'Exquisite [...] beautifully realised', 'Beautiful tremolo, beautiful piece'- Adam Walton, BBC Introducing Wales on Tremolo Study 4
ABOUT DAVID
David John Roche’s music is direct, determined, and loud. Strongly influenced by heavy metal, lush orchestral music, and his working-class Welsh background, he has been marked out as a “clear-minded and class-conscious artist” (Culture Matters) and “one of the most energetic, driven, and successful of Wales’s millennial generation of composers” (Tŷ Cerdd). David’s work has been described as “a glorious confusion of rock and film music […] irresistible” (Stephen Walsh, The Arts Desk), “exquisite” (Adam Walton, BBC Introducing Wales), praised for its “ingenious scoring” (Bernard Hughes, The Arts Desk), and commended for “bravely” using “unusually specific melodic material in an excitingly direct way, with passages of intense expressive power” (Thomas Adès). His compositions have been broadcast, televised, and written about internationally to millions of people. He has been nominated for over 50 academic and professional awards.
A string of international performances and commissions form the backbone of David’s work: BBC National Orchestra of Wales, Tokyo Philharmonic Orchestra, La Filharmonie, Zhejiang Symphony Orchestra, Brazilian National Orchestra, Tanglewood Music Center, Psappha Ensemble, Tredegar Town Band, Royal Observatory Greenwich, The National Library of Wales, and stacks more.
In 2024, David’s first symphony EVERYTHING YOU EVER WANTED (AND MORE) was commissioned by Tŷ Cerdd, Arts Council Wales, and Aberystwyth University - premiering to sold-out audiences, and his second – LOVE IS EVERYTHING - was commissioned by County Hall Arts (where it was also nominated for the €100,000 Symphony Fufu Prize). The same year, Sinfonia Cymru and Britten Sinfonia co-commissioned and toured his Chorus in Alto - a hybrid classical/electric guitar concerto for Grammy-nominated Sean Shibe, receiving performances and coverage on BBC Radio 3 In Concert, BBC Radio Wales Arts Show, BBC Radio 3, and BBC Radio Cymru. Theatr Soar (with support for the National Lottery Heritage Foundation and Tŷ Cerdd) commissioned, filmed, and recorded a new 30-minute work for metal band and heritage organ (premiered by the composer, metal band De’Lour, and organist Georoge Herbert), and – as Composer-in-Residence with CoMA London – David wrote and performed his electric guitar concerto THE CURSE OF THE BEDROOM GUITARIST. David's arrangement of John Metcalf's Calm was broadcast on 3 different different BBC Radio stations, his own Waves of Love being part of the BBC's Digital Concert Series.
In 2025 David has had the awesome privilege of completing a dreamy spread of newly-commissioned works; a new arrangement of Beethoven's Violin Concerto, toured by Sinfonia Cymru and Hyeyoon Park; a new work for antiphonal brass band and orchestra for Britten Sinfonia with Thundersley Brass Band, Soham Comrades Brass Band, and Stamford Brass Band - toured to 3 filled-to-capacity English Cathedrals; a new commission from the International Guitar Foundation for Wales Guitar Duo; a new guitar quartet for National Youth Guitar Ensemble; a song cycle for Jeremy Huw Williams (commissioned on receipt of the Paul Mealor Composition Award); and 3 US performances by NYC Brass Ensemble, Philadelphia Wind Quintet, and as part of the International Society of Double Basses.
He is currently completing a string of exciting newly-commissioned works for performance in 2025/2026 (including a new orchestral composition), preparing a talk for the UK Department for Education on what it means to be a working-class composer, and bracing for a boat load of fresh releases through partnered labels and publishers.