Piers Maxim
Piers Maxim, composer
Piers Maxim's compositions available for purchase

biografia

Piers Maxim

Piers Maxim is a former boy chorister at St Paul's Cathedral, London.Having received his degree in Music at Cambridge University he continued his studies at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama, London.
Composing music since he was 7 years old, he had songs, carols and piano works published while still at school.Composition highlights over the years, include commissions for a National Childrens Home celebration in Winchester Cathedral (The Land of Lost Content), and the millennium eve service of celebration at Southwark Cathedral, in the presence of HM Queen Elizabeth II (And I said to the Man).
As conductor, assistant conductor and chorus master, he has worked regularly in the opera houses and theatres of Europe, including Staatsoper Berlin, La Monnaie Brussels, Le Théâtre des Champs Elysées Paris, and the Netherlands Nationale Reisopera, with whom he conducted Orfeo ed Euridice (Gluck), and performances of Così fan Tutte (Mozart) and Orfeo ed Euridice (Haydn).
In 2004 Piers Maxim made his Scottish Opera debut, conducting performances of Aida (Verdi) and La Bohème (Puccini).From September of that year he was Chef des Choeurs at Le Théâtre Royal de La Monnaie Brussels, where he worked on around 40 operas on stage and in concert, also conducting performances of Agrippina, Giulio Cesare (Handel), Die Zauberflöte (Mozart), La Petite Messe Solennelle (Rossini), and the Concert de Noël 2007 comprising works by Saint-Saëns and Respighi, and both Iphigénie operas by Gluck.
As Assistant Conductor to René Jacobs, he has worked on many Handel operas and oratorios.He features as harpsichord soloist on the harmonia mundi (France) recording of Rinaldo, and was Musical Assistant to Jacobs on the recordings of the three Mozart/Da Ponte operas.
As conductor of several choirs and choruses in England, Piers Maxim has conducted most of the choral and choral-symphonic repertoire, including Messiah and Saul (Handel), Mass in B minor (Bach), Mass in C minor (Mozart), Elijah (Mendelssohn), The Dream of Gerontius (Elgar), Sea Symphony(Vaughan Williams), Carmina Burana (Orff), A Child of our Time (Tippett)...
Piers Maxim made his USA debut conducting Die Zauberflöte at the Brooklyn Academy of Music, New York in April 2007.This same production then toured to Cape Town and Johannesburg in September 2007, where Maxim received glowing critiques.
At the end of June 2009, Maxim left La Monnaie to pursue his freelance career, and to concentrate on his composing.That Summer saw him returning to the Aix-en-Provence Festival to assist René Jacobs on Die Zauberflöte.The 2009-2010 season at La Monnaie saw Maxim invited as Chef du Choeur for several productions, also assisting Christophe Rousset on Semele (Handel) and the Iphigénie operas by Gluck.
In October 2010 he conducted the first performance of a staged baroque opera in China, when he led a performance of Semele (Handel) in the Beijing Music Festival, with soloists Jeremy Ovenden and Yeree Suh, the China Philharmonic and English Voices.
Recent composition projects include An Animals' Nativity for The Church of Scotland in Brussels, and a choral-symphonic setting of Longfellow, which was joint winner of the Longfellow Chorus Cantata Composition Competition 2011 in the USA. At present, he is working on an oratorio commission for performance in March 2016.
Piers is now Director of Music at Great Malvern Priory, and Musical Director of Epsom Chamber Choir.