Clexical

Welcome to Clexical, the podcast dedicated to contemporary classical music! I’m your host, [Kweku Adusei-Poku]. Here you will listen to conversations with living contemporary composers about their work, their journey as musicians and their thoughts on the current new music scene. Join us as we explore and influence the vibrant world of contemporary classical music. To learn more about our work, please visit www.clexical.org. You can find videos of all the interviews we’ve done so far, the outreach programs we’ve done with schools and libraries, and our weekly blog posts discussing the current new music scene. Today’s interview will be conducted by Laurentia Woo.   William Cooper has had a very diverse career as not just a composer, but as a pianist and conductor as well. His music has been acclaimed by Augustin Hadelich, the Julliard Orchestra, Trio 180, the JACK Quartet, and the Lysander Trio, and has been performed at the Radio France Festival and the Wellesley Composer Conference.    Along with holding positions on the faculty at Purdue University, Vincennes University and Interlochen Arts Camps since summer of 2010, he founded the choral department at Ben Davis University.   Cooper received ASCAP awards in 2004 and 2007, and the 2012 Leo Kaplan Award, the highest prize awarded in the ASCAP Morton Gould awards. As a passionate devotee of early music, he was the recipient of the 2012 David S. Saxon award from the UC Davis music department for excellence in performance of early music. He is currently pursuing a Ph.D in music composition at UC Davis, studying composition with Pablo Ortiz, and conducting research on English Renaissance music with Jessie Ann Owens.

Welcome to Clexical, the podcast dedicated to contemporary classical music! I’m your host, [Kweku Adusei-Poku]. Here you will listen to conversations with living contemporary composers about their work, their journey as musicians and their thoughts on the current new music scene. Join us as we explore and influence the vibrant world of contemporary classical music. To learn more about our work, please visit www.clexical.org. You can find videos of all the interviews we’ve done so far, the outreach programs we’ve done with schools and libraries, and our weekly blog posts discussing the current new music scene. Today’s interview will be conducted by Laurentia Woo.   Amy Williams' music has been defined as “simultaneously demanding, rewarding, and fascinating,” “fresh, daring, and incisive,” and “curious and playful”   Born in Buffalo New York in 1969, Williams went to Bennington College where she decided to devote her life to performing and composing contemporary works. After a fellowship in Denmark, she returned to Buffalo to complete her Master’s degree in piano performance at the University at Buffalo with pianist and composer Yvar Mikhashoff, and her Ph.D. in composition, working with David Felder, Charles Wuorinen, and Nils Vigeland. She began teaching at her alma mater, Bennington College, in 1998 as a member of the music faculty and then moved to another faculty position at Northwestern University in 2000. Since 2005, Williams has been teaching composition at the University of Pittsburgh, where she is a  full professor.   Amy Williams’ compositions have been presented at renowned contemporary music venues throughout the U.S., Asia, Australia, and Europe. These include the Lucerne Festival, Lincoln Center, Whitney Museum of American Art, Tanglewood Festival of Contemporary Music, Gaudeamus Festival, Dresden Contemporary Music Days, Ars Musica, Aspekte Festival, Festival Musica Nova, and the Thailand International Composition Festival. Her works have also been performed by acclaimed ensembles such as the Pittsburgh Symphony, Buffalo Philharmonic, Orpheus, JACK Quartet,, Ensemble Musikfabrik, Ensemble Surplus, Dal Niente, and many others.

Welcome to Clexical, the podcast dedicated to contemporary classical music! I’m your host, [Kweku Adusei-Poku]. Here you will listen to conversations with living contemporary composers about their work, their journey as musicians and their thoughts on the current new music scene. Join us as we explore and influence the vibrant world of contemporary classical music. To learn more about our work, please visit www.clexical.org. You can find videos of all the interviews we’ve done so far, the outreach programs we’ve done with schools and libraries, and our weekly blog posts discussing the current new music scene. Today’s interview will be conducted by Edward Lee.    Diana M. Rodriguez is a composer, artist, and educator based in New York City. Her music is most known as a blend between Colombian folk traditions such as Joropo and Cumbia, Rock en Espanol, and Ambient soundscapes. She crafts immersive electroacoustic compositions that explore themes of identity, belonging, and the landscape of internet culture.   DM R was born and raised in Bogota Colombia and attended a community college in Miami at the age of 17 which led her to pursue a PhD at Columbia University in NYC.   Her work experiments in electronic music and noise, pushing the boundaries of sound art in both solo projects and collaborations. Her music has been acknowledged in multiple major ensembles and festivals, including the International Contemporary Ensemble and the MATA Festival. She has had works commissioned by Fromm Music Foundation and National Sawdusts’ Hildegard Commission Initiative.

