Kerry Andrew is a London-based composer, performer, writer and educator. She has a PhD in Composition from the University of York and has won three British Composer Awards. As a composer, she specialises in experimental vocal and choral music, music-theatre and community music. Her debut novel will be published by Jonathan Cape in January 2018.
She was Handel House Composer In Residence 2010-12 and was Visiting Professor at Leeds College of Music 2015-16. Her works have included a large-scale piece for 600 young people in the Royal Albert Hall’s Schools Prom; a vocal/body percussion work for the massed National Youth Choirs of Great Britain at the Royal Albert Hall; a concept drawing and vocal EP for Art on the Underground; a chamber community opera for Wigmore Hall; a wild swimming opera for the Tete a Tete Festival; a work simultaneously performed by 25 community ensembles around the UK for the Landmark Trust; a piece for the London Sinfonietta to fight for the NHS (including the recorded voices of 60 members of the public, and featuring actor/campaigner Michael Sheen); and a work for the national commemoration service one year on from commemorate the 7/7/05 London bombings. Her piece ‘No Place Like’ is part of 2017/18’s BBC Ten Pieces scheme and premiered at the BBC Proms.
She was a British Council/PRS for Music Foundation Musician in Residence in China, spending five weeks in the Henan Province in 2016. She made collaborative new rock/traditional-inspired songs based on foxes in folklore.
She performs with the award-winning experimental post-a cappella trio juice vocal ensemble, who have released two albums on the Nonclassical label. She also performs as alt-folk soloist You Are Wolf and is a multi-instrumentalist with DOLLYman. She has written for the Guardian, writes libretti and made her short story debut on BBC Radio 4 in 2014. Her debut novel Swansong will be published by Jonathan Cape in January 2018.