Biography
Paul Clift (b. 1978 in Melbourne, Australia) is a composer of instrumental and mixed music. Since 2016, he is based in Basel, Switzerland. His music often attempts to make concrete associations with concepts such as collective memory and historical musical traditions, notably through the integration of archival recordings in his works. His compositional outlook is marked by formative studies with Franck Bedrossian, George Benjamin, Jean-Luc Hervé, Fred Lerdahl, Philippe Leroux, Fabien Lévy and Tristan Murail. Since 2024, Paul has been a visiting scholar in the Sound Arts department at the Hochschule der Künste Bern.
His music has been programmed at festivals including Agora, and Festival Ensemble(s), Weimarer Frühjahrstage für zeitgenössische Musik, Darmstädter Ferienkurse, ReMusik St. Petersburg, MATA (New York), Rainy Days Luxembourg, Musikfestival Bern, SMC Lausanne, Koper Biennale (Slovenia), Close Encounters (Georgia), Ultima Oslo, AFEKT (Berlin/Tallinn), ISCM World Music Days (Tallinn), Sounding Now (Singapore) and Sonic Matter (Zurich) among others, and has been performed by ensembles such as Klangforum Wien, Ensemble l’Itinéraire, JACK and Mivos Quartets, L’Instant Donné, Contrechamps, ICE, Ensemble l’Imaginaire, Proton, Neofonía, Novel Ensemble Modern, Adapter, Vortex, TAG, Trio Sæitenwind, Sentieri Selvaggi and Vertixe Sonora, as well as by soloists such as Benny Sluchin, Mike Svoboda, Alain Billard, Kobe Van Cauwenberghe, Marilyn Nonken, Olivia Steimel, Sergej Tchirkov and Anja Clift. In 2019, his large-scale scenic work “Portal Fantasies,” composed in collaboration with cultural historian Barbara Piatti, was premiered at the Zeiträume Biennale für neue Musik und Architektur in Basel.
Paul Clift obtained a Doctorate of Musical Arts from Columbia University, New York, a Masters of Music at King’s College, London, and participated in the two years of the IRCAM Cursus. In 2016, Paul was in residence at Villa Sträuli in Switzerland.
In addition to composing, Paul Clift is active as a researcher. He has undertaken research residencies at the Paul Sacher Foundation (2014) and IRCAM (2014-15). He has appeared as a guest lecturer at New York university, University of California San Diego, New England Conservatory, University of New Mexico, Filosofska Fakulteta (Ljubljana), University of Basel and the University of Aix-en-Provence. Paul also served as artistic director of neuverBand Ensemble für neue Musik and Ensemble Recherche.