Composer, cellist, cabaret artist, educator, mentor and presenter, the increasingly un-categorisable Zoë Martlew travels the world as solo performer and with some of the world’s most renowned contemporary music ensembles, chamber groups, improvisation, film, electronica, multi-media, pop, rock, dance and theatre companies.

As composer/performer, Zoë collaborated with New York City Ballet dancer/choreographer Antonia Franceschi and projects for Ballet Black/Royal Opera House, POP8, Soho Theatre London, 92Y New York (“Electrifying” – KQED – USA) ; working with Laurence Olivier award winning director Toby Sedgwick on her celebrated one-woman show Revue Z (“…set a pace that nearly set the floor on fire.” Independent on Sunday. “Unmissable” Seen & Heard) which she has played at venues worldwide.

Now increasingly in demand as a composer, commissions include works for Birmingham Contemporary Music Group (“gleefully tawdry, fabulous” 5:4); CoMA; pianist Rolf Hind/mezzo Lore Lixenberg and ensemble/St John’s Smith Square; song cycle Cheltenham Festival/Lucy Schaufer and Huw Watkins (“dazzling” Classical Music Magazine; “nuanced, layered vignettes, expertly rendered” Music Opinion); string trio Völuspá Tanglewood Festival (“music that rises to a plangent emotional peak” – Wall St Journal); Spitalfields Festival Bach Reworkd; Riot Ensemble/Wigmore Hall; clarinet and electronics piece for Mark Simpson/Kings Place, and a heavy metal number for David Bruce’s celebrated YouTube channel.

Upcoming commissions include works for Onyx Brass Ensemble (NMC label); Heloise Werner and ensemble/ Wigmore Hall (Delphinium records); song cycle Holland Park Opera; Timothy Gill and David Gomper (cello/piano, Atlanta records), percussion concerto/ Riot Ensemble; and Britten Oboe Quartet. Her music is released on NonClassical and October House Records.

Zoë studied at the Royal College and Royal Academy of Music in London, Chopin Academy of Music in Warsaw and Clare College, Cambridge University. 

www.zoemartlew.com