Artists

Omar Carmenates is currently the Associate Professor of Percussion at Furman University in Greenville SC. He holds a Doctor of Music degree from Florida State University, a Master of Music Degree in Percussion Performance from the University of North Texas, and a Bachelor’s degree in Music Education from the University of Central Florida.

A poet who composes. Refines Chinese ancient essence, which combines with western civilization. Also a writer for film, TV and others, right now looking for someone to mediate.

The Escape Ten (Escape X) duo formed from an epic coast-to-coast road trip taken by Annie Stevens and Andrea Venet in a Ford Escape on the Interstate-10 from Virginia to California in 2012. Today, Escape Ten maintains a steady performance schedule touring as guest artists and clinicians internationally. Regularly premiering new works for percussion, they remain active commissioning composers, collaborating on creative projects, joining consortiums, and writing their own pieces. Their mission is to generate creative and diverse music within a variety of genres and timbral contexts in order to bring challenging, lasting works into the standard repertoire.

The McCormick Percussion Group is recognized by critics and composers throughout the world for their unique recordings and interpretations of music decidedly outside of the mainstream. MPG often collaborates with other non-percussion musicians to explore and develop new trends of compositional thought. Among the most recorded ensembles of the genre, MPG has recorded many award winning albums for Ravello Records (dist. by Naxos). To ensure the original intent of each work, composers are often invited to rehearse with the ensemble and supervise recording sessions. Under the direction of Robert McCormick, MPG is a resident ensemble at the University of South Florida in Tampa.

Robert McCormick is currently Professor of Music at the University of South Florida in Tampa. He served as principal percussionist/assistant timpanist with the Florida Orchestra for 20 seasons. He is a former member of the Harry Partch Ensemble and often performs and records with high profile artists of all genres. In 2010, he conducted the premiere performance of Chan Hae Lee’s Korean folk opera Simcheongga at the National Center of Performing Arts in Seoul. In March 2014 McCormick performed the world premiere of Baljinder Sekhon’s Double Percussion Concerto at Carnegie Hall with percussionist Lee Hinkle. McCormick was the 2006 recipient of the Florida Music Educator of the Year Award; the 2007 Grand Prize in the Keystone Percussion Composition Award; the 2010 University Distinguished Teacher Award; and the 2015 Percussive Arts Society Lifetime Achievement in Education Award. He has also received several Global Music Awards for his albums, many of which are published on the Ravello Records label and distributed by Naxos. McCormick proudly endorses Encore Mallets, Grover Pro Percussion, and Zildjian Cymbals.

Mike Frengel is an internationally recognized composer, performer, researcher, and educator. Born in Mountain View, California, Mike graduated with a B.A. in electroacoustic music from San Jose State University in 1995, where he studied composition and sound production with Allen Strange and Dan Wyman. He spent another three years in the San Francisco Bay Area working at Apple Computers Inc. as well as remaining affiliated with the C.R.E.A.M. Studios at SJSU as a Research Scientist. Mike completed his M.A. in electroacoustic music composition at the Bregman Studios at Dartmouth College in 1999 under the tutelage of Jon Appleton, Charles Dodge, Larry Polansky, and Christian Wolff. He completed his Ph.D. at City University, London, where he studied composition with Denis Smalley.

Stephen Goss’s music receives hundreds of performances worldwide each year. It has been recorded on over 80 CDs by more than a dozen record labels, including EMI, Decca, Telarc, Virgin Classics, Naxos, and Deutsche Grammophon. His output embraces multiple genres: orchestral and choral works, chamber music, and solo pieces. He is considered ‘One of the guitar’s finest living composers’ (International Record Review).

Praised by The Strad magazine for their "wit and imagination", the trailblazing Patterson/Sutton cello and guitar duo continue to be in demand as they bring the rich cello and guitar repertoire to audiences around the world. The Patterson/Sutton duo were featured artists at the 2016 Guitar Foundation of America Convention and have an ongoing relationship with The Juilliard School as Juilliard Global Visiting Artists. The duo have been featured on Performance Today/American Public Media, Radio New Zealand, Fine Music Radio South Africa, among many others.

Joel Gressel (b. Cleveland, 1943) received a B.A. from Brandeis University and a Ph.D. in music composition from Princeton University.  He studied composition with Martin Boykan and Milton Babbitt, and computer music with Godfrey Winham and J.K. Randall.  His computer music has been recorded on the Odyssey,  CRI, and American Composers Edition labels.  He currently lives in New York and works as a computer programmer, maintaining and extending software that models tax-exempt housing-bond cash flows.

Jackson Greenberg is a Los Angeles-based composer, producer, and performer born and raised in Philadelphia. From a young age, Jackson was a featured soloist in various Philadelphia all-city youth jazz ensembles. He was close to pursuing a career in jazz performance when, during his senior year, his high school drama teacher insisted he write the score for her two plays: Dracula and The Tempest. It was these experiences of witnessing his compositions supporting drama that led Jackson to instead pursue a career in composition.

