Andrew Webb-Mitchell

“In Songs of Awe and Wonder, Andrew Webb-Mitchell has created a stunning set of symphonic songs on a grand scale. The music is full of passion and heroism, with glorious harmony and beautiful textures. The orchestration is beautifully detailed and the vocal writing creates a soaring line that carries the listener right through the vast canvas of the cycle.” Tasmin Little OBE

Andrew Webb-Mitchell is an English classical composer living in China. His symphonic song cycle, Songs of Awe and Wonder, was recorded by the Brno Philharmonic in 2011 and released by First Creative in 2013, Andrew’s professional debut recording. The fourth movement of this cycle, The Inspiration of Night, was premiered at the Tianjin Grand Theatre in October 2012 by Sir Mark Elder and the Hallé Orchestra.

Born in Bishop’s Stortford, Hertfordshire in 1970, Andrew Webb-MItchell read music at what is now Anglia Ruskin University in Cambridge before embarking on an international career in music education, holding positions in Kuwait and Taiwan before leading music departments in several schools in the United Kingdom and, more recently, China. In 2008 he was appointed Director of Music and Performing Arts at the British School of Beijing and in 2010 became founding Headmaster of King’s College Beijing. He is currently Artistic Director of The British Schools Foundation Choral Programme.

Despite his long and successful career as an educator, Andrew’s main focus and passion has always been composition. Having become disillusioned with contemporary classical music from a listener’s perspective, he is determined to reclaim the concert hall for modern audiences, giving them new works in a challenging, yet direct and accessible, musical language. He aims to resurrect the lost art of great writing for the classical voice, composing new works which are carefully crafted to engage with both the listener and performer.