Nieder, Fabio

Fabio Nieder is composer, pianist, conductor and professor for composition. He was born in 1957 in Trieste and is a German citizen.

Precocious talent, he studied at the Trieste Music Conservatory. He studied composition, piano and chamber music with Giulio Viozzi, Roberto Repini, Dario De Rosa and Libero Lana (Trieste Trio) respectively, and then specialized in composition with Witold Lutoslawski, Klaus Huber, and Yannis Xenakis.

A musician who grew up in the Middle European culture, he developed a special relation with the German Lied; as an assistant pianist he worked several times with Elisabeth Schwarzkopf and Petre Munteanu, cooperating steadily with several lieder singers such as Alfredo Kraus, Petre Munteanu, Barbara Hannigan and many others.

Founder of the Ensemble for New Music "Florestan-Eusebius", which he also conducted and for which he played the piano, he made its debut in 1983 at the "Musikprotokoll" festival in Graz. As conductor he worked with very important groups dedicated to contemporary music, including "Ensemble Mosaik" and above all his cooperation with the "Nieuw Ensemble" in Amsterdam, which also played many of his works.

His meeting with Luciano Berio, in 1997 in Salzburg, led to an incredible human and artistic relation which then grew into a deep and sincere friendship.

Fabio Nieder taught composition at the Amsterdam Conservatory (CvA) for 9 years and is professor of composition at the Trieste Conservatory "G. Tartini".As a guest lecturer, he taught at several European Academies (Stuttgart, Tallin, Riga, Graz, Salzburger Mozarteum, Harvard University in Boston, Scuola Civica in Milano, Akademija za glasbo, Ljubljana etc.). Additionally he held master classes at "Acanthes" in Metz, at the "Bartók Seminar and Festival" in Szombathely, Hungary and at the "Fondazione Spinola-Banna per l´arte", Italy.

He composes pieces for important ensembles and orchestras including the Klangforum Wien, oenm, Ensemble Recherche, Musikfabrik, Ensemble Mosaik, Musical Nova Leipzig, Nieuw Ensemble, Atlas Ensemble, Ives Ensemble (Netherlands), Orchestra Nazionale della RAI (Italy), Orchestra nazionale di S. Cecilia in Rome, WDR, SWR, SR (Germany) etc.

Some of the most important interpreters of his music include important musicians such as Heinrich Schiff, the Neue Vocalsolisten Stuttgart, Barbara Hannigan, Sarah Maria Sun, Steffen Schleiermacher, Marino Formenti, Teodoro Anzellotti, Eduard Brunner, Ed Spanjaard, Emilio Pomarico, Myung-Whun Chung, Antonio Pappano, Johannes Kalitzke, Rupert Huber, Arturo Tamayo, Tito Ceccherini etc.

His works are present in the main festivals and musical institutions, including the Berliner Festwochen, the Wittener Tage für neue Kammermusik, Musik der Jahrhunderte (Stuttgart), Musik im 21. Jahrhundert (Saarbrücken), Eclat, Wien Modern, Musikprotokoll (Graz), Holland Festival , Output-Festival (Amsterdam), Huddersfield Festival (UK), La Biennale in Venedig, Milano Musica, Nuova Consonanza (Rome), Festival Présences (Paris), Berliner Philharmonie, Gewandhaus Leipzig, Theaterhaus Stuttgart, Tonhalle Zürich, Wiener Konzerthaus, Concertgebouw Amsterdam, Muziekgebouw aan 't IJ Amsterdam, Teatro alla Scala (Milan), Teatro La Fenice (Venice) etc.

In 2013 he was awarded the "Feltrinelli Award dell‘Accademia dei Lincei" for his life‘s work in Rome. This award is the most important in Italy and one of the most generous in the world. In 2023, Fabio Nieder won the GEMA German Music Author Prize in the category Composition for Orchestra. The prize was presented to him in Berlin at the Hotel Carlton-Ritz as part of a major awards ceremony.

His music has been published by the following music publishers: Verlag Neue Musik Berlin, Ricordi Milan, Universal Edition Vienna, Casa musicale Sonzogno di Piero Ostali, Milan.