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Michael Chant | |
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Michaels present cultural preoccupations centre around the necessity to create modern music and other forms of culture which will assist in opening the door to progress. more...  Yorkshire Dances |
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Biographical NotesMichael Chant was born in 1945 near Wakefield, Yorkshire.He studied the organ with Dr P. G. Saunders in Wakefield, then with John Webster of Oxford while at university in Reading. Subsequent study included a period with Fernando Germani in Siena. While taking a degree in mathematics, he was also involved in the Reading New Music Group and won the university organ playing prize in his final year. Michael came to London in 1968, meeting Cornelius Cardew and remaining close friends with him until his untimely death. He was an active composer and performer with the Scratch Orchestra and subsequently worked alongside Cardew in many political activities. He succeeded Cardew as Secretary of the People's Democratic Front (PDF) and was involved in the Second International Sports and Cultural Festival of 1982 in Coventry, which PDF hosted, in that capacity. He was a member of the organising committee for the Memorial Concert for Cornelius Cardew, and has been a member of the jury of the Cornelius Cardew Composition Prize for many years. While never ceasing to compose and perform, he has worked as a typesetter for the past 20 years, in which sphere he has also been active as a trade unionist. He was arrested on a number of occasions in the 1970s in connection with his political and anti-fascist activities. continue... |
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Several of Michael Chant's more recent compositions have been performed at the British Music Information Centre. Other works, such as a piano duet, Ten Years, which was performed at the rally to celebrate the 10th anniversary of the Revolutionary Communist Party of Britain (Marxist-Leninist) - RCPB(ML), have been written for more political occasions. As a performer, he has also continued to play at political events. Of interest is that in 1983, he was the first pianist to perform an Albanian composition in this country at the time when socialism was being built there. His present cultural preoccupations centre around the necessity to create modern music and other forms of culture which will assist in opening the door to progress. In this sphere of work, he is involved with the Progressive Cultural Association/Canadian Cultural Workers' Committee collective (PCA/CWC), and recognises the profound importance of the ideas of Hardial Bains, who was National Leader of the Communist Party of Canada (Marxist-Leninist) until his early death from cancer in 1997. Hardial Bains was closely associated with the joint work of the PCA/CCWC. In the political sphere, Michael Chant is active with RCPB(ML). |
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