William Marsey is a UK based composer. His music has been described as vivid, somewhat unsettling, and very attractive and rewarding. It has been commissioned and performed internationally, including commissions from LA Phil and BBC Arts, with performances by ensembles including The Hallé and Royal Northern Sinfonia.

His music has been performed and exhibited across the UK, the USA, Canada, and Europe. He was nominated for a British Composer Award in 2018 and an Ivor Novello Composers Award in 2023. Collaborators include players such as Lars Vogt, Liam Byrne, Huw Watkins, and Lawrence Power, and conductors Oliver Knussen and Thomas Adès.

Work includes projects with choreographers, photographers, and film makers. Notable collaborations include Hofesh Shechter Company, Torbjørn Rødland, and an immersive audio play and exhibition with Josie Spencer and Polly Wiseman. Recent work includes a binaural audio and video project with Antonia Luxem and Shadwell Opera, and music for a work by Anna Ridler shown in Times Square, New York.

Recordings appear on the composer’s own albums, on the debut disc of the Solem Quartet, and in Oliver Zeffman’s Music x Museums series. The most recent release is Removal and Other Powers, a song on Delphian Records, October 2023.

Born in Hartlepool, County Durham, Marsey studied composition with Giles Swayne at the University of Cambridge, with Gary Carpenter and Edmund Finnis at the Royal Academy of Music, and with Laurence Crane and Richard Baker at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama.

Photos by Matthew Johnson