He is the author of numerous orchestral and chamber works, and of two widely-performed operas. Greek, first performed in 1988, is based on Steven Berkoff's adaptation of Oedipus the King to a modern setting. The Silver Tassie, first performed in 2000, is based on the play by Sean O'Casey. Other works include Three Screaming Popes (after the paintings by Francis Bacon) and Your Rockaby, a concerto for saxophone and orchestra.
Turnage's music is often in a characteristic personal style, with strong rhythmic thrust, involved jazz harmonies, colourful orchestration with prominent use of tuned and untuned percussion, and hints of various orchestrational sounds from Duke Ellington to 1970s TV detective series theme tunes.
In 2006, Turnage was named a co-composer-in-residence of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, a position which he will hold alongside Argentinian composer Osvaldo Golijov.
Mark-Anthony Turnage is a composer with his feet firmly on the ground, less likely to base a new piece on an abstruse technical procedure than on the concept of a lullaby for a new baby, a tune by a jazz colleague, or the chants of a football crowd.
Turnage was born in 1960 in Corringham, on the Essex shore of the Thames Estuary, and began inventing music to enliven his childhood piano practice.
Turnage has been lucky (or talented) enough to receive positive acclaim from that establishment, but these days, that doesn't always equate to huge popularity amongst the concert-going and record-buying public, given the shift in cultural attitudes in recent decades.
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