drum stick called a timpani stick or timpani mallet...
  
   1990
• St. Blane's Hill, 1991
• A Set for the Kingdom: string orchestra
  String orchestra
  A string orchestra is an orchestra composed solely or primarily of instruments from the string family. These instruments are the violin, the viola, the cello, the double bass , the piano, the harp, and sometimes percussion...
  
  , 1991
• October Landscapes, 1993
• Birth/Procession, 1993
• The Lost Mountain (A-bheinn Air Chall): wind band, 1996
• Sweeney Astray, 1996

Concertante

• Ceol-Beag for cello and orchestra, 1981
• An rathad ùr for saxophone
  Saxophone
  The saxophone is a conical-bore transposing musical instrument that is a member of the woodwind family. Saxophones are usually made of brass and played with a single-reed mouthpiece similar to that of the clarinet. The saxophone was invented by the Belgian instrument maker Adolphe Sax in 1846...
  
   and orchestra, 1989

Chamber music

• String Quartet, 1981
• Trio for clarinet, viola and piano, 1982
• Sonata for viola, marimba and claves
  Claves
  Claves are a percussion instrument , consisting of a pair of short Claves (Anglicized pronunciation: clah-vays, IPA:[ˈklαves]) are a percussion instrument (idiophone), consisting of a pair of short Claves (Anglicized pronunciation: clah-vays, IPA:[ˈklαves]) are a percussion instrument (idiophone),...
  
  , 1985
• Sweeney Astray for 2 clarinets, 1987, or for clarinet and viola, 2003
• String Quartet No. 3, 2004–2007
• Sonata for cello and piano, 2010
• The Ballad of the Cat and the Ram for violin and piano

Choral

• Salm an Fhearainn', 1987
• An Seachnadh, 1988
• I Will Wait, 1990
• Two Lyrics, 1992
• Airc an dualchais, 1998

Songs

• 3 Poems from Sangschaw, 1977
• The Heights of Macchu Picchu, 1988
• El Pueblo, 1989
• A Drunk Man Looks at the Thistle, 1992
• An Coilltean Ratharsair (The Woods of Raasay), 1993
• Seeking Wise Salmon, 1994
• All that came in that one coracle, 1999

Sources

• Mackay, Neil. 'William Sweeney's an seachnadh. Tempo, new series, no. 188 (Scottish Issue, March 1994): 58.
• Morris, Francis J. 'Sweeney, William (John)', Grove Music Online, ed. L. Macy (Accessed 2007-06-07), http://www.grovemusic.com/
• Reid-Baxter, James. 'William Sweeney and the Voice of the People'. Tempo, new series, no. 188 (Scottish Issue, March 1994): 26–30.

External links

• Scottish music centre: William Sweeney