Welcome to Clexical, the podcast dedicated to contemporary classical music! I’m your host, [Kweku Adusei-Poku]. Here you will listen to conversations with living contemporary composers about their work, their journey as musicians and their thoughts on the current new music scene. Join us as we explore and influence the vibrant world of contemporary classical music. To learn more about our work, please visit www.clexical.org. You can find videos of all the interviews we’ve done so far, the outreach programs we’ve done with schools and libraries, and our weekly blog posts discussing the current new music scene. Today’s interview will be conducted by Edward Lee.   Jeeyoung Kim is an acclaimed Korean-born composer. She defines her work as a harmonization of the unique cultural aspects of Eastern and Western traditions; Deconstructing and rebuilding cultural heritage through music. She is committed to the power music has to heal, connect, and be a medium for creative expression.   With an extensive educational background, Kim studied music composition at Yonsei University in Seoul South Korea for her bachelor’s, Indiana University for her Masters in music, and she earned her Doctorate of Musical Arts from Yale University. Kim received the Bunting Fellowship at Harvard University where she composed and researched Asian music and philosophy.   In addition to her astounding level of education, Kim has received a multitude of awards and fellowships including recognition from the National Endowment for the Arts, International Alliance for Women in Music, National Association of Composers, Meet the Composer, the Dale Warland Singers New Music Competition, Jerome Foundation, Aspen Music Festival, and many others.   Her compositions have been performed by renowned orchestras and ensembles such as the Korean Broadcasting System Orchestra, Chanticleer, Czech National Symphony Orchestra, Seattle Symphony, KBS Korean Traditional Music Orchestra, Contemporary Gugak Orchestra, Suwon Philharmonic, Daejeon Philharmonic, and Empire State Youth Orchestra.

Richard Wilson is an incredibly prolific composer, having over a hundred works for a wide variety of instruments and ensembles. His compositions have been performed by a number of celebrated groups and artists including Dawn Upshaw, the Chicago Quartet, the San Francisco Symphony, and the London Philharmonic. Wilson has received many accolades for his works including an Academy Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, the Creative Arts Award in Music from the City of Cleveland, the Stoeger Award from the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, and a Guggenheim Fellowship. Also a renowned pedagogue, Wilson taught at Vassar College for fifty years, where he served as the Mary Conover Mellon Professor of Music.   Originally from Cleveland, Ohio, he started out learning piano and cello, with his teachers being Leonard Shure and Ernst Silberstein respectively. In his early musical studies, he studied at the Cleveland Music School Settlement. In 1963, Wilson graduated from Harvard University where he was a recipient of the Frank Huntington Beebe Award. He has been a composer-in-residence with the American Symphony Orchestra since 1992.

Chris Arrell is a celebrated composer and teacher. His incredible works have led to commissions from many prestigious organizations including Spivey Hall, Cornell University, and the Fromm Foundation at Harvard University. He has received worldwide recognition for his works including Bent Frequency Underscore Prize, the Ettelson Composer Award, the Ossia Music Prize, and awards from the League of Composers/ISCM, the Salvatore Martirano Competition, the MacDowell and ACA colonies, and the Fulbright Hays Foundation. Additionally, he has had many incredible ensembles perform his works including Bent Frequency, Brave New Works, and the Boston New Music Initiative.   Originally from Oregon, Arrell received his doctorate in musical arts from Cornell University before going on to work as Director of Theory and Composition at Clayton State University. Currently, he teaches at the College of the Holy Cross, where he leads courses in music theory and computer music. With a distinct sound that has been praised for its “unconventional beauty,” Arrell’s works continue to amaze audiences around the globe.

