June in Buffalo 2021 Senior Composer: Robert H.P. Platz

June in Buffalo is very pleased to announce that the composer and conductor Robert HP Platz will be among our senior composers this festival.  Platz was born in Baden-Baden in 1951, and studied music theory, piano and conducting in Freiburg / Breisgau. He studied composition with Wolfgang Fortner and Karlheinz Stockhausen in Cologne, and later completed his conducting training with Francis Travis in Freiburg. Platz' various collaborations ahve variously taken him to the United Stated, Paris and Japan.  From 1989, Platz’ compositions have been part of a journal-like all-encompassing cycle that continues in associative leaps, distributions in space, and a polyphony of forms.

From 1980 to 2001, Platz in Cologne directed the Cologne Ensemble he founded. Composers such as Scelsi, Xenakis, Kagel, Hosokawa, Sylvano Bussotti and Klaus Huber wrote for the ensemble, which specializes in contemporary music. With guest conductors, Platz worked with ensembles and orchestras such as the Ensemble Modern, the Klangforum and the Vienna series, the German Symphony Orchestra, the Radio Symphony Orchestra of the WDR, the two SWR Symphony Orchestras Freiburg / Baden-Baden and Stuttgart, the Radio Philharmonic Orchestra of the NDR Hannover, and the Lower Rhine Symphoners, the Orchester Philharmonique du Luxembourg or the Bavarian State Opera.

Platz has lectured and taught in many European countries as well as the USA, Mexico, Israel, Indonesia, South Korea and Japan; 1986-1996 and again in 2002 lecturer at the Darmstadt summer courses. From 1990 onwards, Platz led a composition class at the Maastricht University of Music, combined with a seminar on the performance practice of new music. Since October 2013, Platz has held a professorship for composition and ensemble management for new music at the Musikhochschule Würzburg. From 2000 to 2007, Platz was artistic director of the Schreyahner Herbst festival. Since October 2013, Platz has held a professorship for composition and ensemble management for new music at the Musikhochschule Würzburg.

The Steingraeber piano manufacturer has been building the first midi grand piano with permanently installed transducers according to Platz’ specifications since 2016. Since 2005 the composer has been a member of the Bureau du Directeur of the Henri Pousseur Electronic Studio, Liège. Numerous CDs document the compositional and conducting work of Robert HP Platz. His portrait CD Mauro Lanza with the Ensemble Alternance was awarded by the Académie Charles Cros, his first Hosokawa CD with NEOS received the Clef d'Or as "Best CD of the year 2009".

A disc of Platz solo flute works, Più di un sogno, was released in Feburary of this year, with flutist Roberto Fabbriciani.