Branka Popović (1977, Belgrade) graduated in composition and musicologyfrom the Faculty of Music in Belgrade (the class of Zoran Erić). She completed graduate studies of composition in London at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama in the class of Judith Bingham. She remained at the same schools as Composition Fellow as part of the Student Fellowship program. She is currently a doctoral student of composition at the Faculty of Music, the class of Zoran Erić.

She won the First Prize for her trio Dream (I. S. o. F) at the Summer Musical Academy in Budapest in the class of Gyula Fekete, and was the finalist of the competitions Royal Philharmonic Society Prize 2005 (London), Canterbury Festival Commission 2005 (London), Tracey Chadwell Memorial Prize 2005 (with her piece Song “without” words). She was also part of the project of the pianist Stephen Gutman What Strikes the Clocke? within Sir Harrison Birtwistle Festival 2004 (London, Southbank Centre); participated at the Park Lane Group Young Composers’ Symposium (London, 2006), and her composition for mixed choir Lorem ipsum was performed by The BBC Singers during the workshop dedicated to new choral music. Her compositions were performed at the International Review of Composers in 2002 and 2004, Birtwistle Festival (London, 2004) and Yamaha Competition of Brass Quintets (Glasgow 2005), at the celebration of the 125th anniversary of Guildhall School (London 2005), and at other concerts in Belgrade and England.

behind the closed doors, for violin and piano;

The composition consists of six sections based on the same motif. The sections are extremely compressed so as to produce the effect of being mere fragments of a larger whole that cannot be seen in its entirety. The inspiration was Sartre’s vision of the problem of existence; various forms of tensions are examined.

song “without” words for soprano and piano

The song is based on Quantum poem No. 64 – 67 by the Japanese poet Shigeru Matsui.

…ichi ni san ichi ni san ichi ni ichi ichi ni san ichi ichi ni san san ni san ni …

It consists of three words which in Japanese mean 1, 2, 3 and can be read in any other language. The aim of the author was to emphasize the specific quality of poetry, namely the art of combining words so as to produce certain rhythmic patterns. Seemingly boundless possibilities for variation in combining the three words enable the author to play around with the conventions of poetry by concentrating on the form while ignoring the content. Having this in mind, as well as the romantic heritage wherein a poem was a kind of personal confession, I have tried to create music which would be expressive, while its content remains abstract.