The Daphne Oram Trust exists to advance, improve, develop and maintain public education in and appreciation of the art of electronic music and the pioneering work of composer and sound artist Daphne Oram (1925-2003).
Here are a few of The Trust’s achievements since it was founded in 2007:
Donations will enable us to continue this work. We’ll be able to reach more electronic music creators, supporting them directly. We’ll also be able to digitise more of The Daphne Oram Collection, safeguarding it for future generations and enabling us to her communicate her central contribution to early electronic music.
Your donation can make a difference.
If you would like to secure Oram’s legacy and see inclusive electronic music making flourish in the UK, do support The Daphne Oram Trust.
When Daphne Oram died in 2003, her many thousands of recordings, scores, personal papers, software disks and more were passed by Oram’s heir Martin Cook into the care of Hugh Davies who knew Oram and her work better than anyone. Following Davies’ death in January 2005, this material spent two years in the care of Oram’s extended family who then asked Sonic Arts Network (now Sound and Music) to become its custodians.
In November 2008 The Daphne Oram Trust became the owners of Oram’s archive and entered into a formal loan agreement with Goldsmiths College, University of London, that continues to today. With funding from the Arts and Humanities Research Council, they safeguarded the archive and made it accessible to musicians, students and the academic community by siting it in the Goldsmiths Library Special Collections & Archives. The Daphne Oram Collection can be searched online and visited by appointment in Goldsmiths Library, New Cross, London. This collaboration was led by Mick Grierson who was also involved in the retrieval of the original Oramics Machine. It was refound in 2008 after being lost for 40 years and is now in the safekeeping of the Science Museum, London.
The Daphne Oram Trust is Registered with the Charity Commission as 1134910.
The Daphne Oram Trust is run by a board of volunteers who share a common interest in electronic sound and music and an affinity with the work of Oram. They include musicians, instrument builders, writers, academics and members of Oram’s extended family.
Oram’s niece Carolyn Scales finally realised her ambition to set up a charity to promote Daphne Oram’s legacy at this Southbank Symposium on Oramics in 2008. Read the story of the Trust’s foundation.