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Violet Archer (April 24, 1913 – February 21, 2000) was a Canadian composer, teacher, pianist, organist, and percussionist. Born Violet Balestreri in Montreal, Quebec, her family changed their name to Archer. She died in Ottawa. Archer earned an LMus degree from McGill in 1934, and a BMus degree from McGill in 1936. She traveled to New York in the summer of 1942 where she studied with Béla Bartók, "who introduced her to Hungarian folk tunes and to variation technique. She taught at the McGill Conservatory from 1944-1947. Later in the 1940's she studied with Paul Hindemith at Yale. She earned a BMus from Yale in 1948, and a MMus also from Yale in 1949. From 1950-53 Archer was Composer-in Residence at the University of North Texas. From 1953 through 1961 she taught at the University of Oklahoma. Returning to Canada in 1961 for doctoral study at the University of Toronto, she set that aside when, in 1962, she joined the Faculty of Music at the University of Alberta. There she would become chairman of the Theory and Composition Department. She remained at the University of Alberta until her retirement. Her notable students include Larry Austin and Jan Randall.

Born March 4, 1928 in Mannheim, Germany; came to the United States in 1939. Inducted into the American Academy of Arts and Letters in May 2001, Samuel Adler is the composer of over 400 published works, including 5 operas, 6 symphonies, 12 concerti, 8 string quartets, 4 oratorios, many other orchestral, band, chamber, choral works, and songs, which have been performed all over the world. He is also the author of three books: Choral Conducting, an anthology (Holt, Reinhart, and Winston 1971, second edition Schirmer Books 1985); Sight Singing, (W.W. Norton 1979, 1997); and The Study of Orchestration, (W.W. Norton 1982, 1989, 2001). He has also contributed numerous articles to major magazines and books published in the U.S. and abroad.

Adler was educated at Boston University and Harvard University, and holds four honorary doctorates (Southern Methodist University, Wake Forest University, St. Mary's Notre-Dame, and the St. Louis Conservatory). His major teachers in composition were Herbert Fromm, Walter Piston, Randall Thompson, Paul Hindemith, and Aaron Copland. He studied conducting with Serge Koussevitzky.

He is Professor-emeritus at the Eastman School of Music where he taught from 1966 to 1995 and served as chair of the composition department from 1974 until his retirement. Before going to Eastman, Adler served as professor of composition at the University of North Texas (1957-1966), Music Director at Temple Emanu-El in Dallas, TX (1953-1966), and Instructor of Fine Arts at the Hockaday School in Dallas TX (1955-1966). From 1954-1958, he was music director of the Dallas Lyric Theater and the Dallas Chorale. Since 1997, he has been a member of the composition faculty at the Juilliard School of Music in New York City. Adler has given master classes and workshops at over 300 Universities worldwide, and in the summers has taught at major music festivals such as Tanglewood, Aspen, Brevard, Bowdoin, as well as others in France, Germany, Israel, Spain, Austria, Poland, South America, Korea, and China.

Adler has been awarded many prizes including a 1990 award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, the Charles Ives Award, the Lillian Fairchild Award, the MTNA award for Composer of the Year (1988-1989), Special Citation by the American Federation of Music Clubs (2001. In 1983, he won the Deems Taylor Award for his book The Study of Orchestration. In 1988-89, he was designated Phi Beta Kappa Scholar, in 1989 he received the Eastman School's Eisenhard Award for distinguished teaching, in 1991 he was honored being named the Composer of the Year by the American Guild of Organists. Adler was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship (1975-1976), he has been a MacDowell Fellow for five years, and during his second visit to Chile, he was elected to the Chilean Academy of Fine Arts (1993) — for his outstanding contribution to the world of music as a composer. In 1999, he was elected to the Akademie der Keunste in Germany for distinguished service to music. While serving in the United States Army (1950-1952), Adler founded and conducted the Seventh Army Symphony Orchestra, and because of the orchestra's great psychological and musical impact on European culture, he was awarded the Army's Medal of Honor. In May 2003, Adler was awarded the Aaron Copland Award by ASCAP on the occasion of his 75th birthday for life-time achievement in Composition and Teaching.

