Perpetually curious, Peter Knight’s practice thrives in the spaces between genres, categories, and cultures.

His recent work, relesased on ROOM40, 12K, and Earshift, extends the possibilities of his instrument with innovative approaches that interweave acoustic preparations and extended techniques with electroacoustic processing via laptop, vintage delays, and tape machines. Peter is interested in the use of repetition, rhythmic overlapping, slow harmonic evolution, and subtle timbral evolutions to shift our perceptions of linear time.

As Artistic Director of the Australian Art Orchestra (2013–23) Peter commissioned over 100 works and collaborations with a diverse range of artists including Alvin Lucier, Senyawa, Nicole Lizée, Anthony Braxton, Erik Griswold, and Jules Reidy, and led performances by the company in over a dozen countries winning multiple awards and accolades including four AMC Art Music Awards, the Albert H Maggs Composition Prize, and numerous ARIA nominations.

Peter has maintained an active solo career developing an international reputation as a innovator who is extending the possibilities of his instrument with approaches that interweave acoustic preparations, extended techniques with electroacoustic processing via laptop, vintage delays, tape machines, and pedals. His latest solo release, Shadow Phase, is out on the ROOM40 label, described by Headphone Commute as, "a carefully curated exercise in reflective restraint, dreamy atmospherics, ebbing dynamics.”

Peter’s current touring projects include: Hand to Earth, featuring Yolngu songkeepers, Daniel & David Wilfred which has recently appeared at venues and festivals including Lincoln Centre (NY), Barbican Centre (London), Dark MOFO (Tasmania), Art Gallery of NSW, Vancouver Jazz Festival, Pierre Boulez Saal (Berlin), and Jeonju International Sori Festival (Korea); TL;DR which was nominated for the 2025 ARIA Awards Jazz Album of the Year; and solo with a new release, For a Moment the Sky Knew My Name.

Peter also composes for film and theatre and composed the scores for recently released features, Kid Snow dir. Paul Goldman (in collaboration with Warren Ellis) currently streaming on Stan, and Longe da Estrada dir. Hugo Viera da Silva, soon to stream on Arte. He works in contemporary theatre, most notably with director/performer, Tamara Saulwick (Chamber Made) with whom he has made five works that blur the boundaries between theatre and music performance that have toured to major international festivals and won three Green Room awards. 

Peter was a Creative Australia Music Fellow 2013-14. He holds a doctorate in music composition from Griffith University and was named its 2013 Alumnus of the Year. He is a board director of Melbourne’s iconic arts centre, The Substation, and was also recently appointed to faculty for the Soundweavings intercultural music residency at the Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity in Alberta, Canada. 

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“Solos here were like songlines, not paving superhighways through a compositional infrastructure but leaving faint footprints in a soundscape that evolved as organically as an ecosystem.” Downbeat 

“Hard to categorise… hauntingly memorable” The Wire

“Sure there are shades here of Miles’ electric outings, Jon Hassell’s Fourth World Music, The Necks’ slow burn improvisations. But TL;DR has wedged its own unique sound palette into the mix, mystical undercurrents, layered patterns, ambient snatches…” Rhythms Magazine

“Offering a listening experience that feels at once intimate and cosmic.” Sonofmarketing 

“If trumpet is an element then Knight is an alchemist.” New York City Jazz Record

Full CV here

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