Poul Ruders (b. 1949) is one of the era’s most highly regarded composers for both the opera stage and the symphonic concert hall. His operas have been staged in Copenhagen, New York City, London, Toronto and Munich, and his orchestral music commissioned by the Berlin Philharmonic, New York Philharmonic, and the BBC Symphony Orchestra.
Ruders lives a spartan life in the countryside of Denmark. The isolation has afforded him the opportunity to produce a deep and highly varied catalog which includes five operas, 45 symphonic works and concertos, and dozens of chamber and solo pieces. The music of Poul Ruders has been well-documented by the record labels DaCapo (Denmark) and Bridge (USA), and is published by Edition Wilhelm Hansen, Copenhagen.
In 2019, Poul Ruders will celebrate his 70th birthday with the world premiere of his newest opera, The Thirteenth Child, staged by the Santa Fe Opera. Prior to the premiere, Bridge Records will release a studio recording of the two act ‘fairytale’ opera. Also on tap in 2018/2019 are new productions in the USA and Europe of Ruders’s best known opera, The Handmaid’s Tale after the dystopian novel by Margaret Atwood.
POUL RUDERS LINKS
Santa Fe Opera: “The Thirteenth Child” world premiere information
Official Poul Ruders Website: poulruders.net
Personal Representation: becky@bridgerecords.com
DaCapo: Ruders recordings
Bridge Records: Ruders recordings
Publisher:
Edition Wilhelm Hansen/Music Sales
REVIEWS
Writing about Ruders's latest opera production in the New York Times:
"Mr. Ruders is a prodigiously skilled and daringly imaginative craftsman, and "Kafka's Trial" is a brilliant achievement: a grotesquely comic, bitterly satirical and, ultimately, deeply moving work that hooks you for two onrushing and uninterrupted hours."
- Anthony Tommasini
Writing about Ruders's opera "The Handmaid's Tale" in the Minnesota Opera production in USA Today:
"Thickly clouded, ominous harmonies give way to poignant minimalist tonality as Offred recalls her lost happiness with her lover and child from the Time Before. Terrifying orchestral swells segue into silence, while the tune of Amazing Grace is threaded through the score in distortions that musically mirror Gilead's own enforced perversion. Ruders' idiosyncratic style draws on many sources, not as a postmodern hodge-podge but as a refined technique to differentiate the story's psychological polarities."
- Thomas May
"...His orchestrations hallucinate and illuminate in amazing ways. Hear him. Now."
- Edward Seckerson, The Independent
