REBECCA DALE BECOMES THE FIRST FEMALE COMPOSER TO SIGN TO DECCA CLASSICS AND THE FIRST WOMAN TO SIGN TO DECCA PUBLISHING

Photo: Carsten Windhorst

DALE’S FIRST FULL-LENGTH ALBUM FOR DECCA CLASSICS, REQUIEM, WILL BE RELEASED LATER THIS YEAR

16 May 2018 (Toronto, ON) - Young British composer Rebecca Dale has signed an exclusive recording deal with Decca Classics, becoming the first female composer ever to join the label. She has simultaneously signed to Decca Publishing as the first woman to join its growing roster.

Dale’s first recording for the label will be her brand-new album, Requiem, written in memory of her mother. It will feature two star soloists – soprano Louise Alder and tenor Trystan Griffiths – and will be released later this year.

Rebecca Dale comments: “I’m so honoured to be signing to Decca Classics and Decca Publishing, and humbled to be the first female composer to do so. It’s a huge moment for me, and I can't wait to share my new music with everyone in the months to come.”

Dr. Alexander Buhr, Managing Director of Decca Classics, said: “We are delighted to have Rebecca join the label. She is a force of creativity and has developed a style that is incredibly captivating and very personal to her. We are delighted to bring her beautiful scores to life on record.”

Natasha Baldwin, Head of Decca Publishing, adds: “Rebecca is a hugely talented young composer with an amazing ability to write in quite divergent environments – live, recorded, film, TV. We are thrilled to bring her into the growing Decca Publishing family and to help her amplify a very exciting career ahead.”

Born in 1985, Rebecca started composing from a very young age, completing her first full musical at the age of 10 and piano concerto at 15. She studied at Oxford University (New College) and the National Film and Television School. Her work first came to public attention when BBC Radio 3 premiered her choral symphony When Music Sounds in 2014. The following year she enjoyed success with I’ll Sing and in 2016 her orchestral work Soay was featured on the chart-topping Decca album, The Lost Songs of St Kilda. Dale’s track, “Winter”, commissioned by vocal group Voces8 for their album of the same name, was described by Gramophone Magazine as a “masterpiece” and Classic FM described Dale as “a household name in years to come”.

A fellow of the famous Sundance Composers Lab and alumna of the ASCAP Film Scoring Workshop in Hollywood, Dale writes extensively for film and TV. She has worked on a variety of big screen projects including Mandela: Long Walk To Freedom, director Stephen Frears’ The Program, action film The Take starring Idris Elba, and Disney’s Queen of Katwe, while her score to Crossing The Line was nominated for Best Original Music In Feature Film at the 2017 international Music+Sound Awards. Most recently, she contributed to BBC One’s three-part adaption of Little Women, starring Angela Lansbury, Michael Gambon, and Emily Watson.

As a concert composer, Dale has written for numerous artists and ensembles including the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic, the Scottish Festival Orchestra, and the London Mozart Players. She is a fellow of the prestigious Macdowell Colony in New Hampshire (alumni include Leonard Bernstein and Aaron Copland), and has been an associate composer with the London Symphony Orchestra on its Soundhub programme. Dale has recently been commissioned by Canterbury Cathedral Girls' Choir and is 2017-18 Composer in Residence for the London Oriana Choir as part of its five15 project.

With so many exciting opportunities ahead, Rebecca Dale is positioned at the forefront of a new generation of composers, and her partnership with Decca Classics and Decca Publishing promises to give her a new platform to develop in her remarkable career.

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