Biography

The music of Turkish/American composer Kamran Ince bridges Anatolia and the Balkans to the West. The energy and rawness of Turkish and Balkan folk music, the spirituality of Byzantium and Ottoman court music, the tradition of European art music and the extrovert and popular qualities of the American psyche are the base of his sound world. These ingredients happily breathe in cohesion, and they spin the linear and vertical contrasts so essential to his music forward.

Hailed by the Los Angeles Times as “that rare composer able to sound connected with modern music, and yet still seem exotic,” Ince was born in Montana in 1960 to American and Turkish parents. He holds a Doctorate from Eastman School of Music, and currently serves as Professor of Composition at University of Memphis and at MIAM Center for Advanced Research in Music at the Istanbul Technical University. His numerous prizes include the Rome Prize, the Guggenheim Fellowship, the Lili Boulanger Prize and the Arts and Letters Award in Music from the American Academy of Arts and Letters.

His works are performed by such orchestras as the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, BBC Symphony Orchestra and the Prague Symphony Orchestra, and such ensembles as the Nederlands Blazers Ensemble, Chanticleer Choir and the Los Angeles Piano Quartet. Concerts devoted to his music have been heard at the Holland Festival, CBC Encounter Series (Toronto), the Istanbul International Music Festival, Estoril Festival (Lisbon), TurkFest (London), and Cultural Influences in Globalization Festival (Ho Chi Minh City). In addition to symphonic and chamber works, his catalogue also includes music for film and ballet. His music is published exclusively by Schott Music Corporation.

Dance of the Sorrowful was created just for the Portland Youth Philharmonic as part of the Youth Orchestra Commissioning Initiative. Kamran had just completed a work for string orchestra, Intermezzo, commissioned by the Gedik Philharmonic Orchestra in Istanbul, when he was approached by David Hattner for the project. Having had so much fun with the work he had just finished, being asked to write another one with the same orchestration for PYP was an exciting prospect for him. Writing in the midst of the pandemic, there is of course much horror and sorrow. However, that is countered in the piece with the youthful act of dance, the feeling of optimism, and with the idea that hope is always just around the corner. There is a constant push and pull between these states of existence. The title Dance of the Sorrowful reflects this.