Biography
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Finn Mattingly is a composer who “possesses an impressive combination of scholarship, humanity and passion that is inspiring and brings hope to the future of classical music” (Ryan Turner, music director, Newburyport Choral Society). From the North Shore of Boston, Massachusetts, he draws inspiration from across disciplines and genres, from the processes of decay in contemporary photography to the time-old hemiola patterns in American bluegrass and folk idioms to the sinusoidal patterns of tidal motion. He has worked with numerous performers and ensembles including àktapha Ensemble, Barcelona Modern, the Fidelio Trio, Peter Miyamoto, Tien-Hsin Cindy Wu, Bridget Kibbey, the Pro Musica Chamber Players, and the Aizuri and Julius Quartets, as well as fellow students in a variety of programs.​
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Finn's recent projects include Altitudes, a chamber work written for the Barcelona Modern's 10th International Composition Course; a piano trio for the Fidelio Trio; a solo viola work for Bengt Gilbert based on long exposure photography processes; and a sinfonietta showcase/recording of the works of emerging composers, which he simultaneously organized, wrote for, and curated.​In February of 2023, Finn was featured as the contemporary composer in an RCM Brass Ensemble concert celebrating the music of America, alongside the works of Copland, Gershwin, and Joplin. Additionally, Finn wrote “Sappho Fragments”, for Orchestra, exploring ways in which an audience's sense of temporality can be manipulated through careful repetition and slow development of material. The piece was read by the Brevard Music Center's orchestra, and was selected as a finalist in Brevard's 2022 orchestral composition competition.
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​Finn is currently finishing his degree at the Royal College of Music in London as a Humphrey Searle Scholar, studying with Kenneth Hesketh and Simon Holt. In the fall of 2023, he studied on an exchange at Det Kongeligium Danske Musikkonservatorium (the Royal Danish Academy of Music) for one term with Bent Sørensen and Marcela Lucatelli. In September of 2024, he will study with Zesses Seglias as part of àktapha Ensemble's International Composition Masterclass, and in the spring of 2024, he worked under the mentorship of Hèctor Parra and Daniel D'Adamo as an active participant in Barcelona Modern's International Composition Course, and has recently been selected for the Eötvös Foundation's Spotlight on Ramon Lazkano masterclass. Previously, he studied composition with Dr. Rodney Lister and electronic music with Aaron Smith at the New England Conservatory Preparatory School, where he won the Senior Award in Composition. He is a alumnus of the composition program at the New York Youth Symphony, where his piece for orchestral winds, brass, and percussion, Scintilla, was performed. Finn has attended numerous summer music festivals, including the inaugural Cascade Composers Workshop, Brevard Music Center, Atlantic Music Festival, the Curtis Institute of Music’s Young Artists Summer Program, and Boston Conservatory at Berklee’s High School Composition Intensive, through which he studied with professors and composers including David Ludwig, Pierre Jalbert, Martin Bresnick, Melinda Wagner, David Dzubay, Robert Aldridge, Eun Young Lee, and Reiko Fueting, among others.. He has attended masterclasses with Martin Bresnick, John Corigliano, Pamela Z, Mari Kimura, Nico Muhly, Jessie Montgomery, Molly Joyce, Chen Yi, Reena Esmail, Gabriela Lena Frank, John Mackey, and Kati Agócs.
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As a passionate educator, Finn is a composition teacher with Through the Staff, an organization providing one-to-one lessons to underprivileged students, and previously mentored students at the Youth Orchestra of St. Luke's. Beyond this, he served on the inaugural ABRSM Young Adults Advisory Board. He has run workshops for groups of all ages in the US, UK, and Denmark, and has significant experience with students in special education programs.
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Finn can be reached at finnian.mattingly@gmail.com.