Welcome to Clexical, the podcast dedicated to contemporary classical music! I’m your host, [Kweku Adusei-Poku]. Here you will listen to conversations with living contemporary composers about their work, their journey as musicians and their thoughts on the current new music scene. Join us as we explore and influence the vibrant world of contemporary classical music. To learn more about our work, please visit www.clexical.org. You can find videos of all the interviews we’ve done so far, the outreach programs we’ve done with schools and libraries, and our weekly blog posts discussing the current new music scene. Today’s interview will be conducted by Laurentia Woo.   Jeff Scott is a Grammy Award winning composer and educator. He defines his work as an intersection between European classical tradition and African American cultural expression, what he calls Urban Classical Music. Rather than a hybrid or compromise, his music is a reclamation that draws from the harmonic rigor of Western art music and the rhythmic vitality, emotional depth, and communal spirit of Black American life. It’s shaped by his urban upbringing and the stories that surround him.   Born in Queens, NY, Scott began playing the french horn at age 14, when he received a scholarship to attend the Brooklyn College Preparatory Division. His further education includes a bachelor’s degree from the Manhattan School of Music where he studied with David Jolley, and a master’s from SUNY at Stony Brook where he studied with Willian Purvis. He later continued his horn studies with Scott Brubaker and the late Jerome Ashby.    For more than 20 years following, Scott served as the French hornist of the Imani Winds. This position allowed him to perform at Carnegie Hall, Walt Disney Concert Hall, the Kennedy Center, and countless other prominent stages. His most recent commissions and performances include collaborations with the Detroit Symphony, the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra, the St. Paul Chamber Orchestra, Chamber Music Detroit, and other notable ensembles and soloists across the country.   As an educator, Scott believes in inviting his students and performers to hear themselves in the classical music canon. His goal is to allow them to see their stories, their neighborhoods, and their ancestry reflected in concert halls. He wants his audience to feel the urgency and beauty of music from the lived experience. 

Daniel Asia is a prolific composer and educator. His works for orchestra have been commissioned and performed by numerous major orchestras across the U.S. and the world. His work has earned him numerous prestigious awards and fellowships including a Fulbright Arts Award Fellowship, a Guggenheim Fellowship, an Aaron Copland Fund for Music Grant, and numerous prizes in composition from ASCAP and BMI. His achievements also allowed him to be inducted into the American Academy of Sciences and Letters in 2024. He worked as an Assistant Professor of Contemporary Music and Wind Ensemble at the Oberlin Conservatory of Music from 1981-1986, and from 1998-2024, served as a professor of music at the University of Arizona. Mr. Asia is also a respected author, with his book, Observations on Music, Culture and Politics, being published in 2021. He is currently the president of Polyhymnia, a platform dedicated to discussions about fine arts, economics, politics, philosophy, and culture.  Originally from Seattle, Washington, Mr. Asia graduated with a Masters in Music from the Yale School of Music, with his major composition teachers including Jacob Druckman, Stephen Albert, Gunther Schuller, and Isang Yun. He has a large portfolio of published works for a wide range of instruments including 6 symphonies for orchestra. 

Chaya Czernowin (χaja t͡ʃɛʁˈnobin) is an acclaimed composer and educator. Her work is characterized by attempts to find alternative temporalities, changing perspectives and scale, and fragmentation, all coupled with a high emotional intensity. She makes direct reference to the use of metaphors as a means of reaching an unfamiliar sound space and the use of noise and physical parameters such as weight and textural surface, and an inquiry of the handling of time. These ways of thinking fuse her work with multi-sensory content and work to reach a sonic expression into the subconscious that goes beyond style, conventions, and rationality.   Although born and raised in Israel, Czernowin continued her studies in Germany through the DAAD grant, the US, Tokyo, through the Asahi Shimbun Fellowship and American NEA grant, and finally back in Germany through a fellowship at the Akademie Scholl Solitude.    Czernowin considers teaching to be an important aspect of her continued compositional development. She held professorship at UCSD and was the first woman to be appointed as a composition professor at the University of Music and Performing Arts in Vienna from 2006-2009, and at Harvard University where she has been the Walter Bigelow Rosen Professor of Music. Along with Steven Kazuo Takasugi and Jean-Baptiste Jolly, she has founded the summer Academy at Schloss Solitude, a bi-annual course for composers.   Czernowin’s works have been performed in most of the significant new music festivals in Europe and also in Japan, Korea, Australia, US, and Canada. Her works have been commissioned by Vlaamse Opera Belgium, IRCAM Paris, Mannheim Stadtheater, and the Deutsche Opere Berlin.   Her opera Infinite Now, commissioned in 2017, combines materials of the first world war with the short story “Homecoming" by Can Xue. This opera was chosen as the premier of the year in the international critics survey of Opernwelt.