Adler has appeared as conductor with many major symphony orchestras both in the U.S. and abroad. His compositions are published by Theodore Presser, Oxford University Press, G. Schirmer, Carl Fischer, E.C. Schirmer, Peters Edition, Ludwig Music, Southern Music Publishers, Transcontinental Music Publishers: and recorded on Naxos, RCA, Gaspara, Albany, CRI, Crystal, New World, and Vanguard.

Merrill Ellis (1916-1981) began studying music in his birthplace of Cleburne, Texas. After early piano study he switched to the clarinet and later taught himself to play saxophone, playing both instruments in his early teens in various area jazz bands. He also played in a National Guard band before he was legally old enough to join the military service and on one momentous occasion performed with a mounted cavalry band at a camp in Wichita Falls, Texas. In 1935, Merrill Ellis enrolled for study at Oklahoma University, receiving both a Bachelor's degree (1939) and Master's degree (1941) from that institution. During his collegiate years he contyinued to play in several dance and jazz bands as well as the University Symphony Orchestra, and he worked as an arranger/copyist for the Oklahoma City Symphony. While at Oklahoma University he began to compose seriously, and for many years studied privately with composer Roy Harris, with whom he developed a lasting friendship.

Ellis joined the North Texas faculty in 1962, making significant contributions to the School of Music as it achieved national and international prominence. He founded the Electronic Music Center and pioneered many developments in the field of electronic and intermedia music. During his tenure at North Texas, Ellis persuaded Robert Moog, inventor of the synthesizer, to design and build another example of the instrument (the second one ever made) for him and his students to use. The world-renowned Center for Experimental Music and Intermedia at North Texas is an outgrowth of his early foresight, and the Merrill Ellis Intermedia Theater remains a lasting tribute to his visionary ideals.

The UNT Willis Library houses a collection of performance materials for Merrill Ellis' complete works (tapes, slides, films, instructions, masters) as well as recordings of historical importance such as the John Cage Lecture, the Roy Harris Informal Evening, and a tape of Ellis discussing plans for the new music building.

The Merrill Ellis Memorial Composition Scholarship Endowment provides an annual award to a composition student with particular interest in experimental music and intermedia works. To make a contribution to this endowment, please contact:

UNT College of Music
Attn: Elida Tamez
P.O. Box 311367
Denton TX 76203-1367
(940) 565-2243

William Peters Latham was born in Shreveport, Louisiana, January 4th, 1917. He was educated in Kentucky, Ohio and New York, completing degrees in composition and theory at the Cincinnati College of Music in Cincinnati, Ohio. Later, he was awarded a Ph.D. in composition at the Eastman School of Music of the University of Rochester in Rochester, New York (1951). His principal composition teachers were Eugene Goossens and Howard Hanson.

Latham taught theory and composition at the University of Northern Iowa from 1946 to 1965, attaining the rank of Professor of Music in 1959. In 1965 he joined the faculty of the College of Music at the University of North Texas (North Texas State University) as Professor of Music and Coordinator of Composition. He was appointed Director of Graduate Studies in Music in 1969. In 1978 he was promoted to the rank of Distinguished Professor of Music, the University's highest rank. Only seven other faculty members of the University had been so honored at that time. He retired from active service at UNT in June, 1984, and he was formally designated Professor Emeritus by the Board of Regents in November, 1984.

Dr. Latham has composed 118 works; 62 have been published, 56 remain in manuscript, but all have been performed; many throughout the United States, Canada, Europe, and Japan. He has received numerous awards and commissions (29). His orchestral works have been performed by the Cincinnati Symphony, the Eastman-Rochester Philharmonic, the Dallas Symphony, the St. Louis Symphony, and Radio Orchestras in Brussels, Belgium and Hilversum, Holland, under such well known conductors as Eugene Goossens, Howard Hanson, Thor Johnson, Anshel Brusilow, John Giordano, and Walter Susskind.

Dr. Latham died in Denton, Texas on February 24, 2004. Memorial donations may be made to:

William P. Latham Composition Fund
UNT College of Music
Attn: Elida Tamez
P.O. Box 311367
Denton TX 76203-1367
(940) 565-2243

Dr. Martin S. Mailman (1932-2000) was born on June 30, 1932 in New York City. He served on the College of Music faculty at the University of North Texas for thirty-four years as the Coordinator of Composition, Regents Professor of Music, and Composer-in-Residence. He served for two years in the United States Navy, was a Ford Foundation composer in Jacksonville, Florida, and was the first Composer-in-Residence at East Carolina University, Greenville, North Carolina.

