About

A GAME-CHANGER IN THE WORLD OF MUSIC, ARTS & CULTURE (The Guardian)

The multi-award-winning composer, Shirley J. Thompson, is known globally for her distinct musical language and pioneering innovations in classical music (The Guardian, November 2018 and 2023). She was one of 12 British composers personally commissioned by His Majesty King Charles III to compose choral and orchestral music for The Coronation on 6 May 2023 gaining a prominent place in a 900-year legacy of iconic, world-leading composers from Tomas Tallis to the symphonic composer, Ralph Vaughan Williams, who are all known as ‘Coronation Composers.’ The music of Thompson is performed worldwide and has been claimed as ‘the present and future’ of British classical music by The Gramophone, the definitive publication on classical music. Thompson has consistently demonstrated in her work a belief in the transformative power of music to affect social, cultural, and political change with her mesmerising and inclusive, compelling musical artistry.

She is considered to be the first women to compose and conduct orchestral music for a major BBC drama series in the iconic Lime Street studios, South of the Border (1988), and previously to this she is considered  to be the first composer of African and Caribbean heritage to have a BBC TV documentary feature on her work as a young composer (1985). The programme  attracted millions of viewers in the UK and immediately became a catalyst for many young people seeing the possibilities of themselves becoming accomplished classical musicians.  As well as her distinctions as a composer, she is thought to be the first University Professor of Caribbean and African heritage in Europe.

Often described as a visionary artist and cultural activist, Shirley J. Thompson is renowned for resurrecting what were considered archaic classical forms, such as the symphony and opera, by making them relevant to 20th century and latterly 21^st century audiences. From 1980, she has employed the medium of classical music to spotlight issues of social justice and ‘hidden histories’, a practice that has been adopted by many today, but was not considered appropriate to contemporary classical music practitioners and audiences in the 1980s when she courageously voiced these submerged issues. Several of her historical works, such as Mighty Mandela, Visions (Caribbean self-determination as asserted by Maurice Bishop of Grenada) and Women of the Windrush (that she transformed into an operatic work from her award-winning, 1991 film), have hugely re-vitalised the classical music landscape. The works of this trail-blaizing composer are performed and screened worldwide and often described as ‘superbe’ (Le Figaro) as well as ‘powerful and striking’ (BBC Radio 3).

Thompson is a highly versatile and prolific composer with innumerable works for orchestra, the operatic stage, TV, film, theatre and choirs. She boldly set up her own orchestral ensemble in 1994, The Shirley Thompson Ensemble, performing a range of instrumental/vocal/dance and multi-media works in multiple musical styles including contemporary classical, world, Township, hip hop, neo-soul and reggae. 

Thompson is considered the first woman in Europe to have composed and conducted a symphony in the last 40 years (Classic FM Magazine). The work, New Nation Rising: A 21st Century London Symphony (2002) is a highly innovative and epic musical story celebrating London’s thousand-year history, and one in which the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra is accompanied by two choirs, solo singers, a rapper and dhol drummers, a total of nearly 200 performers in the recording of it. It is possible that the RPO was the first a major orchestra to perform a hip hop symphonic movement! This extraordinary work was originally commissioned to celebrate Her Majesty the Queen’s Golden Jubilee in 2002 and the concept was latterly assumed as the framework for the 2012 Olympics Opening Ceremony.

The music of composer Shirley J. Thompson is performed and screened worldwide and often described as “beautiful and powerful” (Le Figaro). Thompson co-scored the Sadler’s Wells ballet, PUSH, that toured to over 40 of the world’s major opera houses, including The Marinsky Theatre, La Scala (Milan) and Sydney Opera House.

Her ground-breaking opera series, Heroines of Opera started in 2006 and continuing to wow audiences in 2024, encapsulates epic narratives of iconic women in history and especially those of African and Caribbean heritage. Through this series, Thompson has dynamically created exciting new roles for extraordinary performers as well as revolutionising the traditional passive, femme fatale portrayal of women in the operatic canon. 

Music by Shirley J. Thompson has been commissioned for several other royal engagements since the 1990s, including music for Commonwealth Day at Westminster Abbey in 1999; with her ensemble again for HM Queen Elizabeth’s summer party at Buckingham Palace in 2001; and launching the newly built Stratford Cultural Quarter with the London Gala Orchestra performing the Newham Symphony with Prince Edward and Countess Sophie of Wessex in attendance.

In Thompson’s role as a University Professor and scholar she researched and excavated the work of  composers such as Florence B. Price;  William Grant Still and many other composers of African descent from Henry VII’s court to the present day. Thompson created a historical timeline of such composers from 1494 – 1940 for the BBC website. She also wrote the script for the BBC documentary, Hidden Histories of Music, broadcast in 2021. Florence B. Price is now frequently heard on radio broadcasts and in concerts but this was certainly not the case before Thompson pitched her work to BBC Radio 3 executives in 2014 as being an outstanding historical female composer that deserved to be recognised. The rest is history…

Thompson has collaborated with several other orchestras, ensembles and soloists including:  the Philharmonia; the BBC Concert Orchestra; the BBC Singers; Chineke!; the Southbank Sinfonia; New Music Players; the Wren Orchestra; the London Gala Orchestra; the African American Chamber Orchestra; the COM String Orchestra; HER Ensemble; Orpheus Sinfonia; the Coronation Orchestra; the Hannover State Theatre Opera Orchestra; the Lynn Conservatory Orchestra; the Davidson College Orchestra, Nairobi Women’s Symphony Orchestra, the Gordonstoun School Orchestra, and several amateur orchestras.

Shirley J. Thompson has served for over 30 years on several national arts institutions, including the London Arts Board, the Arts Council of Great Britain, the Newham Council Cultural Forum, Hon MP Bernie Grant’s Parliamentary Group for Cultural Diversity in Music, Sound & Music, English National Ballet, the RCM Council and many more.  She was the first female executive of the Association of Professional Composers which is now the highly revered Ivors Academy.  She has been named in the Evening Standard’s ‘Power List of Britain’s Top 100 Most Influential People of African and Caribbean Heritage, every year since 2010 – 2024.