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Vincent Plush

Vincent Plush

For over 50 years now, Vincent Plush has lived a varied career in music, not just as a composer, but also as a teacher and broadcaster, writer and commentator, and conductor-director of ensembles and small-scale festivals. At various stages of his life, he has worked for extended periods in most Australian capitals and for nearly 20 years was based in North America, living in 15 cities throughout the USA. Since his permanent return to Australia in 2000, his focus has been on developing ties with colleagues and institutions throughout Asia. He has composed over 120 works, few of which have been recorded or even played in Australia. These include four orchestral pieces (only one of which Pacifica [1986] has been heard in Australia) and large-scale community pieces, as well as solo pieces and works for multiple instruments and voices. An articulate and sometimes controversial figure, most of his music relates to Australian heritage and universal political issues. In 2018 he completed his PhD in Musicology with a thesis devoted to music in the life and work of Patrick White, reflecting his interest in the intersections of various strands of Australian culture.

INSIDE THE MUSICIAN. Vincent Plush (Part 1): And One Thing Led to Another

On a Harkness Fellowship, Australian composer Vincent Plush travelled to the USA to an initial base at Yale University. From there he began an enormous exercise in networking, travelling around the USA to meet, especially, American composers. Over the next 20 years he interviewed over 200 of them and among other things produced radio programs for broadcast in Australia. He also, back in Australia, produced programs of Australian composers for broadcast in the US. This article is bountiful in details of Plush’s peregrinations.

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