Dr. Sam Nichols is a renowned composer, musician, and educator. He has written works for a variety of ensembles and organizations including the Fromm Music Foundation at Harvard University, the Left Coast Chamber Ensemble, Earplay, the Empyrean Ensemble, and the Composers Conference at Wellesley College. Dr. Nichols has also won numerous awards for his compositions including the 2011 Lee Ettelson Composer’s Award for his string quartet, Refuge, as well as 3rd prize in the 2010 Salvatore Martirano Memorial Composition.   Born in rural Maine, Dr. Nichols studied at Vassar College and Brandeis University, where he received his PhD in 2006. He has studied with many renowned teachers including Ross Bauer, Eric Chasalow, Annea Lockwood, David Rakowski, Richard Wilson, and Yehudi Wyner, Marty Boykan, and Terry Champlin. Since 2002, Dr. Nichols has taught at the University of California Davis, where he currently serves as the chair of the music department. He works as a professor of teaching, and also teaches music theory, electronic music, and composition.

Osnat Netzer /osˈnat ˈnɛtsɛʁ/ is a composer, performer and educator. Osnat creates her compositions collaboratively, tailoring her work to the performer’s sensibilities, physicality and improvisational inclinations. She takes inspiration from cognitive linguistics, and in dialogue with the embodied experience of physical forces, such as potential and kinetic energy, resulting in compositions that are rich in musical languages and connected to the fulsome pursuit for tension and relaxation. Born in Haifa, Israel, Netzer studied composition and piano at the Jerusalem Academy of Music and Dance, where her primary composition teacher was Menachem Zur. She came to the United States in 2003 for graduate studies in composition with Robert Cuckson at Mannes school of Music and continued her studies with Lee Hyla at New England Conservatory, where she earned her doctorate in 2011. In 2019, she joined the faculty of DePaul University, where she is now Associate Professor of Composition and Musicianship. Netzer’s works have been commissioned and performed by Ensemble Dal Niente, ICE (International Contemporary Ensemble), Patchwork, mezzo-soprano Lucy Dhegrae, bass David Salsbery Fry, saxophonists Kenneth Radnofsky, Doug O’Connor and Geoffrey Landman, Spektral Quartet, and Winsor Music, among many others, published by Edition Peters and earthsongs, and recorded on Bridge Records and New Focus Recordings. Her opera, The Wondrous Woman Within, was described as “riotously funny” in The New York Times when its first scene was performed at New York City Opera’s VOX festival in 2012 and “challenging and fascinating” by critic Amir Kidron when it received its World Premiere in a sold out run at Tel Aviv’s Cameri Theatre in 2015. As a pianist and performer, she regularly plays and conducts new music by fellow composers, as well as her own songs and compositions. Also a committed and passionate educator, Netzer teaches at The Walden School and has served on the faculties of New England Conservatory, Longy School of Music of Bard College and Harvard University.

