Joby Talbot is the only living composer to have written the music for three full-length ballets for The Royal Ballet in London. In this sixth episode of Composing Myself Wise Music CEO and Creative Director Dave Holley and Gill Graham catch up with the genre-bending maestro to talk about his “horrible” jobs before he became a composer (Night shift at the local mortuary! Laundry at a mental institution!), working with Nigel Godrich and their close professional bond, the key differences between composing for animations versus live action projects, the culinary genesis of the Like Water For Chocolate ballet score, and the upside-down sensibility of composing for choreography - “you’re trying to give a platform for the choreographer and the dancers to do their thing, without knowing what that thing is”. 

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Joby Talbot was born in London in 1971. He studied composition privately with Brian Elias and at Royal Holloway and Bedford New College, before completing a Master of Music (Composition) at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama under Simon Bainbridge.

Talbot's diverse catalogue includes full-length narrative ballets (Alice's Adventures in Wonderland , 2011; The Winter's Tale, 2014) and contemporary dance works (Chroma, 2007); small- and large-scale choral and vocal works (The Wishing Tree, 2002; Path of Miracles, 2005; A Sheen of Dew on Flowers, 2019); orchestral pieces (Sneaker Wave, 2004; Chacony in G Minor, 2011; Worlds, Stars, Systems, Infinity, 2012); concerti (Desolation Wilderness, 2006; Ink Dark Moon, 2018); and scores for the screen (The Lodger, 1999; The Dying Swan, 2002; Vampyr, 2018).

Talbot's critically acclaimed first opera, Everest, was given its premiere in 2015 by The Dallas Opera. His second opera based on the true story The Diving Bell and The Butterfly, a further collaboration with librettist Gene Sheer, premieres in November 2023. Like Water for Chocolate, Talbot's third narrative ballet with Christopher Wheeldon premiered in June 2022 at The Royal Ballet and will be presented by partner commissioner ABT, in March 2023 in Costa Mesa and at the Metropolitan Opera in New York in June 2023. 

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