Acclaimed by Fanfare Magazine as “Masterful...a modernized Rachmaninoff” Christopher J. Keyes (b. 1963) began his career as a pianist, winning many competitions and later making his “double-debut” in Carnegie Hall as both soloist and guest composer with the New York Youth Symphony. He began formal composition lessons at the University of California at Santa Barbara, earning a B.M. in Piano Performance and a B.A. in Creative Studies with an emphasis in composition. He continued his musical training at the Eastman School of Music, completing his doctorate in 1992. His major composition teachers include Joseph Schwantner, Samuel Adler, Christopher Rouse, and Robert Morris. Among his numerous awards are the Eastman Szernovsky Award, several ASCAP Grants to Young Composers, and the Rudolf Nissim Award for best orchestral work written by a living ASCAP member. He is also an author of various scholarly articles on subjects including audio engineering, the pedagogy of composition, and music technology.

Kirk O'Riordan's music has been referred to as “unapologetically beautiful” and is often praised for its uniquely “visual” qualities that depict a wide range of striking moods. Gramophone Magazine praised O’Riordan as “a composer for whom imagery is a defining inspiration. ...[He] is a deeply sensitive composer who savours going gently into the night.” O’Riordan (b. 1968) is an active composer, conductor, saxophonist, and teacher.

Composer Anne Neikirk is drawn to creative processes that involve interdisciplinary work. Her background in vocal music instilled a particular interest in the relationship between music and the written word. Past awards and grants include the Presser Music Award, an American Composers Forum Subito Grant, and inclusion in the Society of Composers CD Series. Neikirk has presented her work at conferences including those of the Society of Composers, the College Music Society, the Society of Electroacoustic Music in the United States, and the American Harp Society, among others. Her music is distributed by ADJective New Music, LLC.

In 2010, Greg Harrison and Jonny Smith created the percussion duo Taktus while pursuing Masters Degrees at the University of Toronto. With a wide range of musical influences - from classical to electronic - Taktus seeks to create music that crosses borders between genres and is relevant to contemporary audiences. Their premiere project is set of marimba duet arrangements of Glass Houses - a seminal work of Canadian minimalism by composer Ann Southam.

Leonard V. Ball, Jr. was Associate Professor Emeritus of Composition and Theory at the University of Georgia, where he taught music theory, acoustic composition, electronic composition, and music technology. While at UGA, he was also Director of the University of Georgia electronic studio from 1987 to 1995; Director of the Roger and Phyllis Dancz Center for New Music Electronic Studios from 1995 to 2001; Director of the Roger and Phyllis Dancz Center for New Music from 2002 to June 2015; and Chair of the Composition/Theory area from 2010 to June 2015.

Polevaya’s journey as a musician began with classical training on several instruments. She then became immersed in more experimental forms of performance, in particular electroacoustic improvisation with effect pedals. Polevaya’s performance background ties closely with her compositional work, which is often infused with electronics, found objects, and theatrical elements.

The Canadian-American duo of flutist Zara Lawler and marimbist Paul J. Fadoul, hailed as “a great treat” (Classical WETA, Washington DC), offers audiences an unexpected mélange of classical virtuosity, lively commentary, theatrical flair, and a dose of indie rock sensibility. The duo’s repertoire ranges from delightful arrangements of classics to newly written pieces for their unusual instrumentation. Their debut album, Prelude Cocktail, was called “collaborative artistry at its finest” by I Care If You Listen. Recent highlights include a residency in Western Massachusetts as part of Chamber Music America’s Residency Partnership Program, tours of West Virginia, Michigan, and Ohio, and a New York appearance at Mannes School of Music’s Glassbox Performance Space. In 2016, Lawler + Fadoul incubated and premiered their theatrical concert, Clickable: The Art of Persuasion, at the cell theatre in New York City. Clickable has been performed across the United States.

Akemi Naito is a composer based in New York City. Born in Tokyo, she studied composition at the University Division of the Toho Gakuen School of Music and was a member of the school’s faculty from 1980 to 1991. Following her earlier activity as a composer in Tokyo, she received a grant from the Asian Cultural Council that enabled her to move to New York City in 1991.

Maija Hynninen (b. 1977) — composer and sound artist — works in concert music, electronic instrument design, and multidisciplinary performances. The essence of her music builds on the unique moments where the parameters of this world are slightly altered to allow a glimpse of another reality to be present. It can be a moment where the timbre of purely acoustical writing gives surprising results or when electronics project sound into another domain, space, and reality.

James O’Callaghan (b. 1988) is a composer and sound artist based in Montréal praised for his “mastery of materials and musical form” (Electromania, Radio France). His music has been described as “very personal... with its own colour anchored in the unpredictable” (Goethe- Institut). His work spans chamber, orchestral, live electronic and acousmatic idioms, audio installations, and site-specific performances. It often employs field recordings, amplified found objects, computer-assisted transcription of environmental sounds, and unique performance conditions.