A composition student of Louis Mennini, Wayne Barlow, Bernard Rogers, and Howard Hanson, he earned his BM, MM, and PhD degrees from the Eastman School of Music in Rochester, New York. He was among the first contemporary American composers chosen in 1959 to participate in The Young Composers Project sponsored by the Ford Foundation and the National Music Council. Dr. Mailman received numerous awards and grants for composition, which include two American Bandmasters Association/Ostwald prizes for composition, the National Band Association/Band Mans Company prize for composition, and the Edward Benjamin Award. He won the 1982 Queen Marie-Jose Prize for composition in Geneva, Switzerland for his Concerto for Violin and Orchestra (Variations). His works include chamber music, band, choral, and orchestral music, film scores, television music, an opera, and a requiem for chorus, orchestra, and soloists. The impact of his music, teaching, and career is immeasurable: a frequently sought-after clinician and teacher, Dr. Mailman served as guest conductor/composer at more than ninety colleges and universities across the United States and Europe.

He was a leader in promoting comprehensive musicianship programs through MENC throughout his career and gave presentations at conventions and schools across the country. Instead of featuring his own music, he always focused on music in general and the impact it has on students and professionals alike. He was particularly intrigued by the compositional process and the concept of music as "sound with intent over time."

He was a member and active supporter of ASCAP, MENC, Phi Mu Alpha Sinfonia, Pi Kappa Lambda, the American Bandmasters Association, TUBA, and Sigma Alpha Iota (National Arts Associate).

Some of his many works for band include Geometrics 1 for Band, Op. 22; Concertino for Trumpet and Band, Op. 31; Liturgical Music for Band, Op. 33; A Simple Ceremony: In Memoriam John Barnes Chance, Op. 53; Night Vigil, Op. 66; Exaltations, Op. 67; The Jewel in the Crown, Op. 78; For precious friends hid in death's dateless night, Op. 80; Toward the Second Century, Op. 82; Concertino for Clarinet and Band, Op. 83; Bouquets, Op. 87; Concerto for Wind Orchestra (Variations), Op. 89; Secular Litanies, Op. 90; and Pledges, Op. 98.

The Martin Mailman Memorial Composition Scholarship Endowment provides an annual award to a deserving composition student whose work reflects the spirit of Dr. Mailman's musical vision. To make a contribution to this endowment, please contact:

UNT College of Music
Attn: Elida Tamez
P.O. Box 311367
Denton TX 76203-1367
(940) 565-2243

Newel Kay Brown is a native of Salt Lake City, Utah, where he first studied composition with Leroy Robertson at the University of Utah. Graduate degrees were undertaken at the University of California at Berkeley and Eastman School of Music, where he completed his PhD in Composition & Theory under Bernard Rogers, Howard Hanson, and Wayne Barlow. Teaching positions included Centenary College for Women in New Jersey, Henderson State College in Arkansas, and the University of North Texas, where he retired as chairman of the composition division in the College of Music. His catalog of compositions reflects an interest in a variety of styles and instrumental combinations.

Dr. Brown is a former member of the Mormon Tabernacle Choir. He presently resides in Dallas, Texas.

Thomas Clark, born 1949 in Michigan, earned three degrees from The University of Michigan, including a Doctor of Musical Arts degree in 1976. He studied composition with Pulitzer Prize winner Leslie Bassett, Eugene Kurtz, electroacoustic music with George Balch Wilson, conducting with Sydney Hodkinson, and music theory with Wallace Berry and Richmond Browne. He was trombonist for Contemporary Directions, Michigan’s Rockefeller Foundation supported new music repertory ensemble, and elsewhere studied trombone with contemporary virtuoso trombonist Stuart Dempster.