Christopher Cerrone (b. 1984, New York) is internationally acclaimed for compositions characterized by a subtle handling of timbre and resonance, a deep literary fluency, and a flair for multimedia collaborations. Balancing lushness and austerity, immersive textures and telling details, dramatic impact, and interiority, Cerrone’s multi-GRAMMY-nominated music is utterly compelling and uniquely his own. Cerrone’s opera, In a Grove (libretto by Stephanie Fleischmann), jointly produced by LA Opera and Pittsburgh Opera, was called “stunning” (Opera News) and “outstanding” (Pittsburgh Post-Gazette) in its sold-out premiere run directed by Mary Birnbaum in March 2022. Other recent projects include The Year of Silence, based on the story of the same name by Kevin Brockmeier, for the Louisville Symphony and baritone Dashon Burton; A Body, Moving, a brass concerto for the Cincinnati Symphony; Breaks and Breaks, a violin concerto for Jennifer Koh and the Detroit Symphony; The Insects Became Magnetic, an orchestral work with electronics for the Los Angeles Philharmonic; The Air Suspended, a piano concerto for Shai Wosner; and Meander, Spiral, Explode, a percussion quartet concerto co-commissioned by Third Coast Percussion, the Chicago Civic Orchestra of the Chicago Symphony and the Britt Festival. Upcoming projects include Beaufort Scales, an oratorio for voices, electronics, and video commissioned by Lorelei Ensemble to premiere at Mass MoCA; a new percussion quartet co-commissioned by Sandbox Percussion, Blow Up Percussion, and the Park Avenue Armory, and new large works for the LA Philharmonic and Roomful of Teeth. Cerrone’s first opera, Invisible Cities, a 2014 Pulitzer Prize finalist, was praised by the Los Angeles Times as “A delicate and beautiful opera…[which] could be, and should be, done anywhere.” Invisible Cities received its fully-staged world premiere in a wildly popular production by The Industry, directed by Yuval Sharon, in Los Angeles’ Union Station. Both the film and opera are available as CDs, DVDs, and digital downloads. In July 2019, New Amsterdam Records released his GRAMMY-nominated sophomore effort, The Pieces that Fall to Earth, collaborating with the LA-based chamber orchestra, Wild Up, to widespread acclaim. The Arching Path, from 2021 (In a Circle Records), features performances by Timo Andres, Ian Rosenbaum, Lindsay Kesselman, and Mingzhe Wang and was nominated for a 2022 GRAMMY. His most recent release, a studio version of In a Grove, was named one of the best recordings of 2023 by The New York Times: “A vividly immersive thriller... not a word or note is without purpose, and both are captured, if not enhanced, in this richly produced recording.” Cerrone won the 2015–2016 Samuel Barber Rome Prize in Music Composition and was a resident at the Laurenz Haus Foundation in Basel, Switzerland from 2022–2023.  

Chilean American composer Javier Farias has been awarded First Prize in the Andrés Segovia Composition Competition, International Composing Competition «2 Agosto,» and Michele Pittaluga Composition Competition. In 2014 he was honored with the Fromm Music Foundation Prize at Harvard University for a concerto for two guitars composed for Sérgio and Odair Assad and the YOA Orchestra of the Americas. His catalog consists of works ranging from solo guitar to full guitar ensemble to others featuring or incorporating the guitar into compositions for chamber ensembles, choral music, and orchestral settings, including five guitar concertos, having outstanding musicians such as the guitarist of the band The Police, Andy Summers; bandoneonist of Astor Piazzolla’s sextet, Daniel Binelli; jazz guitarist Mike Stern or classical guitarist Eliot Fisk premiering and recording his music. His compositions have premiered in lauded venues such as Carnegie Hall, Teatro Colón in Buenos Aires, Instituto Cervantes in New York City, the Kennedy Center, Tsuda Hall in Japan, Meistersaal in Berlin, Troy Music Hall, and by the Organization of American States among others.  His music written for guitar has also been included in guitar program repertoire for conservatories including the Conservatoire de Paris, Yale University, San Francisco Conservatory of Music, and Royal Danish Academy of Music in Copenhagen.

