TITLE OF TALK: Chaos into Creativity: Reflections on The Brontë Chamber Music Series
Speaker: Courtney Caitlin Phillips
Date: Tuesday 18 August 2026 VIA ZOOM: at 18.30 UK time
This talk will take place exclusively online via zoom, there is no in person attendence, a link will be sent out via email prior to the talk. A recording will be made available for all attendees to watch for a month after the date. Tickets on sale here.
Synopsis:
Composer Courtney Caitlin Phillips wrote an 8-piece chamber music series for each of the Brontë sisters’ novels, including Charlotte’s unfinished Emma. Though its April 2020 live premiere was cancelled due to the pandemic, she was thrilled to resurrect her work and celebrate the legacy of the Brontës in a world premiere of her compositions at the Kilkee Brontë Festival in Ireland in September 2025. She is now delighted to be able to share her work with the Brontë Birthplace, Thornton. Her talk will include some brief, personal vignettes of how she was first introduced to the Brontës, how her connection to them has deepened over the years, and how they continue to inspire her creativity. She will also share excerpts and analyses of the chamber music series, show how each piece connects with its respective novel, and reveal a few Easter eggs hidden in the scores.
Courtney Caitlin Phillip’s biography:
Courtney Caitlin Phillips is a composer and singer from Birmingham, Alabama (USA) with experience in classical, sacred, and metal music. She studied music composition with Dr. Mark Lackey at Samford University and has composed for solo instruments, choir, and various chamber ensembles. Her compositions are tightly woven with storytelling and are often inspired by literature, including the Brontës’ novels, Longfellow’s poems, and the Bible. She is an ASCAP member and publishes under White Orchid Resonance.
Courtney graduated as valedictorian of her high school and is an alumnus of the Omicron Gamma chapter of Delta Omicron, Samford’s professional music fraternity, in which she served as an officer in the role of its mascot. She also served in Zimrah, the music student organization at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary, as its vice president and later president. She is a former recipient of the Shepherd-Walker Scholarship, the Hazel Boren Music Scholarship, and the 2020 NAMM President’s Innovation Award.
Passionate about music education, she has taught piano and voice at two Mason Music locations in Birmingham, Alabama, The Studio in Centreville, Alabama, and was also head piano teacher at Ethnic Group Academy for refugee children in Fort Worth, Texas. Her primary instrument is voice, and she has been a member of several prestigious choirs in different states and was also the lead singer for a melodic death metal band called Exalt the Throne in Fort Worth, Texas. In 2021, she was featured on the atmospheric doom metal track Ashes from In Memoriam by Crowned in Sorrow. Additionally, she collaborated with Type-Kast for six songs from 2023–2025. Currently, she resides in Mobile, Alabama where she leads worship with her husband at Christ Anglican Church, sings in a virtual doom metal project called Orchis Nocturna, and teaches voice privately.