After teaching at The University of Michigan, Indiana University, Pacific Lutheran University, and for 10 summers at the National Music Camp in Interlochen, Michigan, in 1976 Dr. Clark joined the composition and music theory faculties of the University of North Texas. There he developed the New Music Performance Lab and served as Chair of the Doctor of Musical Arts program and Director of CEMI, the Center for Experimental Music and Intermedia. He went on to serve eight years as Associate Dean for Academic Affairs and one year (2000-2001) as Interim Dean of the UNT College of Music. Dr. Clark retired in August of 2004 from the UNT faculty after a 33-year college teaching career, and was named a Professor Emeritus of the university.

Active in music societies, he has served as President of the Texas Society for Music Theory, Regional Chair and National Council member of the American Society of University Composers (now SCI), and South Central Chapter President of the College Music Society. He is a member of Pi Kappa Lambda music honors fraternity and an honorary member of Phi Mu Alpha Sinfonia.

Clark’s compositions have been performed at festivals throughout the U.S.A., in Canada and Japan, three times at the Brno International Music Festival in the Czech Republic, and at the Festival Internacional Alfonso Reyes in Monterrey, Mexico. Several of his works, affiliated with BMI, are published by Borik Press and recorded on Centaur Records. His writing has appeared in Perspectives of New Music, In Theory Only, Computer Music Journal, New Groves Dictionary of American Music, and Contemporary Composers (published by St. James Press of London). Co-author with Larry Austin of the text, Learning to Compose (1989), Clark also authored ARRAYS: A Worktext of Musical Patterns for Aural Development, published in 1992.

Larry Austin (b. 1930, Oklahoma), composer, was educated in Texas and California, studying with Canadian composer Violet Archer (University of North Texas), French composer Darius Milhaud (Mills College), and American composer Andrew Imbrie (University of California, Berkeley). He also enjoyed extended associations in California in the 1960s with composers John Cage, Karlheinz Stockhausen, and David Tudor.

Highly successful as a composer for traditional as well as experimental music genres, Austin's works have been performed and recorded by the New York Philharmonic, Boston Symphony, and the National Symphony orchestras, as well as many other major ensembles in North America and Europe. Austin has received numerous commissions, grants, and awards, and his works are widely performed and recorded. Since 1964, Austin has composed more than eighty works incorporating electroacoustic and computer music media: combinations of tape, instruments, voices, orchestra, live-electronics and real-time computer processing, as well as solo audio and video tape compositions. Over the past ten years, Austin has been invited to a number of residencies to work on his compositions. In summer, 1997, Austin was Magistère composer-in-residence at the BEAST studios at the University of Birmingham, UK.

From 1958 to 1972 Austin was a member of the music faculty of the University of California, Davis, active there as a conductor, performer, and composer. There, in 1966, he co-founded, edited, and published the seminal new music journal, SOURCE: Music of the Avant Garde. Subsequently, he served on the faculties of the University of South Florida, 1972-78, and the University of North Texas, 1978-96, founding and directing extensive computer music studios at both universities. In 1986 he founded and served as president (1986-2000) of CDCM: Consortium to Distribute Computer Music, producer of the CDCM Computer Music Series on Centaur Records, with thirty-five compact disc volumes released since 1988. On the Board of Directors of the International Computer Music Association (1984-88, 1990-98), Austin served as its president, 1990-94. Retiring from his 38-year academic career in 1996, Austin resides with his wife Edna at their home in Denton, Texas. Working in and out of his Denton studio, gaLarry, Austin continues his active composing career with commissions, tours, performances, writing, recordings, and lecturing, anticipating future extended composer residencies in North America, Asia, and Europe.

David Dzubay was born in 1964 in Minneapolis, grew up in Portland, Oregon, and earned a D.M. in Composition at Indiana University in 1991. Additional study was undertaken as a Koussevitzky Fellow in Composition at the Tanglewood Music Center (1990), at the June in Buffalo Festival, and as co-principal trumpet of the National Repertory Orchestra in Colorado (1988, 1989). His principal teachers were Donald Erb, Frederick Fox, Eugene O'Brien, Lukas Foss, Oliver Knussen, Allan Dean and Bernard Adelstein.