Andrés Soto is a Costa Rican composer based in Los Angeles with an active career in both film and concert music. He has written music for several feature films, documentaries, shorts, trailers and video games, as well as numerous concert works that have been performed by orchestras around the world, (including the Nashville Symphony, Baltimore Symphony, Detroit Symphony, Seattle Symphony, Buffalo Philharmonic, Utah Symphony, Florida Orchestra), and in 2024 the New York Philharmonic and the Juilliard Pre-College Symphony will jointly premiere an upcoming work as part of a grant from the Sphinx Foundation.  Recent albums include “Doce Musas”, recorded by 12 emerging pianists from his native Costa Rica, and three albums for Universal, including  “Champion Beats”, co-written with Grammy-winning producer Alex Hitchens and recorded at Capitol Studios, with tracks that have appeared on ABC, ESPN, Univision, Golf Channel, NBA, Tennis Channel, Fox, and other channels. In 2022 he collaborated with producer/ composer Daniel Rojas by writing  incidental music for the celebrated 90th Pageant of the Masters at the Festival of the Arts in Laguna Beach. Recent feature films include the sports documentary King Otto (available on Peacock), the sci-fi Órbita Prima; Nowhere (nominated for Best Film Score in Colombia’s national film awards), the comedy He Matado a mi Marido; and a coming-of-age family film, Buscando a Marcos Ramírez.  He has twice received rare Honorable Mentions in the National Prize in Composition (Costa Rica) for his works Amalgama (2018) and Pas de Deux (2022). He made his Carnegie Hall compositional debut in 2015 and has led workshops and masterclasses on film scoring and composition at USC, University of Costa Rica, Spain, New Jersey and the University of South Dakota.  Andrés’s music is published by Symphonica Productions.

Nicolás Lell Benavides’ (Ben-ah-VEE-des) music has been praised for finding “…a way to sketch complete characters in swift sure lines…” (Anne Midgette, Washington Post) and cooking up a “jaunty score [with] touches of cabaret, musical theater and Latin dance.” (Tim Smith, OPERA NEWS). He has received commissions from groups like The New York Philharmonic/The Juilliard School, Eighth Blackbird, New Century Chamber Orchestra with Daniel Hope, SFCM Orchestra with Edwin Outwater, West Edge Opera, Washington National Opera, The Glimmerglass Festival, Music of Remembrance, Left Coast Chamber Ensemble, Fry Street Quartet, Friction Quartet, and Khemia Ensemble. His music has received support from organizations such as the American Composers Forum, The Barlow Endowment, New Music USA, the Alice M. Ditson Fund, and the National Endowment for the Arts.

As a prolific composer who blends Chinese and Western traditions, transcending cultural and musical boundaries, Dr. Chen Yi is a recipient of the Ives Living Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters in 2001. She has been Lorena Cravens/Millsap/Missouri Distinguished Professor at the Conservatory of Music and Dance in the University of Missouri-Kansas City since 1998. She was elected to American Academy of Arts & Sciences in 2005, and the American Academy of Arts & Letters in 2019. Fellowships and commissioning awards were received from Guggenheim Foundation (1996), American Academy of Arts and Letters (1996), Fromm Foundation at Harvard University (1994), Koussevitzky Music Foundation at the Library of Congress (1997), and National Endowment for the Arts (1994). Honors include the first prizes from the Chinese National Composition Competition (1985, 2012), the Lili Boulanger Award (1993), the NYU Sorel Medal Award (1996), the CalArts/Alpert Award (1997), the UT Eddie Medora King Composition Prize (1999), the ASCAP Concert Music Award (2001), the Elise Stoeger Award (2002) from Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center.

Tomás Gueglio is an Argentine composer currently based in Chicago. In his creative work, he devises surreal sound worlds through the blending of a variety of musical lineages and styles. Elements central to his recent work are private languages, the logic of dreams, and, as of late, melodramas and radio soap operas. “Tomás Gueglio creates musical environments that facilitate subtle examinations of timbre, phrase, and gesture. He eschews bombastic surface activity in favor of substantial multi-layered textures. The results are beguiling and moving, music that lives in a space that is balanced between the visceral and tactile on one side and the curated and meticulous on the other. ” — Dan Lippel. Liner notes for Duermevela

The music of Anna Weesner (winner of 2018 American Academy of Arts and Letters Virgil Thomson Award and 2009 Guggenheim Fellowship) has been performed by widely (including: Abramovic; ACO; Arnold; Bandwidth; Beck; Bowers; Cassatt; Chamber Music at Lincoln Center; Counter)induction; Cuckson; Curtis 20/21; Cygnus ; Cypress; Daedalus ; de Guise-Langlois ; Eighth Blackbird; Fader; Goode; Kang; Kraines; Lark; Look and Listen; Morales; Network; NY Virtuoso Singers; Open End; Pearson; Prism; Riverside Symphony; Sequitur; Shao; Stillman; Stinson; Tanglewood; Upshaw; Waggoner; Watras; WCM). Violin at age five and flute as a teenager in youth orchestra were formative experiences. Radio presets in her car are heavy on pop. Her recent output includes My Mother in Love, ten songs for which she wrote text, and The Eight Lost Songs of Orlando Underground for clarinet quintet. She studied at Yale (B.A.) and Cornell (D.M.A.) and is Professor at the University of Pennsylvania. 

