Stichting Oosterkerk

Biografie

Simon Knighton (1984) primarily creates live and recorded music for performance, contemporary dance and theatre. After setting up his own independent studio in Liverpool, Simon has gained over 8 years’ experience of working professionally as a composer, producer, sound engineer and guitarist. He developed a composing method from this studio setting; regular collaboration with musicians and artists from the local community facilitated his practice into many new and unknown areas. This nursed a broad minded, flexible and practical approach to music creation across multiple genres, styles and disciplines, from composing to specific commission briefs, to the development of audio-visual street theatre, to producing/mixing other people’s music for commercial purposes.

A key element of his aesthetic is merging aspects, elements and sounds particular to traditional music composition (harmony, rhythm etc.) with elements particular to electronic music production (recording techniques, audio manipulation etc.). His style blends and twists the relationship of these characteristics to create a new type of music. Elements from contradictory styles, genres, disciplines and cultural personalities are presented in new contexts; for instance the manipulation of acoustic instrumentation in the digital domain, or the use of unusual instrument combinations in the live domain.

Simon is currently studying for an MA in Composition at the Amsterdam Conservatorium with Joël Bons and Willem Jeths.