Biography

I’m a composer, a producer of creative projects for film, theater and web, and Communications Manager at New Music USA.

I write music that tells stories. I use literature, theater, marimbas, cellos and plenty of jokes. I also blog about the future of the arts. And cocktails.

Composer

Several of my pieces have evolved into films, which I’ve produced with the help of a group of talented filmmakers. These include The Seafarer, an experimental film adaptation of my piece for solo acting cello, and Cucumbers & Gin for solo violin, which was on the front page of Kickstarter.com. You can read more about the project in my award winning case study for Step2.

My adaptation of A Midsummer Night’s Dream is currently in development both online and off. Part opera, part play, and part music-theater piece, Summer’s Twilight tells the story of the four young lovers getting lost in the woods. The fairies, Puck and Oberon, are played by a cello and a marimba, and speak their lines through their instruments.

When the Journeyman restaurant solicited goofy haiku for their bathrooms to replace their “employees must wash hands” signs, I knew I had to turn them into comic art songs. A similar thing happened with Newt Gingrich’s epic press release in May 2011.

Producer

My most recent project was Ruckus Amongstus, a new music variety night at the Exapno New Music Community Center. We used short sets from a wide variety of performers, a high quality cocktail bar, and the integration of youtube videos to create a unique, fun evening that can be shared by new music experts and the broader arts community. It was a cross between the Muppet Show and Darmstadt, and I’m planning to do it again later this year.

As a producer I’ve worked with Harbor Opera on productions of my music and others’, with Thesia Arts on a play for the NY Fringe Festival, and with Evident Films on a documentary about abstract expressionist painter Thornton Willis. I’ve also helped design several Kickstarter campaigns including The Emerging Voices Project.

I serve on the board of the Exapno New Music Community Center, which provides to its members space to compose, rehearse and perform in Brooklyn Heights. I’m also a team captain and co-editor of Actually Happening, a podcast panel game about history and current events that has been the top-rated explicit-tagged history podcast on iTunes.

New Music USA and Meet The Composer

I began at Meet The Composer in the summer of 2008 as a grantwriter, just before the financial crisis hit. Since then, I’ve left development to launch and manage the MTC Studio, a platform to connect new audience members with the journeys of new composers. Our first year culminated in the Three City Dash festival, which I produced, featuring world premieres by Kati Agócs, Marcos Balter, Yu-Hui Chang, Glenn Kotche, Dohee Lee and Ken Ueno.

In November 2011, Meet The Composer and the American Music Center merged, becoming New Music USA. As Communications Manager I work on NewMusicBox, Promoting our grantmaking work, and New Music USA’s digital strategy.

Education

I came to New York after finishing my MM and BM in Composition (Pi Kappa Lambda), and my BA in Philosophy (Phi Beta Kappa), at the Peabody Conservatory and the Johns Hopkins University. A finalist for the Marshall Scholarship, I’ve received awards for composition from the Peabody Camerata, Mu Phi Epsilon and the National Federation of Music Clubs among others. My composition professors include Robert Sirota, Christopher Theofanidis, and Michael Hersch.

As a student at Peabody, I created the Junior Bach program, in which Peabody student composers teach composition lessons at an inner city middle school for talented, low-income students. The pieces written in the program are premiered by Peabody musicians for the students of both schools. Begun as a student project, the program is now a credit-granting course, awarding a scholarship to one middle school composer each year. One of my first students, Tariq Al-Sabir, is currently pursuing his BM at Peabody.