Short biography
Rūta Vitkauskaitė’s (b.1984) musical interests are widely varied – while working in the field of classical composition, she has also dedicated much of her time for research in collaborative music creation and music personalisation. Rūta has recently received PhD in Composition at the Royal Academy of Music in London, where she focused on audience engagement and collective music creation. Her collaborative electro-acoustic opera for blind-folded audience, Confessions, created by Spatial Opera Company has won Golden Stage Cross in Lithuania, and since then has toured across Lithuania, Sweden and EU. Her Walking Opera, (opera co-created with local communities and presented as sound-walk around local areas), has been premiered in Aarhus Capital of Culture 2017, and re-created in Notting Hill, London. Her ensemble and orchestral compositions have been five times awarded as Best Composition of the Year by Lithuanian Composer's Union, while her music has been performed in festivals across EU, including Gaudeamus, Operadagen (NL), Apeldoorn, Sound (UK), Nordbeg, BZZZ, Halland (SE), Gaida, NOA (LT), Q-O2 Winter fest (BE), SUSA (DK) and elsewhere, and has been broadcast on Lithuanian National TV, LRT Classic, BBC Radio 3, Deutschlandradio Kultur (a special one hour long portrait) and many independent radio stations. Rūta has also been active initiator of experimental music projects, from collaborative groups to large scale festivals: she was director of Druskomanija festival and workshop series the Process in Lithuania for several years, facilitator of New Music Incubator in Nordic and Baltic countries and across EU, facilitator and tutor at ComposersPlus summer academy in Lithuania, and currently – initiator of CoMA, Contemporary Music for All, Glasgow branch. Musical language (text by Asta Pakarklyte, 2009) In her music, Ruta Vitkauskaite strives to grasp the fundamental matters, the primeval universality, as if looking for the ‘philosophical stone’ of the mythic musical substance. Her works show a highly powerful basis of irrational intuition, hard to describe soundscapes resembling archetypes – the shapes of the collective unconscious. The composer often combines the language of contemporary academic music, elements of ethnic and ritual music of different cultures (African tribes, shamans of the North, Georgians, Arabs and Jews, or the Lithuanian laments), or the sounds of experimental electronics. Her eccentric works often resemble natural forces, seemingly unorganised and chaotic formations, sticking together into a highly dynamic, vital and unpredictable whole, always generating an active emotion. Me about music
Music, I think, is an inevitable part of the human condition, it is the most powerful learning tool for understanding and experiencing how the many layers and dimensions of our life, societies and states of mind interact. Music has great ability to bring us into particular state of being, to energise wildly, or to completely slow-down our heartbeat, to have our 'aha' moments, to reinforce transformation, insights, wisdom and growth. As a composer, I am constantly seeking to broaden the musical landscape. Through imagination and experimentation I try to stretch the understanding of what we, as humans, are capable of, where we can grow, and I communicate these ideas to my audiences. For years, I have been painfully observing unpopularity of contemporary music, and the 'same small circle' of the audiences in new music concerts and festivals. I believe that new music is not necessarily meant for refined audience of musical intellectuals, and has much more potential for outreach. During my years in education, I observed how children, whose minds are not yet conditioned, approach new music - they enjoy it, explore it, listen and interact with it, and participate in it; and through this they understand it. Through participation in music, especially in new, unexplored, unfamiliar music, people learn so much about themselves, and others from all walks of life. I take it as my responsibility to envision new perspectives, make people aware of these possibilities, and create participatory environments for engaging with new music, not only for children, but also for adults, amateurs and especially young and professional musicians. |
Profiles at other websites
Lithuanian Music Information and Publishing Centre
PRS for music foundation
KVAST
Q-O2
Soundcloud
Peter Sheppard Skaerved website
ECSA
Lithuanian Music Information and Publishing Centre
PRS for music foundation
KVAST
Q-O2
Soundcloud
Peter Sheppard Skaerved website
ECSA
Interviews
Ramune Kazlauskaite, Die Ganze Welt abbilden, portrat der litauishen Komponistin Ruta Vitkauskaite, MusikTekste (paper), 2048 February
Ugnius Babinkas, In der Konzertmusik vermisse ich das Ritual, MusikTexte, 2018 February
Ugnius Babinskas, The Ritual Peripehry of Academic Music: An Interview with Ruta Vitkauskaite, MIC.LT, 2017
Interview about life,creation, and opera Confessions, Journal Cikados, 2018
Opera 'Confessions' interview, Literatura ir Menas, 2017
Lietuvos zinios, by Gintare Ciuladaite, interview/review
Rasa Murauskaite about Opera and live in a way of workshop, 7 Meno Dienos, 2015
Rasa Murauskaite, about Opera in the Dark, Radikaliai, 2015
NOA, Paulina Nalivailaite and Rasa Murauskaite, about operas at NOA, MIC, 2015
TV programme, on LRT Theatre (Lithuanian TV), about and during NOA 2015 festival
Resonance FM, Soundhub April 26, 2015 - Robert Szymanek and me discussing the uniqueness of voice
Asta Pakarklyte. New [Re-]Generation of Lithuanian Contemporary Music.
BBC Radio 3 interview about Baltic Dunes for flute orchestra as part of Adopt a Composer Scheme by Making Music.
Reviews
Karolina Rimskyte, Gaidos festivalio kulminacijoje - pasaulio scenu verta premjera (on premierre of my work Chrysalis for symphony orhcestra and percussion), Lietuvos Rytas, 2018
About 'Ashraga' for symphony orchestra, Moteris, 2014
The Music Nail of the Year Awards 2015 short review at lrytas.lt
Review after NOA festival - Confessions, Plan B, Skyle, 2015, Lietuvos Rytas
'Confessions', 'Plan B' and other operas at NOA festival 2015, at Literatura ir Menas
'The Most Excellent and Lamentable Plan B' review after first premierre, 2013, at alfa.lt
Interpretations in the theme of Opera - review after NOA 2015 festival, at 7md.lt
Lithuanian TV3 reviews, various
About 'Ashraga' for symphony orchestra, Moteris, 2014
The Music Nail of the Year Awards 2015 short review at lrytas.lt
Review after NOA festival - Confessions, Plan B, Skyle, 2015, Lietuvos Rytas
'Confessions', 'Plan B' and other operas at NOA festival 2015, at Literatura ir Menas
'The Most Excellent and Lamentable Plan B' review after first premierre, 2013, at alfa.lt
Interpretations in the theme of Opera - review after NOA 2015 festival, at 7md.lt
Lithuanian TV3 reviews, various