Composers

Brian Field’s music is an eclectic fusion of lyricism and driving rhythm that brings together elements of post-romanticism, minimalism, and jazz. Field has received a host of awards, including the RMN Classical recording prize, the Benenti Foundation recording prize, Briar Cliff Choral Music Competition (first prize), the Victor Herbert ASCAP Young Composers’ Contest (first prize), among many others.

Shyly courting the limelight, composer and librettist Edward Ficklin focuses his creative energy on the various forms of music theater. He has realized his works in a number of unusual venues, like a store window near Grand Central Station and a vacant bank lobby near the World Trade Center (with the support of the Lower Manhattan Cultural Council and the September 11th Fund). His work has also been presented by American Opera Projects (Brooklyn, NY), Opera Company of Astoria (Astoria, NY), Little Opera Theatre of New York, the Spring Fever Festival (New York, NY), David Parker/The Bang Group (a collaboration with choreographer Lise Brenner) and Opera Vista (Houston, TX).

Nina Feric, born in Zagreb, Croatia, began her musical studies at the age of 6. She obtained her Master of Music Degree in Piano Performance and Piano Pedagogy from the Music Academy of the University of Zagreb (Croatia) in the class of Prof. Veljko Glodic, and continued her studies at Postgraduate Course in Music Disciplines at DAMS Bologna (Italy). 

Frank Felice (b. 1961) is an eclectic composer who writes with a postmodern mischievousness: each piece speaks in its own language, and his works can be by turns comedic/ironic, simple/complex, subtle/startling, or humble/reverent. Recent projects of Felice’s have taken a turn toward the sweeter side, exploring a consonant adiatonicism.

Sarah Feigin, 1928 – 2011, was born in Dvinsk, Latvia. A precocious child, her musical talent became apparent in the early age of two, as she began to replicate melodies on the piano without instruction.

Francis Fairman (b. 1923) was born in Annapolis MD. Growing up in a musical family, his father played the violin, his mother the piano, his brother the trumpet, and his sister the violin, Fairman was exposed to music at an early age; he had his first piano lesson in Pittsburgh at the age of 5, and was soon able to sight read and play Beethoven's Sonata Pathetique Op. 13. At age 10, his family moved to Philadelphia, where he continued music lessons under Ms. Gertrude Hamilton, a Curtis Institute graduate.

Atlanta-born Margaret Fairlie-Kennedy (b. 1925) has been commissioned by many contemporary dance companies and chamber groups, and worked with noted choreographers Takehiro Ueyama in New York, Bill Bayles at Bennington College, and Peggy Lawler at Cornell University. Her has a strong rhythmic drive at its core.

Composer Noam Faingold’s music has been described as "...lyrical…," "...exhilarating…," and "...a tour-de-force of Jazz melded with Classical..." by sources as varied as The New York Times, The BBC, Downbeat Magazine, and The Tulsa World among others. His crossover ensemble Burning City Orchestra’s debut album was described as "21st century acoustic electric art music” (Rich Fisher, Public Radio Tulsa).

Ray Fahrner composes in eclectic styles and conducts all manner of music in Cambridge MA. Fahrner began his composition studies with Robert Wason and Arnold Franchetti at Hartt College of Music, University of Hartford, subsequently studying with Scott Huston and Norman Dinerstein at the College-Conservatory of Music, University of Cincinnati, where he received his doctorate in 1980.

Michael J. Evans is an American composer based in Washington DC He has recorded with pianist Karolin Rojahn, Sirius Quartet, St Petersburg State Symphony Orchestra, Millennium Symphony Orchestra, Kiev Philharmonic, Prague Radio Symphony Orchestra, Moravian Philharmonic and Janaček Philharmonic.

Joanna Estelle (Storoschuk) is a Canadian composer, lyricist, and arranger, born of Ukrainian parentage. Her music has won critical acclaim from Parliament Hill, Ottawa (Canada) to London (United Kingdom), Barcelona (Spain), Carnegie Hall (New York City), and elsewhere around the world. Estelle studied classical piano and theory with the Royal Conservatory of Music (Toronto) as a young person, but her parents deterred her from pursuing music as a career. Instead, she graduated in Psychology and English (Brock, 1972), then went on to study management accounting. However, her enthusiasm for music never waned.

Ian Erickson is a composer and performer from Southwest Missouri. He graduated from Missouri State University with two bachelor of arts degrees in music performance and composition, and he has extensive experience in improvisation. Many of his works aim to explore polyphonic textures through the use of complex rhythms and dense harmonies.

Paul A. Epstein's compositions include two chamber operas as well as works for string orchestra and for a variety of small ensembles. His Prime Times 2 for flute, bassoon, and piano was a winner of the Pascal Gallois 2008 call for scores.

Angel Sánchez Enríquez was born in Mexico City in 1971. He graduated from the Superior School of Music which belongs to the National Institute of Fine Arts in Mexico City with a Bachelor of Music in Percussion Performance. He also studied piano with Yulia Vischnevetskaia, violin with Guela Dubrova, and orchestral conducting with several prominent conductors as Kurt Redel, Ronald Zollman, and Yuri Simonov.

Mark Engebretson (b 1964, Modesto CA), is Associate Professor of Composition and Electronic Music, University of North Carolina at Greensboro.

Award-winning and critically acclaimed British conductor and composer Benjamin Ellin is currently co-founder and Musical Director of the Thirsk Hall Festival and De Mowbray Music; Music Director of the Thursford Christmas Spectacular; co-founder, conductor and composer of the contemporary-fusion ensemble Tafahum; Principal Conductor of the Slaithwaite Philharmonic Orchestra; and President of Pembroke Academy of Music, London. Ellin is also a founding trustee of the Evgeny Svetlanov Charitable Trust.

Mexican composer José Elizondo received degrees in Humanities, Electrical Engineering and Computer Science from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). At Harvard University, he studied musical analysis, orchestration and conducting. As an engineer, Elizondo’s work focuses on speech-recognition technology, which combines his interests in computer science, linguistics, natural language processing and artificial intelligence.

Adrienne Elisha (1958-2017), a native of Glen Cove NY, studied violin and composition at Indiana University. She earned an Artist Diploma in Viola Performance at the Cleveland Institute of Music and a doctorate in Composition at the University of Buffalo. As a performer, she specialized in the performance of contemporary music, playing in new-music ensembles such as the Cleveland Chamber Symphony, Slee Sinfonietta, as well as the Boston Modern Orchestra Project.

Kenneth Eggert (b. 1969) began his musical career at age 10, with a love of music theatre and an obsession with the music of Billy Joel. After starting his first of many bands at age 12, he began writing songs for them, which led him to eventually study Music Composition at Carnegie-Mellon University with Marilyn Taft Thomas. Feeling more comfortable at that time in the realm of rock and jazz, he transferred to Berklee College of Music as a Film Scoring major, and then left school to pursue a career in performance.

Ruud van Eeten (b. 1973) composed his first pieces when he was 11 years old. He earned Bachelor's degrees in Orchestral Conducting and Theory of Music at the Brabants Conservatory of Tilburg, and received his Master's degree in Orchestral Conducting at the Royal Conservatory of the Hague.