www.natworks.com.au
Natalie Williams is currently a Doctoral Student in Composition at the Jacob's School of Music at Indiana University in Bloomington, United States. She completed a Masters Degree in Composition at the University of Melbourne in 2002 and holds a Bachelor of Music from the University of Adelaide (Elder Conservatorium), graduating with first class Honours in Musicology in 1998. She has studied under composers; Brenton Broadstock, Graeme Koehne and John Polglase and is currently working with Professors Claude Baker and David Ward-Steinman in Indiana.
Her works have been commissioned and performed by national and international ensembles, including the Adelaide, Melbourne & West Australian Symphony Orchestras, the Sydney and Australian Youth Orchestras, the Australian Chamber Orchestra, the Song Company, the Zephyr String Quartet, Adelaide Youth Orchestra, the Cameo Trio, Melbourne University Orchestra, Elder Conservatorium Symphony Orchestra, Fiorini Trio (UK), Syntony and the Brenton Langbein String Quartet. Her output includes music for film, theatre, chamber and orchestral genres.
Williams is a joint recipient of the Inaugural Schueler Awards for a new work commissioned for the Adelaide Symphony Orchestra, premiered to an audience of 30,000 in February 2007. Current projects include a major commission from Adelaide Baroque for a series of four new works for their 2007 concert season, through funding from the Australia Council. She was the youngest Australian composer commissioned by the West Australian Symphony Orchestra to compose a Fanfare for their 75th Birthday series in 2003. She has worked with composers such as Philip Glass, Peter Sculthorpe, Brett Dean and Roger Smalley and conductors Martyn Brabbins, James Judd, Kevin Field and Professor John Hopkins. In 2005 Williams was commissioned by the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra for a new work for their Metropolis series which was premiered to critical acclaim. She was also commissioned by Ars Musica Australis to compose a Viola Concerto for the Australian Youth Orchestra's 2005 Young Symphonists Program.
In 2006 Williams won the APRA Professional Development Awards in the Classical Music category, and a scholarship from the Opus 50 Charitable Trust (Melbourne) enabling further overseas study. She reached the finals of the 2001 Young Australian of the Year Awards and held an Australian Postgraduate Research Scholarship for Composition studies at Melbourne University. In 2006 she has been awarded a Jacob's School of Music Fellowship which includes full scholarship and a teaching position at the Indiana University School of Music.
Natalie is a member of the Fellowship of Australian Composers, the Australian Music Centre and the Australasian Performing Rights Association. She has worked in arts administration for the past four years, at the Australian National Academy of Music and on the management team of Orchestra Victoria.
“….Successful was Natalie Williams’ Fanfare Sonic Boom, a smartly conceived concert opener that bristles……and surges along with a well-honed main theme of cinematic proportions. Williams…is a highly talented composer deserving of close attention.”
Graham Strahle, Adelaide Review, March 2002 (pg 25)
"Williams Premieres Agreeably.... Speaking directly and showing every indication of a balanced, personal voice, these pieces made an agreeable impression on an audience by this stage attuned to more...confrontational matter.”
Clive O'Connell, The Age, Wednesday 25 May 2005, (Metro) pg 9 [Melbourne Symphony Orchestra, Three Portraits of Scheherazade]
Updated 21-Nov-2007