Amelia Clarkson

Northern Irish composer Amelia Clarkson's music moves between stage and concert hall. Praised for its “inherent elusiveness… beautifully captured” (Het Parool), she weaves folk colours with contemporary textures to explore social issues through the lenses of nature, literature and mythology.

In the past year, Amelia's has composed new orchestral works for the for the National Symphony Orchestra of Ireland, BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra and most recently 'The Rain Keeps Coming' for the Ulster Orchestra, making history as the orchestra's youngest commissioned female composer.  Other highlights include music for Hard Rain SoloistEnsemble, Crash Ensemble, the Royal Air Force, Opera Holland Park and soloists Oliver Wass, Alison Langer and Lana Bode.

Dance forms a large portion of Amelia’s practice. In 2023, she co-founded Six Dance Collective with choreographer Ruaidhrí Maguire, composing all its music to-date including Belfast’s first ballet, White Doves (The MAC, 2023) and The View from Mars (2025) which brought local dance back to The Lyric. Internationally, Amelia was commissioned by the Dutch National Ballet to compose Ephemeral for the Junior Company’s 10 the anniversary national tour in 2024.

She is represented by CMC Ireland as an Associate Composer and is a Music Patron Composer, which reimagines music patronage for the 21st century. Her practice has been supported by the Arts Council of Northern Ireland and PRS, Vaughan Williams and Hinrichsen Foundations.

Amelia's doctoral research is focussed on exploring the re-orientation of her creative practice through composing new music for dance and movement, spanning ballet and contemporary dance.

Her PhD at the RNCM is supported as the 2022 Mendelssohn Scholar, with additional support from the college.