Composers

Mari Tamaki is a Japanese cellist, composer, performer, and producer whose great improvisational and compositional skills create fascinating music, fluidly crossing genres both classical and contemporary. As a composer, she has successfully created works in a variety of styles, including classical music, progressive rock, free improvisation, avant-garde, and collaboration with the Butoh dance form. In her pieces, she skillfully transitions from tense dissonance to complete harmonization by the end. She employs a lyrical style while emphasizing dissonance. 

Nicholas Weininger (b. 1978) is a composer, singer, software engineering manager, and leadership coach. Weininger's works for a cappella chorus have been performed by ensembles across the United States, ranging from the International Orange Chorale of San Francisco and the NYC-based ensemble Choral Chameleon to the West Genesee High School Chorale, the Germantown Friends School Concert Choir, and the festival ensemble Coro Mundi. In March 2023, the Empire City Men's Chorus premiered his cantata Hakol Hevel (All is Mere Breath) for TTBB chorus, orchestra, and soloists. Weininger's works are published through Personage Press and ArrangeMe. 

Vincent Kennedy is a composer and conductor from Dublin, Ireland, who received his earliest music education in CBS Westland Row, Dublin. He won the under 18 category in the Feis Ceoil national music competition at age 12, and two years later won the adult Feis Ceoil. He was performing trumpet with the National Symphony Orchestra by the age of 19, and holds a master’s degree from Dublin City University in humanities (music and composition). Kennedy’s life experiences have defined his musical purpose, and he describes it as thus; “Music has been a faithful friend: always there to uplift, distract, colour, and comfort. I write music to enrich life and take my inspiration from many sources and possibilities, like a bee using the nectar of different flowers to produce a unique honey.”

Eric Marshall Price was born November 8, 1944 in Philadelphia PA. He was raised in Abington PA, and graduated from Abington High School in June, 1962. Not exposed to classical music during his childhood and adolescent years, Price’s desire to compose did not begin until his early college years, when a roommate with a massive classical record collection introduced him to classical music. Also interested in a career in Psychology and Medicine, Price pursued classical composition as a side gig. He studied under Donald Rappoport at Settlement Music School in Philadelphia for a number of years. Price’s first major classical piece, which he called his Student Sonata, (Piano Sonata #1 in A minor) came around his 36th birthday.

Anthony Wilson (b. 1962) developed a strong interest in music from an early age. He spent many hours at the piano as a child,  experimenting with various combinations of sound. His parents’ record player also provided the wonderful experience of being able to enjoy both the world of classical music and popular music.  

In a career of over 50 years, award-winning composer, pianist, and recording artist Margaret Brandman has followed her passion to create appealing music with strong melodic content, sensitive harmonies, and rhythmic ingenuity. Her output includes works for orchestra, chamber ensembles, choir, solo voice, and solo instruments, composed across a wide range of genres from Contemporary Classical to Jazz and Latin-American. 

Octavian Nemescu (1940-2020) was born in Pascani (Romania). He studied composition with Mihail Jora at the Conservatory of Music in Bucharest, obtained the Ph.D. in Musicology in 1978, at the Conservatory in Cluj, under the guidance of Sigismund Toduta. The title of his doctoral thesis was: “The Semantic Capacities Of Music,” published as a book, at Editura Muzicala Publishing House, Bucharest, 1983. He was an assistant and then lecturer at Brasov University (School of Music) between 1970-1978.

As a writer, producer, and director, Michael Roush has had a lengthy career in the development  of creative content for independent film and theater production. During his years in Colorado at Cherry Creek High School (a Grammy® Signature School), Roush was active in Performing Arts as a performer in Musical Theatre and Drama, as well as Choral, drawing upon a heavy Fine Arts course load which also included theory, composition, and music appreciation.

John J. Craven (b.1971) was enthusiastically drawn to listening to classical music, music theater, and popular music as a child. He studied piano and flute and began to compose at age 11. He was a winner in the Fourth International Aaron Copland Competition for Young Composers at age 12. He studied piano at the Peabody Conservatory of Music from 1989 to 1991. From 1992 to 1994 he received a B.A. in Communication Studies at the University of Iowa; in 1997 he completed a B.F.A. in music composition at SUNY Purchase. He returned to Peabody in 2009 to receive a M.M. in composition.

Hendrik Hofmeyr, who has been described as South Africa’s most performed composer of Classical music, was born in Cape Town in 1957. He achieved his first major success as a composer in 1988 with the performance at the State Theatre of The Fall of the House of Usher, which won the South African Opera Competition and the Nederburg Opera Prize. In the same year, Hofmeyr, who was furthering his studies in Italy during ten years of self-imposed political exile, obtained first prize in an international competition in Trent with music for a short film by Wim Wenders. In 1992 he was appointed lecturer at the University of Stellenbosch, and in 1997 won two further international competitions, the Queen Elisabeth Competition of Belgium (with Raptus for violin and orchestra) and the Dimitri Mitropoulos Competition in Athens (with Byzantium for high voice and orchestra).