David Dzubay's music has been performed in the U.S., Europe, Canada, Mexico, and Asia, by ensembles including the symphony orchestras of Aspen, Atlanta, Baltimore, Cincinnati, Detroit, Honolulu, Kansas City, Louisville, Memphis, Minnesota, Oregon, Oakland, St. Louis and Vancouver; the American Composers Orchestra, National Symphonies of Ireland and Mexico, New World Symphony, National Repertory Orchestra and New York Youth Symphony; and ensembles including Le Nouvel Ensemble Moderne (Montreal), Onix (Mexico), Manhattan Brass, Voices of Change (Dallas), the Alexander and Orion String Quartets, the League/ISCM, Earplay and the San Francisco Contemporary Music Players. Recent honors include a 2007 Guggenheim Fellowship, 2007 Djerassi Artist Residency, 2006 and 2007 MacDowell Colony Fellowships, 2007 Indianapolis Chamber Orchestra Composition Competition, 2005 Utah Arts Festival Commission, 2005 Columbia Orchestra American Composers Competition, 2004 William Revelli Memorial Prize from the National Band Association, 2003 Commission from the Metropolitan Wind Symphony, 2001 Walter Beeler Memorial Prize, 2000 Wayne Peterson Prize, and grants from the Aaron Copland Fund for Music for all-Dzubay CDs by Voices of Change (innova 588) and the Manhattan Brass (Bridge). Dzubay has also received awards from the NEA (1992-1993), BMI (1987, 1988), ASCAP (1988, 1989, 1990), the American Music Center, Composers, Inc., Phi Mu Alpha Sinfonia, Indiana State University, Indiana University (including the “Outstanding Junior Faculty Award”), the Tanglewood Music Center, and the Cincinnati Symphony.

David Dzubay served on the faculty of the University of North Texas in 1991-92 and is currently Professor of Music, Chair of the Composition Department, and Director of the New Music Ensemble at the Indiana University Jacobs School of Music in Bloomington. Dzubay has conducted at the Tanglewood, Aspen, and June in Buffalo festivals. He has also conducted the Pittsburgh New Music Ensemble, the Greater Dallas Youth Symphony Orchestra, Music from China, Voices of Change, an ensemble from the Minnesota Orchestra, the Kentuckiana Brass and Percussion Ensemble and strings from the Louisville Orchestra at the Maple Mount Music Festival. From 1995 to 1998 he served as Composer-Consultant to the Minnesota Orchestra, helping direct their "Perfect-Pitch" reading sessions, and during 2005-2006 he was Meet the Composer/American Symphony Orchestra League Music Alive Composer-in-Residence with the Green Bay Symphony Orchestra.

Composer/performer Joseph Butch Rovan was Associate Professor of Composition and served as director of CEMI at UNT from 2000-2004. He currently serves on the faculty of the Department of Music at Brown University, where he co-directs meme@brown (Multimedia & Electronic Music Experiments @ Brown) and the Ph.D. program in Computer Music and Multimedia. Prior to his appointments at Brown and UNT, Rovan was a "compositeur en recherche" with the Real-Time Systems Team at the Institut de Recherche et Coordination Acoustique/Musique (IRCAM) in Paris. Rovan worked at Opcode Systems before leaving for Paris, serving as Product Manager for MAX, OMS and MIDI hardware.

Rovan is the recipient of several awards, including a jury selection and second prize in the 1998 and 2001 Bourges International Electroacoustic Music Competitions, and a first prize in the 2002 Berlin Transmediale International Media Arts Festival. Recent performances include the performance of his "Vis-à-vis" for voice, electronics and video at the 2004 International Computer Music Conference (ICMC) in Miami, performances at the 2005 Spark Festival and the 2005 New Interfaces for Musical Expression (NIME) Conference, and the premiere of his "Hopper Confessions" for cello and interactive electronics at the 2003 Festival Synthèse in Bourges, France. Rovan frequently performs his own work, including performances at the 2000 ICMC in Berlin and the 2002 NIME conference, as well as many recent performances with the interactive performance duo "Envyloop". His interactive scores for dance have been programmed in Munich, Paris, Reims, Monaco, the 2001 SEAMUS conference in Baton Rouge and the 2001 ICMC in Havana.

Rovan's research into gestural control and interactivity has been featured in IRCAM's journal Resonance, Electronic Musician, Computer Music Journal, the Japanese magazine SoundArts and is featured on the CDROM Trends in Gestural Control of Music, published by IRCAM (2000).