Praised as “a real talent” (The Seattle Times) with “vivid, dramatic” (San Francisco Chronicle) and “enjoyable” (Gramophone Magazine) scores, and “an incredible span of compositional tool box” (American Record Guide), Shuying Li is an award-winning composer who began her musical education in her native China. In her sophomore year at the Shanghai Conservatory of Music, she won a scholarship to continue her undergraduate studies at The Hartt School in Connecticut. She holds doctoral and master’s degrees from the University of Michigan and is a research faculty member at the Shanghai Conservatory of Music. A passionate educator, Shuying has taught and directed the Composition/Music Theory Program at Gonzaga University. She joined the faculty at California State University, Sacramento in Fall 2022.

Brad Balliett enjoys being a musical omnivore, focusing equal parts of his career on composing, playing bassoon, and teaching artistry. Brad is principal bassoon of the Princeton Symphony, a member of Signal and Metropolis Ensemble, a founding member and former Artistic Director for Decoda, a member of the composer-collective band Oracle Hysterical, and on faculty at The Peabody Institute, The Juilliard School, and Musicambia.   As a teaching artist, Brad regularly leads composition and song-writing workshops in prisons, schools, hospitals, and homeless shelters. His work with Musicambia has given him the opportunity to guide aspiring composers and performers at Sing Sing Correctional Facility, Allendale Correctional Facility, Brooklyn Detention Center, and San Quentin State Prison. With Project: Music Heals Us, Brad has led music history and composition workshops at Radgowski-Corrigan and Bain Correctional Center. With Decoda, Brad has participated in workshops for over six years at Lee Correctional Institute. ​

Michael Pisaro-Liu (born, Michael Pisaro, 1961 in Buffalo, New York) is a guitarist and composer and a long-time member of the Wandelweiser collective. While, like other members of Wandelweiser, Pisaro-Liu is known for pieces of long duration with periods of silence, in the past fifteen years his work has branched out in many directions, including work with field recording, electronics, improvisation and ensembles of very different kinds of instrumental constitution. Pisaro-Liu has a long-standing collaboration with percussionist Greg Stuart, with over thirty collaborations (pieces and recordings) to date, including their 3-disc set, Continuum Unbound from 2014 and Umbra & Penumbra for amplified percussion and orchestra premiered by the La Jolla Symphony in February, 2020. Pisaro-Liu also has recurring (intermittent) duos with Christian Wolff, Keith Rowe, Taku Sugimoto, Antoine Beuger, Graham Lambkin, Toshiya Tsunoda and Reinier van Houdt.  

Texu Kim (b.1980) is “one of the most active and visible composers of his generation” (San Francisco Classical Voice), writing music that’s fun, sophisticated, and culturally connected. Drawing on his personal affinity for humor, his background in science, and his fascination with everyday experiences, Kim’s work radiates positivity, offering “major-league cuteness” (Broadway World) while demonstrating “surprising scope.” (San Diego Story) As a Korean-American, Kim explores the localization of imported traditions, incorporating cross-cultural elements into his work in “impressive and special” ways so that “many orchestras and conductors around the world are taking an interest in [his] music.” (KPBS) By highlighting the interaction between folk culture and external influences, Kim creates meaningful depth while maintaining a signature playfulness and exuberance that is listener-friendly and engaging. Characterized by “exuberant, colorful washes of sound… punchy bass lines, snappy brass fanfares, and suave... solos” (San Diego Story), Kim’s music is at times “explosively virtuosic” (Wall Street Journal) but always uplifting and rewarding for both listeners and performers. ​

The composer and/or producer of over 50 works for the stage, concert hall, radio and recordings, EDWARD BARNES is the winner of Guggenheim, NEA and NY Foundation for the Arts fellowships, and the Stephen Sondheim Award for the “creation of innovative musical theater.”  He has served as Executive Director of Gotham Chamber Opera, Producing Director of MasterVoices, and Managing Director of American Lyric Theater, and is currently a lecturer at The Juilliard School.

