Sean Shibe

Often praised for his innovative programming, Sean Shibe is a classical and electronic guitarist who continues to prove himself as an original mind at the frontier of contemporary classical music.

Born in Edinburgh, Shibe studied at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland under Allan Neave – the youngest student to enter the school – and took further studies at Kunst-Universität Graz in Austria and in Italy under Paolo Pegoraro. A former BBC New Generation Artist Shibe is a Borletti-Buitoni Trust Fellowship winner, Leonard Bernstein Award winner and a multi-GRAMMY nominee.

He is a musician who is keen to explore new and co-operative dynamics, with both soloists and ensembles, and in recent years has worked with artists including the Hallé, Britten Sinfonia, Manchester Collective, Danish String Quartet, flautist Adam Walker, singers Ben Johnson and Robin Tritschler, and performance artist Marina Abramović.

An ardent supporter of contemporary classical music, Shibe has worked with a number of composers to experiment with and expand the guitar repertoire. Among the many premieres he has performed are works by Thomas Adès, Oliver Leith, Cassandra Miller, Shiva Feshareki, Julia Wolfe, Freya Waley-Cohen, Mark Simpson and Tyshawn Sorey. And he remains similarly committed to the classical canon, including his project pairing bold new pieces with his own transcriptions of JS Bach’s lute series.

Shibe’s Southbank Centre Residency sees him perform bold works by Oliver Leith, Steve Reich and Julia Wolfe and introduce us to a number of ‘forgotten’ Scottish lute manuscripts.