Originally from Wigan (United Kingdom), David Lancaster began his musical career on trumpet before studying music at York and Cambridge Universities where his attention shifted to composition. As a young composer he gained a number of important awards including the Lloyds Bank Young Composer Award, Michael Tippett Award, LCM Centenary Prize and the Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival Composer Award. His music was performed in concerts and festivals around the UK by leading performers of new music including the Kronos String Quartet, Lontano, Electric Phoenix, Nancy Ruffer, Alexander Baillie and many others.
In recent years David’s music has been subject to a dramatic simplification of style in a search for greater clarity of form and expression. In November 2013 his ‘Strata’ was given its first performance by the Orchestra of Opera North and in 2014 his ‘Vertigo’ string quartet was performed in Hong Kong and at the Aspen Festival, Colorado. David’s large-scale choral work ‘Apocalypse’ - which tells the story of the end of the world as depicted in York’s medieval stained glass - was given its premiere in June by The 24 conducted by Robert Hollingworth during York’s Festival of Ideas. In 2015 ‘Strata’ was recorded by the Brno Philharmonic Orchestra for CD release and ‘Strike’ was performed in Hong Kong and York.
In 2016 'Apocalypse' was performed in Copenhagen by the Danish Radio Vocal Ensemble, 'Hiraeth' received a stunning first performance given by the Albany Piano Trio and 'Breathless' was premiered in York by the Orichalcum Brass Quintet
Also in 2016, David successfully completed PhD Composition at the University of York, supervised by Roger Marsh.
David Lancaster is based in York (UK) and is Director of Music at York St John University.