Both critics and other artists have recognized composer David Gaines (b. 1961) for his imaginative orchestrations and his uniquely international and eclectic style. His music, which has been performed across North America and Europe, includes two symphonies, concertos for baritone saxophone, trombone, and euphonium, plus a variety of chamber, choral, and electronic music. A graduate of Northwestern University, American University, and Johns Hopkins University's Peabody Conservatory of Music (where he earned a doctoral degree in composition), he has been a faculty member at The New School's online Master of Media Technology degree program via Connected Education, Inc., for which he created the first Internet university-level music course for credit (on the history of electronic music technology), as well as University of Maryland Global Campus (formerly University of Maryland University College), where he held the rank of adjunct associate professor.

American composer and pianist Christopher Jessup is an award-winning artist of formidable prowess. Jessup has garnered international acclaim, with critics praising his “imaginative handling of atmosphere” [Fanfare Magazine] and “high standard of technique” [New York Concert Review]. Furthermore, he has performed at Carnegie Hall countless times, soloed with distinguished orchestras across the globe, and collaborated with some of the finest artists and ensembles of our time.

Ryan Homsey is a versatile, award-winning American composer, equally at home writing for instrumental and choral ensembles, theater, dance, and film. His background in classical, electroacoustic, and popular music draws inspiration from his history as a professional ballet dancer. Homsey’s works have been performed by JACK Quartet, PUBLIQuartet, Access Contemporary Music, ensemble mise-en, Duluth-Superior Symphony Orchestra’s Music to You String Quartet, Boston New Music Initiative, and the Orlando Contemporary Chamber Orchestra at such venues as the Taipei Cultural Center, the Museum of Natural History, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, HERE Arts, and National Sawdust.

Thomas Cabaniss (b. Charleston SC, 1962) is a composer for dance, theater, film, and the concert stage. Cabaniss helped to create the Lullaby Project at Carnegie Hall, serving young parents in shelters, hospitals, and prisons with collaboratively created songs for their children. He has been teaching at Juilliard in the Dance Division since 1998 and in the Music Division since 2007. He served as education director for the New York Philharmonic and Music Animateur at the Philadelphia Orchestra. He has written articles for Chamber Music Magazine and the Teaching Artist Journal. His music is published by Boosey & Hawkes, European American Music, G. Schirmer, and musiCreate publiCations. He is a member of ASCAP and an associated artist of Target Margin Theater.

Samuel Adler was born March 4, 1928 in Mannheim, Germany and came to the United States in 1939. He was inducted into the American Academy of Arts and Letters in May 2001, and then inducted into the American Classical Music Hall of Fame in October 2008. In 2018 he was awarded the Bundesverdienstkreuz (first class), the highest civilian award given by the German government. He is the composer of over 400 published works, including five operas, six symphonies, 17 concerti, eight string quartets, five oratorios, and many other orchestral, band, chamber and choral works, and songs, which have been performed all over the world.

New York City native Michael Cohen has a diverse and expansive career as a composer. His many compositions include works for chamber ensemble, musical theater, opera, and television. He attended the High School of Music and Art and the Dalcroze School of Music, graduated cum laude from Brandeis University, and studied composition with Harold Shapero and Irving Fine.

Avner Finberg is an Israeli American composer and violinist. His music reimagines traditional musical forms and ideas using fragments and stylistic references to wide-ranging sources, while also drawing upon cutting-edge contemporary music techniques. Finberg’s debut album, THE FOUR SEASONS OF ISOLATION, was hailed as “intriguing, entertaining and thought-provoking” by Gramophone Magazine. His music was described by the late composer Steven Stucky as “refined, mature work of impeccable technique, original voice, and considerable ambition.”

Born in San Juan, Puerto Rico, composer Carlos Carrillo holds degrees from the Eastman School of Music (B.M.), Yale University (M.M.), and the University of Pennsylvania (Ph.D.). He is the recipient of numerous awards, including the Bearns Prize, the Charles Ives Scholarship from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, BMI, and ASCAP awards. He has been commissioned by Music and the Anthology, Casals Festival, the New York Youth Symphony, Concert Artists Guild, and Boston Opera Collaborative, among others.

An American whose music has been characterized by "propulsive, syncopated rhythms, colorful orchestration, and instrumental virtuosity," (Robert Kirzinger, Boston Symphony) composer Kevin Day has quickly emerged as one of the leading young voices in the world of music composition today, whose music ranges from powerful introspection to joyous exuberance. Kevin Day is an internationally acclaimed composer, conductor, and pianist, whose music often intersects between the worlds of jazz, minimalism, Latin music, fusion, and contemporary classical idioms.

Sebastian Quesada is a Costa Rican composer interested in exploring the ambiguous and subjective nature of music to evoke specific imagery. Through a blend of diverse genres and processes, his compositions aim to explore musical narratives that are connected to our cultural and social perceptions. His work spans a variety of media, including large and chamber ensembles, rock music, incidental works, installations, and more. This diverse range of mediums has contributed to his intention of synthesizing different elements to explore extra-musical concepts.