Ivan Moody

Specialism:

Composition

Location:

Sao Joao do Estoril
Portugal 2765

Additional Info:

Fr Ivan Moody studied music and theology at the Universities of London, Joensuu and York (where he took his doctorate). He studied composition with Brian Dennis, Sir John Tavener and William Brooks. His music has been performed and broadcast all over the world, and commissioned by world-renowned artists.

His largest works to date are Passion and Resurrection (1992), the Akathistos Hymn (1998) and Qohelet (2013). Other significant works from recent years include the Liturgy of St John Chrysostom No. 2 (Greek Liturgy), commissioned by the St Romanos Choir of Chicago, The Land that was Not, commissioned for the BBC Singers and ‘cellist Nicholas Altstaedt and premièred in London in October 2014, and the Dante Trilogy, for choir and ensemble (O Luce Etterna, Oltre la Spera, and Cielo della Luna, premièred in Portugal and the USA). In 2016 he completed Los Espejos de Velázquez for the pianist Artur Pizarro, Paris, 7 a.m. for soprano Suzie Leblanc, a Petrarch cycle, Le Vergine, for Stimmwerck, Lacrimae for the brass ensemble Septura, and the large-scale Vespers Sequence for New York Polyphony, premièred to great acclaim in New York in January 2017. In 2017 he completed Psalm Antiphon for the Lisbon University Chamber Choir, a companion work to Stravinsky's Symphony of Psalms, two works in celebration of the 25th anniversary of Singer Pur, commissioned by Singer Pur and the Regensburger Domspatz, and in 2018 Isangele, premièred by the English Chamber Choir at the Patmos Festival of Sacred Music, and a set of three motets for Trio Mediaeval. Works completed in 2019 include Tanninim for tuba and piano, premièred in Alcobaça, Portugal, by the composer’s daughter Sofia in August of the same year, and Imperaytriz de la Ciutat Joyosa for the organetto player Catalina Vicens.

As a conductor, Ivan Moody has directed and collaborated with many choirs and vocal groups, notably Voces Angelicae and the Kastalsky Chamber Choir in Britain (both of which he founded) and Capilla Peña Florida in Spain. In 1992 he was invited by Radio Nacional de España to direct the inaugural concert in celebration of Columbus Day, broadcast live to more than 30 countries. He is a founder member of Ensemble Alpha, specializing in eastern and western mediaeval music, and which has given hugely successful concerts in various European countries and the USA, and of the Pravoslava chamber choir. He is in frequent demand as a guest conductor, and has given courses with a number of groups, such as Capilla Peña Florida (Spain), Vértice and the choir of the Semanas Internacionais de Música (Portugal), the Early Music Ensemble of the UFF (Brazil), Cappella Romana (USA), the Winterthur Vocal Ensemble (Switzerland) the Orthodox Choir of the University of Joensuu (Finland), the choir of St George’s Cathedral, Novi Sad (Serbia), Sforzinda (Spain), the Odyssea Choir (Portugal), the Chamber Choir of the Academy of Arts, Novi Sad, (Serbia) and Vox Laci (Portugal). He is a co-founder, together with Peter Phillips, Pedro Teixeira and Jordi Abelló, of the choral course Victoria 400, held in Barcelona.

As a musicologist, Ivan Moody has published extensively on the music of the Balkans, Russia and the Mediterranean, with a particular emphasis on contemporary and sacred music. His book Modernism and Orthodox Spirituality in Contemporary Music was published in 2014. He is a researcher at CESEM – Universidade Nova, Lisbon, having previously been Professor of church music at the University of Eastern Finland, and is founder and president of the International Society for Orthodox Church Music, founder member of the music panel of the European Academy of Religion and Coordinator of the Music Panel of the International Orthodox Theological Association. He is a protopresbyter of the Orthodox Church (Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople) and rector of the parish of St John the Russian in Estoril, Portugal.

Specialisms

Early Music, Contemporary Music, Commissions, Contemporary Classical

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