Born 2 November 1948 in Minsk into a family of opera singers, Dmitri Nikolaevich Smirnov entered the Moscow Conservatoire in 1967. Here he studied composition with Nikolai Sidelnikov, orchestration with Edison Denisov, and analysis with Yuri Kholopov. He also studied with Webern's pupil Philip Herschkowitz. In August 1972 he married the composer Elena Firsova. They have two children, Philip (b.1985) and Alissa (b.1986).

Dmitri N. Smirnov has lived and worked in Britain since 1991. He is a composer of international renown, a teacher of composition and an acknowledged authority on the many aspects of contemporary music. Over the years, he has composed symphonic and chamber music, operas and vocal cycles, as well as incidental music for film and theatre. His operas were staged in Germany and Britain, his symphony works has been played by international conductors, including Martin Brabbins, Dennis Russell Davies, Peter E?tv?s, Oliver Knussen, Alexander Lazarev, Reinbert de Leeuw, Gennadi Rozhdestvenski, Gunther Schuller, Vassili Sinaiski, Yan Pascal Tortelier, etc. Smirnov's recent commissions have been from the London Symphony Orchestra, L'Orchestre de la Suisse Romande, Leeds Festival Chorus, Brodsky Quartet, Nash Ensemble, London Sinfonietta, The Nieuw Sinfonietta of Amsterdam, The Netherlands Blazer Ensemble, Karine Georgian and Mstislav Rostropovich. He and his wife Elena Firsova were among the founders of Russia's new Association for Contemporary Music, established in Moscow in 1990. At present, he holds a position of the Visiting Fellow at the Goldsmiths College, University of London. For years, he has been teaching Russian Music at Keel University, and delivered papers on this subject in Germany, USA, Canada and the UK. He published a series of articles about Shostakovich, Schnittke, Denisov and Gubaidulina. His book on Philip Herschkowitz A GEOMETER OF SOUND CRYSTALS (in English) was published in 2003 by Verlag Ernst Kuhn, Berlin.

His music is available through Publishers Boosey & Hawkes London, Hans Sikorski Hamburg, G.Schirmer New York, and Meladina Press, St Albans.


Bibliography: 1.Yuri Kholopov: Russians in England. In Valeria Tsenova (ed.) "Ex oriente" 2002, Verlag Kuhn, Berlin, 2002, pp. 207-265. 2.Gerard McBurney: Smirnov's Tiriel, Tempo, no.169 (1989), 612