Ričardas Kabelis

Ričardas Kabelis studied composition at the Lithuanian Academy of Music and Theatre in the class of Prof. Julius Juzeliūnas from 1977 to 1982. From 1983, he further deepened his knowledge through postgraduate studies and an internship at the same academy. In 1984, he founded the festival “Druskininkai Chamber Music Days” and directed it until 1990 (since 2000 known as “Druskomanija”). Between 1987 and 1990, he prepared and published the music journalism collection Jauna muzika (“Young Music”). In 1988, he earned a doctoral degree in the humanities for his theoretical study The Timbre Dynamics of 20th-Century Orchestral Works, and in 1989 he was awarded the Lithuanian National Prize for Culture and Arts.

In 1990, after moving to Germany, he became the first Lithuanian composer to lecture on the Lithuanian school of composition at the Darmstadt International Summer Courses for New Music, as well as at the universities of Tübingen, Zurich, and Vienna. Between 1991 and 1996, his works and research projects received awards and scholarships from the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD) and the Baden-Württemberg Foundation. In 1994–1995, he held residencies at the Akademie Schloss Solitude and the Center for Art and Media (ZKM) in Karlsruhe. From 1991 to 1994, he assisted Prof. Helmuth Lachenmann at the Stuttgart State Academy of Music and Performing Arts and also taught at the University of Stuttgart.

In 1993, his Invariations for string quartet won first prize at the international composition competition “Stille Musik” in Boswil (Switzerland). At the composer’s request, the work was performed in the finals at Boswil Cathedral by the Vilnius String Quartet. In 1994, the German contemporary music label td.records released his portrait CD—the first such release of a Lithuanian contemporary composer abroad. In 1997, premieres of the film Musica per camera, based on his five chamber works and produced at the Ludwigsburg Film Academy, took place in cinemas in Frankfurt, Mannheim, Stuttgart, Cologne, Leipzig, and Kassel.

Between 1994 and 1996, together with Indian programmer and composer Sekhar Rama, he developed the idea of spherical sound diffusion. His works implied artistic synergies: Jaunatis for male voices and percussion was performed at the unveiling ceremony of Israeli sculptor Micha Ullman’s ground sculpture New Moon (1996), and in the same year, fragments of the score of Mini-Duo were used by Japanese landscape architect Ayumi Han to decorate the vaults of an underground passage on the Nihonzaka national highway in Japan. From 1996 to 2004, his commissioned works were performed at contemporary music festivals such as Berlin’s MaerzMusik and Ultraschall, Stuttgart’s Eclat, OpenSolitude and Klangraum, Hamburg’s Klangfest and Novoflot, Rothenburg’s Tage für Neue Musik, and Baden-Baden’s JetztMusik.

In 2008, the premiere of his Asprom for virtual trombone took place at the ISCM World New Music Days in the Sound Cube installed by Lithuanian National Radio and Television (LRT). The work was named composition of the year at the Center for Art and Media in Karlsruhe. That same year, the Bergen International Festival New Nordic Highlights, dedicated to the works of Ričardas Kabelis, Lasse Thoresen, and Magnus Lindberg, featured the premiere of his commissioned work Long Now for Hardanger fiddle and string quartet.

Since 2008, Kabelis’s creative activity has again been developed in Lithuania. With support from the creative industries and European structural funds, he, together with younger colleagues Tadas Dailyda and Mantautas Krukauskas, implemented the project of establishing the Music Innovation Studies Centre at the Lithuanian Academy of Music and Theatre (2010–2013). The Spatial Sound Sphere conceived by him and installed at the centre—the first of its kind in Northeastern Europe—became a hallmark of the academy’s innovation. In 2013, the Sphere received the main prize at a European Commission exhibition of art technologies; in 2014, it was included in the Lithuanian Design Association’s catalogue of best works; and in 2016, it was named after Julius Juzeliūnas. Kabelis headed the Music Innovation Studies Centre until 2017.

At the “Sphere Premieres” festival (2015–2019), which he initiated, spatial premieres of works by Justė Janulytė, Osvaldas Balakauskas, Gintas Kraptavičius, Vykintas Baltakas, Rytis Mažulis, Mindaugas Urbaitis, and Ričardas Kabelis were presented. Since 2007, dozens of young composers studied in his composition class at the Lithuanian Academy of Music and Theatre, many of whom became recognized artists, including Tomas Kutavičius, Mykolas Natalevičius, Justina Repečkaitė, Raimonda Žiūkaitė, Goda Gužauskaitė, Jonas Jurkūnas, Agnė Matulevičiūtė, Matas Drukteinis, Agnė-Agnetė Mažulienė, and Kristupas Bubnelis. Seven of them obtained doctoral degrees in the arts at the academy.

In 2010, he conceived and initiated the National School Students’ Composition Competition “Mano nata,” chaired its jury until 2023, and since 2023 has served on its artistic board. More than twenty laureates and diploma recipients of the competition went on to study composition at the academy. Since 2010, Kabelis has been elected a member and vice-chair of the Lithuanian section of the International Society for Contemporary Music (ISCM), participated in Erasmus+ and Nordplus academic mobility programs, chaired doctoral defense committees in the arts, and served as an expert for Lithuanian and international music institutions.

In 2022, an album of works by his students was presented to the Lithuanian musical community. The same year, his work was discussed at the music theory conference “The 21st-Century Lithuanian School of Composition: Ričardas Kabelis and His Students.” From 2023 to 2025, he served as Head of the Composition Department at the Lithuanian Academy of Music and Theatre.

Performers of his works included conductors Romualdas Gražinis, Martynas Staškus, Vytautas Lukočius, Gintaras Rinkevičius, Robertas Šervenikas, Juozas Domarkas, Robert HP Platz (Germany), Vicente Larrañaga (Chile); flutist Manuel Zurria (Italy); oboists Robertas Beinaris and Peter Veale (Germany); trombonists Vytautas Pilibavičius and Mike Svoboda (Switzerland); percussionists Dominykas Snarskis, Saulius Auglys-Stanevičius, Arkadijus Gotesmanas, Katarzyna Myćka (Poland), Thomas Witzmann (Germany), Manos Tsangaris (Greece); violinists Ulrike Stortz (Germany), Mary Oliver (USA), Nils Økland (Norway); singers Giedrė Kaukaitė, Hanna Sturludottir (Iceland), Donatienne Michel-Dansac (France); pianists Sergejus Okruško, Motiejus and Mykolas Bazaras, Peter Hackert (Germany), Sven Thomas Kiebler (Germany); organist Bernhard Haas (Austria); cellist Anton Lukoszevieze (United Kingdom), among others.

Orchestras and ensembles performing his works included the Lithuanian National Symphony Orchestra, Lithuanian State Symphony Orchestra, SWR Symphony Orchestra (Germany), Hamburg and Baden-Baden Symphony Orchestras, Klaipėda Chamber Orchestra, choirs Aidija, Brevis, Jauna muzika, the Vilnius and Chordos string quartets, Open Harps (Austria), Engegård Quartet (Norway), ExVoco (Germany), Ensemble Modern (Germany), ConBrio (Germany), SurPlus (Germany), Ars Nova (Germany), Bugallo-Williams Piano Duo (USA), Neue Vokalsolisten (Germany), and Odeon Quartett (Switzerland).