Harald Muenz

About Harald Muenz

Harald Muenz (born in 1965) studied composition at the Universities for the Arts in Cologne and Stuttgart with Helmut Lachenmann, Johannes Fritsch, Hans Ulrich Humpert, Krzysztof Meyer, Martin Redel and Clarence Barlow, as well as at the Detmold institute for sound engineering and the phonetic institute at the university in Cologne (with Georg Heike). In addition to chamber music, as well as orchestral and vocal music, he is particularly interested in compositions involving speech and language, Ars Acustica, and instrumental music with or without live electronics. He has frequently worked with writers (e.g. for the "Liedertafel" at the Berlin Singakademie, or, several collaborative works together with the poet Florian Neuner, among others for the Clang-Cut-Book project by Kammer ensemble Neue Musik Berlin in Berlin and Buenos Aires.) Harald’s music has been performed throughout Europe, Asia and the US, among others by hand werk (Cologne), Ensemble Modern (Frankfurt), Apartment House (London), Alter Ego (Rome), Musikfabrik (Cologne), Neue Vocalsolisten (Stuttgart), and the Berlin Philharmonics. His works have been heard at numerous festivals (among others at the Donaueschinger Musiktage and the festivals Ultraschall in Berlin and Acht Brücken in Cologne) and have been broadcast nationally and internationally (ARD, BBC, RAI, etc.) He has received the NRW Support Prize (1997) and a NRW Research Grant (2001), the city of Cologne’s Bernd-Alois Zimmermann Scholarship (2000), and was invited to work residencies in the Villa Aurora in Los Angeles and at the Artists’ Colonies in Wiepersdorf (1995) and Schreyahn (2005). The publisher Pfau has released his book on Franco Evangelisti. The Feedback Studio publishers in Cologne published his scores. His music is represented on five CDs on, a.o., the cybele and WERGO labels, as well as on a portrait CD with Berlin’s ensemble mosaik on Coviello. From 2001 to 2005, he taught Aesthetic Phonetics at the university in Cologne and was the artistic director of the electronic studio at the Lübeck Conser vatory. Since 2005 he has a permanent full position teaching composition at the Centre for Con tem p orary Music Practice at Brunel University London. Muenz commutes between Cologne and London as a composer active in various areas and media.
www.haraldmuenz.eu