Hannah Kendall

Hannah Kendall (born 1984 in London, of Guyanese heritage and now based in New York) is one of the most acclaimed British composers of her generation. She studied at the University of Exeter and the Royal College of Music, and completed a doctorate at Columbia University with Georg Friedrich Haas and George E. Lewis. Her music is intricate and allusive, and often engages with Black history and identity. It has been widely performed: her orchestral piece The Spark Catchers was premiered at the BBC Proms in 2017, her chamber opera The Knife of Dawn dramatises the imprisonment of the Guyanese poet-activist Martin Carter, and her ‘shouting forever into the receiver’ won an Ivor Novello Award. She is known for delicate, layered textures, the use of unusual sound sources (wind-up music boxes, harmonicas), and a deeply thoughtful engagement with history and memory.