Mehran Rouhani Information

Mehran Rouhani was born in Tehran-Iran in 1946. His musical training began at the age of eight. Although he achieved BSc in Economics, his love for music drew him to Tehran University, College of Fine Arts for further studies in Music.

When graduated he entered the Royal College of Music in London where he studied Postgraduate, Mmus and Advanced Studies in Composition with Philip Cannon and Anthony Milner. Meanwhile he continued advanced composition lessons with the late Sir Michael Tippet.

After finishing his studies at the Royal College of Music in London he went back to Iran, where he held professorship position at the College of Fine Arts and Tehran Conservatory of Music for two years. As a consequence of the revolution in 1979 he had to establish his career at home, teaching Harmony, Counterpoint, History of Western Music, Composition and Piano, privately.

Throughout the years he wrote many pieces which include two String Quartets, Three Symphonic Poems (including “The Little Black Fish” and “Shomaal – The North”, One Ballet for Large Orchestra, Clarinet Concerto, Iranian Serenade for Classical Orchestra, Two pieces for String Orchestra, Trio Fantasy No.1 for Flute, Guitar and Cello, and Trio Fantasy No.2 for Flute, Clarinet and Piano, over twenty Piano works, many pieces for Chamber Ensembles, Songs and Choral works on Iranian poetry.

Mehran Rouhani’s music has been performed in different parts of the world.

He is married with two children and lives in London.

Since the year 2000 he moved to London in order to develop his career in composition. Although he maintained his role as a private music teacher in Iran, he continued composing new pieces.

For the first two years he only wrote five inventions based on J.S.Bach, and then came more pieces like “WedReng” on Iranian wedding dance and “Five Iranian Folk Songs” for Soprano, Alto and Piano accompaniment on a request of a friend, String Trio, and “The Same Old Tune”. Meanwhile Artists without Frontiers organized some concerts and recitals of his pieces which were performed by his son and his colleagues as both solo and chamber music in various UK venues such as Holywell music room in Oxford, Bush Hall in west London, Burgh House in Hampstead and Trinity College of Music where his son was studying.

In 2002 he carried out working on the rest of J.S.Bach’s inventions and finished the full composition of 15 different pieces based on Bach.

Between 2003 and 2005, he composed several new pieces for different ensembles, such as “Oriental” for Cello and Piano and “Elegiac Dance” for solo piano, 3rd Trio Fantasy for Flute, Violin and Piano and 2nd part of “The Same Old Tune”.

Meanwhile he had collaborations with some Iranian and non-Iranian musicians and ensembles, like Parsian String Ensemble who performed his Adagio and Fugue “Irani” in 2006 and before that with Ani String Quartet from Armenia who performed his first String Quartet in a Festival of Contemporary Iranian Composers held in 2005.

Since his move to London in year 2000 he has been in collaboration with various performers and conductors such as Wissam Boustany, Toby Purser, Peter Stark, Levon Parikian, Micallef-Inanga Piano Duo, Andy Meyers and Keith Stent who conducted “The Little Black Fish” with the Wandsworth Symphony Orchestra in June 2007.

Currently two of his pieces are to be performed by orchestras in the summer 2008 in London and some of his chamber pieces by The Duo2xm across Europe.