{"id":766,"date":"2026-06-03T12:55:00","date_gmt":"2026-06-03T11:55:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/barrywebb.eu\/?page_id=766"},"modified":"2026-06-09T13:10:12","modified_gmt":"2026-06-09T12:10:12","slug":"composer-and-singer-songwriter","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/barrywebb.eu\/?page_id=766","title":{"rendered":"COMPOSER AND SINGER SONGWRITER"},"content":{"rendered":"

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COMPOSER AND SINGER SONGWRITER<\/span><\/h1>\n

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After the Applause<\/strong><\/span><\/h2>\n

I spent decades performing in some of the world\u2019s great musical institutions \u2014 Covent Garden, Bayreuth, La Scala, London Voices, Abbey Road \u2014 but the direction of my work changed after a difficult period in 2005, when I lost both my mother and brother within twenty\u2011four hours over Christmas. My voice fell silent for three years. I left the UK and found a kind of refuge in the Czech Republic, where I stayed in a former monastery house in Nepomuk with a lake at the bottom of the garden and a castle watching over it. That landscape, and the story of St John of Nepomuk himself, became a source of quiet strength.<\/span><\/p>\n

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The Beginning of Composing<\/strong><\/span><\/h2>\n

It was in Prague and Nepomuk that I began to compose. I purchased an old baby grand piano that seemed to sing back to me when I touched its keys, and I started writing small pieces \u2014 firstly not for performance, but simply to find my way back to music. I wrote the songs \u201cDa tanto d\u2019Amore\u201d and \u201cLook Up\u201d, then performed at the Frantiskovy Lazne Festival, Kamen Theatre\u00a0 and on Czech Radio broadcast from the Alpha Theatre Plzen. Those early works were part of a slow return to breath and expression. Water, nature, and music became steady companions, and they remain at the centre of what I do.<\/span><\/p>\n

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From those early songs I developed and wrote my opera Nepomuk that was performed in Liverpool in 2018 (me conducting) with an Arts Council of England grant. <\/span><\/p>\n

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