Adrian Lee is a composer, music director and multi-instrumentalist whose work is suffused with his interest in the music of non-Western cultures. He has worked very extensively in theatre, notably as a music director of the Royal Shakespeare Company, as well as in film, television and radio. Nearly all his compositions feature unique combinations of Western and non-Western vocal and instrumental genres.
Adrian is well known as a facilitator and collaborator in multi-disciplinary and intercultural work. Instances of the latter include many successful creative ventures with artists from India, Indonesia, Japan, Malaysia, the Middle East, West Africa and Central and South America.
Having obtained the ARCM from London’s Royal College of Music, Adrian went on to obtain a Bmus (Hons) degree from the University of Birmingham and an MA in performance and research from the University of York. His instrumental skills include: plucked string instruments (guitar, mandola, ‘ud, sitar, banjo, harp); percussion (he has an extensive collection of instruments from the Middle and Far East and from West Africa); keyboards (piano and synthesizers); wind (wooden and bamboo flutes, whistles). He has performed with many of the major London-based music ensembles, opera and music-theatre companies, including London Sinfonietta, Royal Opera House, Opera Factory, Gemini and Endymion Ensemble. He has also performed with the English Gamelan Orchestra, Rhythm in Bronze Gamelan Ensemble (Malaysia), Maqaam (an Anglo-Egyptian sextet) and other ethnic ensembles.
In addition to composing extensively for the theatre, television and radio, Adrian has composed for dance (Starlings Kissing for London Contemporary Dance School, 1999) and music theatre. In collaboration with leading Malaysian composer Sunetra Fernando Adrian composed the first through-composed opera in the Malay language, Uda Dan Dara.
Adrian has his own fully equipped MIDI recording studio in London.
