de la Cour, Adam

Adam de la Cour (b. 1979) is a British composer, performer, and filmmaker. He studied composition at the University of Southampton with the composer Michael Finnissy.

His work frequently incorporates absurdism, satire, and dark humour, and spans a range of forms including short film, video, concert music, studio recordings, radio plays, music with film, and installation.

De la Cour’s music draws from a broad palette of genres—experimental, free improvisation, contemporary classical, jazz, and heavy metal—and often employs novel approaches to musical transcription, including reworkings of his own material. His music has been performed internationally at festivals such as MATA Festival, Bergen International Festival, Melbourne Festival, Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival, and London Contemporary Music Festival. It has been broadcast on BBC Radio 6 Music, BBC Radio 3, NTS Radio, ABC Classic FM (Australia), and Resonance FM. His music is published by Verlag Neue Musik (Berlin).

He is the creator of BBC Radio 3’s first-ever commissioned Christmas pantomime, Oh, Bobby!, which was performed as a live radio play at BBC Maida Vale Studios in 2023.

As a filmmaker, he has produced multiple short films for Cartoon Network’s Adult Swim (Warner Bros. Discovery), including Puzzl (2018), Dentata Solutions (2019), and In-House, which featured in Adult Swim Smalls: Volume Five – Year in Review (2021).

He has collaborated with a range of creative practitioners, including Scottish artist Bruce McLean and composer Michael Finnissy. His two-part piano and film work Hammerklavier, created with Finnissy, marks the latter’s first direct collaboration with a filmmaker on an original composition.

He is also a co-founder of the artist cooperative and net-label squib-box, established alongside composers Neil Luck and Federico Reuben.