www.tobywren.com
Toby Wren plays jazz guitar and writes music. Toby has a BMus (composition) from the Queensland Conservatorium of Music and a 1st Dan Black Belt from Rhee TaeKwon-do. He has written numerous works for orchestra and was invited to participate in the 2000 and 2001 Australian Composers Orchestral Forum and was a Composer Affiliate of the Queensland Orchestra in 2002. In 1997 he won the DIGF composition prize for his guitar piece 'Nebbish'. He has also written arrangements for rock bands (rhubarb, george, chris pickering, megan washington, blind) and 2 CDs of original material.
Toby was a co-director of the group COMPOST which produced large scale new music events between 1997 and 2003. Toby is also a member of the Trevor Hart Quartet .
Since 2004 Toby has consolidated his output and focussed on his group, The Toby Wren Trio, for which he writes the music and performs. The group released it's debut CD "Umlaut" in 2006. Since 2006 Toby has been investigating Carnatic (South Indian Classical) music which led to a study tour in India and recent collaborations with Carnatic musicians. Recent compositions for the group use structures from Jazz and Carnatic music to create new vehicles for ensemble and improvisation.