Martin Fröst - About

The most important aspect of this unique award is that it offers me, as a performer, the freedom to invest a very generous sum of money into my career in ways that I find most creative and constructive. With the support, the know-how and the contacts of BBT’s Artistic Committee, it will be possible for me to use my award to achieve some of the high artistic goals I have set for myself. I am very grateful and excited about the possibilities that lie ahead!

One of a small handful of truly international wind players, Swedish clarinettist Martin Fröst was among the very first artists to receive a BBT Award. He is renowned for his multi-media projects as both a performer and conductor and for his charismatic and energetic stage presence. His repertoire encompasses mainstream clarinet works as well as a number of contemporary pieces that he has either commissioned or personally championed.

Martin’s BBT award gave him the opportunity to make a film of his unique performance as the soloist and dedicatee of Anders Hillborg’s Clarinet Concerto Peacock Tales, in which he combines his role of musician with that of dancer and mime artist. For a young musician, commissioning a major new concerto with the bulk of his BBT award fund may have been a leap of faith, but an impeccably judged one in the masterful hands of Finnish composer Kalevi Aho. BBT captured on film these two distinctive characters at the very start of their musical journey to create a new work which premiered in London in 2006 and was released by BIS Records the following year, establishing a valuable legacy for future generations.

In its first decade BBT undertook several international tours and Martin participated in two of them, both led by Mitsuko Uchida. The first, in 2004, featured concerts at Concertgebouw Amsterdam, Konzerthaus Vienna and Queen Elizabeth Hall London, and four years later they toured in the US (Kalamazoo, Philadelphia and New York) and Europe (Perugia, Amsterdam and London). And Martin wholeheartedly joined in with BBT’s 10th anniversary celebrations, appearing in chamber recitals, giving a public masterclass and leading a rousing klezmer set at one of the late night ‘Out of the Box’ events.

Martin was supported with a BBT Award between 2003 and 2006.

For a current biography please visit martinfrost.se or harrisonparrott.com

Press Release: Aho Premiere

Read a blog by Martin Fröst, On tour with BBT, here

Photographs by Mats Bäcker / Sony Music Entertainment