Hormoz Farhat


Hormoz Farhat is a Persian-American composer, ethnomusicologist and emeritus professor of music, a fellow of Trinity College, Dublin.

Life

Born in Tehran, Persia/Iran, Farhat started to study violin with Vahe Djingouzian in Tehran but later moved to the United States and received a BA in music from the University of California, Los Angeles, UCLA, an MA in composition from Mills College, California, and a Ph.D. in composition and ethnomusicology from UCLA. He studied composition with Darius Milhaud, Lukas Foss, and Roy Harris.
In 1959 Farhat founded Music of Persia Performance Group at UCLA. During his years in California Farhat worked first as an assistant professor of music at California State University, Long Beach and then as associate professor of music at University of California, Los Angeles.
On returning to Iran he became a professor and head of Music Department at University of Tehran, as well as the head of Music Council in the National Iranian Radio and Television Network and Shiraz Arts Festival. He was vice chancellor at Farabi University in Tehran. In 1972 and 1973 he was invited as a visiting professor of music to Harvard University.
Farhat moved to Northern Ireland in 1979 as a senior research fellow at Queen's University, Belfast and then to the Republic of Ireland as the chair, professor and head of School of Music in Trinity College Dublin. He has been a guest lecturer at numerous institutions including universities of Michigan, Illinois, Indiana; Princeton, Stanford, Berkeley, Glasgow, Edinburgh, Durham, Amsterdam, Cologne, Warsaw, Ljubljana, Copenhagen, Stockholm and The Smithsonian Institution in Washington D.C. He has been the external examiner at University of Durham School of Music and Royal Irish Academy of Music.
Hormoz Farhat is married to the academic philosopher Maria Baghramian.

Music

His compositions have been performed widely by, among many others, the BBC Symphony Orchestra and English Chamber Orchestra and most recently by the pianist Soheil Nasseri in Carnegie Hall and Merkin Hall in New York as well as in Strathmore Music Center.

Selected compositions

For orchestra
Chamber music
For piano
Vocal music
Motion picture scores:
Scores for feature films by prominent Iranian film directors Dariush Mehrjui: Gaav, Postchi, and Aagha-ye Haaloo ; and Nasser Taghvai: Aaraamesh dar hozoor-e digaraan ; and Saadegh Kordeh. In 1970, Farhat was awarded The Golden Plaque for Best Music for the score of Mehrjui's internationally acclaimed film Gaav.

Selected publications

Books:
Selected Articles: