Peszat, Piotr

Born in 1990, Cracow-based composer and sound artist. He studied composition with Simon Steen-Andersen at the Royal Academy of Music in Aarhus (2013–15) and Krzysztof Meyer at the Music Academy in Cracow (2009–14, diploma with honours). He obtained his PhD in 2018 under the tuition of Marek Chołoniewski. 

His accolades include the first Roche Young Commission from a jury chaired by Pierre Boulez, with the resulting symphony work premiered at the 2015 Lucerne Festival. He has also won the 1st Prize at the MCI Meetings Composition Competition in Copenhagen (2014), joint 2nd Prize at Krzysztof Penderecki Composition Competition in Sopot (2017), Composer’s Concert of the Year competition, finalist of the Tadeusz Baird Competition for Young Composers in Warsaw (2013), Polish Ministry of Culture and National Heritage Award (2013). In addition, he was also the prizewinner of the competitions organized by Ensemble Musikfabrik in cooperation with the Adam Mickiewicz Institute (Composer Collider, 2014), Ensemble Adapter (Adoptions, 2016), and Ung Nordisk MusikFestival Danmark (UNM, 2015). In December 2014, Peszat and visual artist Katarzyna Feiglewicz won the artistic residence in Fljótstunga (Iceland), where they created the installation Inside Earth Outside. 

His music has been featured at numerous workshops and festivals such as Ostrava Days, Nature Meets Music, workshops with JACK Quartet and Esbjerg Ensemble, Pulsar Festival, RAMA Festival, Wawel at Dusk, Aarhus Jazz Festival, Warsaw Autumn, Klassenarbeit workshops with ensemble recherche, Alpbach European Forum, Ung Nordisk Musik Festival, Musica Polonica Nova and Musica Electronica Nova in Wrocław, Summer Courses for New Music in Darmstadt, Donaueschinger Musiktage, Audio Art, Poznań's Music Spring and Malta Festivals, Sacrum Profanum in Cracow, Neo Arte, and Ultraschall.

Since 2014, he has been the manager of the Spółdzielnia Muzyczna Contemporary Ensemble. In 2017 he founded NewMediaNotation blog in which he discusses problems of notation of audiovisual media by analysing the scores of contemporary composers. 

Selected works: Try to watch this without crying for performer, chamber ensemble, audio playback and video (2018), Untitled Folder for chamber ensemble and audio playback (2017), U.N. Owen was her? for electronic string quartet, audio playback and 2-channel video projection (2017), My Body, My Capital, video (2017), Grocery Store Music #3 for piano and audio playback (2016), Grocery Store Music #2 for chamber ensemble and audio playback (2016), Jenny’s Soul. Or Dirk’s? for percussion, audio playback and video (2016), The Message for two pianos, audio playback and video (2016), The Artist’s Way for symphony orchestra, audio playback and video (2017).