Seoul-born Chicago based composer Dongryul Lee (이동렬 [iː doŋ ɾjəɾ], pronouns: he/him) crafts music that entwines the acoustical nature of sounds with clarity, pathos, and reinvented classical expressions. Embracing the joy of rendering ludic permutations or interstellar sonic fables, he aspires to reach the human spirit through epistemic journeys. The dual identities of his backgrounds, a Korean immigrant living in the States, a born Catholic and learned Buddhist thinker, and a composer with a computer science degree, also greatly influence his musical language. He finds inspirations in spiritual, literary, and scientific elements, encompassing a diverse range of topics from Borgesian poetics and Jungian Philosophy to Number Theory, Deep Learning, and Engineering Campanology, oftentimes employing yearlong in-depth interdisciplinary research.

Miranda Cuckson is known for her playing of a wide range of music and styles, her organic expressivity, dexterous virtuosity, insight and programming, and love for music. Acclaimed internationally as a soloist and collaborator, violinist and violist, she performs at venues large and small, concert halls, and informal spaces. ​ Miranda’s albums include Világ, featuring the Bartók Sonata along with new works; the Ligeti, Korngold, Ponce, and Piston concertos; music by American composers Finney, Shapey, Martino, Sessions, Carter, Eckardt, Glass, Hersch; her ECM Records album of Bartók, Schnittke and Lutoslawski; Melting the Darkness, an album of microtonal and electronics pieces; and Nono’s La lontananza nostalgica utopica futura, which was named a Best Recording of the Year by the New York Times. 

Praised for “combining omnivory and brilliance” (The New York Times), four-time GRAMMY Award-nominated violinist and composer Curtis Stewart translates stories of American self determination to the concert stage. Tearing down the facade of “classical violinist,” Stewart is in constant pursuit of his musical authenticity, treating art as a battery for realizing citizenship. As a solo violinist, composer, Artistic Director of the American Composers Orchestra, professor at The Juilliard School, and member of award-winning ensembles PUBLIQuartet and The Mighty Third Rail, he realizes a vision to find personal and powerful connections between styles, cultures and musics. Stewart’s 2023 album of Love., a tribute to his late mother Elektra Kurtis-Stewart, has been nominated under Best Instrumental Solo in the 2024 GRAMMY Awards.

Jessica Krash is a native of Washington, DC and continues to find it an interesting and challenging place to think about worldview in music and art. She was awarded the 2010 “Wammie” for Classical Composer (Washington Area Music Association’s version of a Grammy). Her work has appeared in traditional and experimental concerts and radio in the US, Europe, and Asia, including a work for dancers and saxophones on Washington’s canal in a thunderstorm.  Jessica’s 2018 chamber and vocal music CD (Albany Records) was praised by the Wall Street Journal, Gramophone, and Fanfare, was “Recording of the Month” in Voix des Arts, and was named in “10 of the Best New Releases in 2018” by The Daffodil Perspective. Her solo piano CD (Ravello/Capstone Records) was listed by Tim Page in The Washington Post and Detroit News as one of the most interesting recordings of 2006.  ​

Shin Kim is a Master student at the Royal Academy of Music, London, with Professor Dr. Rubens Askenar. Prior to that, he was studying at the Korea University of Arts in Seoul with Byungmoo Lee, and for a year was student of Karlheinz Essl at the University of Arts in Vienna. In his work, he distinguishes three major themes: religion, narrative and psychological phenomena, paying great attention to making his music understandable to all audiences. He is the winner of the George Enescu International Competition 2022 in the symphony music category. Also, he won the 1 st prize at the concours de Genéve with his work "The song of Oneiroi". In "The song of Oneiroi", he tells the story of the dream world - and tells it to himself as the dreamer - using not words but pronunciation systems from various languages and using microphones to amplify, diversify and spatialise his music. And to make more dreamlike.