Composition Student Resources

Doctoral composition candidate Hsiao-Lan Wang has accepted a position at Montana State University, where she will teach in the music technology program beginning in the fall of 2008.

Undergraduate composer Mark Scott’s Spring Lightning for trombone quartet received its premiere performance at the International Trombone Festival in Salt Lake City, Utah on 28 May 2008. It was performed by the Bell Street Four trombone quartet, a UNT ensemble in which the composer also plays.

Works by three UNT composers were selected for performance on 21 May 2008 at the Denton Visual Arts Center, as part the Greater Denton Arts Council Composition Competition: Greg Dixon's Train of Thought (Derailed) for oboe/English horn and computer music, featuring UNT oboist Victoria Eastman; Jason Fick's tape piece McKinney Street Freight; and Dave Gedosh's tape piece Train Song. The Greater Denton Arts Council presented a cash award to Dave Gedosh following the performance.

On 28 April 2008, UNT alumni Ben and Kristin Polk performed undergraduate composer Mark Scott’s Improbable Edges, a duet for oboe and tenor trombone, at Louisiana Tech University in Ruston, LA. The performance was part of a Guest Artist recital presented by Ben Polk, who received his Artist Certificate from UNT in May 2008.

Cantus Curatio (2008) for alto saxophone and piano by doctoral composer Da Jeong Choi was performed by Chiaki Hanafusa and Hsing-Yin Ko for the NASA Biennial Saxophone Conference at the
 University of South Carolina,
 Columbia, on 19 April 2008.

In April of 2008, undergraduate composer Chaz Underriner's composition, Rondo for Viola Solo, was premiered at Rice University in Houston by violist Rachel Kuipers. Also during the spring 2008, Chaz composed and recorded improvisatory guitar music for a UNT RTVF master's student documentary, Searching For Juan Carlos. Chaz also composes and performs in an experimental indie-folk band, Baruch the Scribe, that regularly plays in the Dallas/Ft. Worth area.

On 5 April 2008 Three Pieces on the Shapes of a Pair by doctoral composer Sarah Page Summar premiered at the Campus Theatre in downtown Denton as part of the 2008 Collage Dance Festival. The work was a collaboration with TWU choreographer Lily Sloan and was performed by Ms. Sloan and Emily Lockard with musicians Jon Jackson, Gary Knudson, Tim Mabrey, Laura Nieman, Sarah Summar, and Rachel Yoder.

Works by the following UNT composers were presented at the 2008 conference of the Society for Electroacoustic Music in the United States (SEAMUS) at the University of Utah (April 2008): Nick Bober and Stephen Lucas (Shattered Images),Camilo Salazar and alumna Jessica Leza (Vejez naciente, Naciente vejez), faculty member Jon Christopher Nelson (Just After the Rain), alumni Mikel Kuehn and Elainie Lillios, and former faculty members Butch Rovan and Larry Austin.

Pontis (2007) for marimba solo by doctoral composer Da Jeong Choi has received several performances during the spring 2008 semester by UNT faculty percussionist Mark Ford: East Carolina State University (22 February 2008), Messiah College in Grantham, PA (24 March 2008), Indiana University of Pennsylvania (26 March 2008), and Cameron University in Lawton, Oklahoma (4 April 2008).

Doctoral composition student Dave Gedosh curated a program of electroacoustic music for the Living Arts of Tulsa's "New Genre Festival" on 8 March 2008. Featured UNT composers included Nick Bober, Greg Dixon, Dave Gedosh, Stephen Lucas, Joseph Klein, Andrew May, Jon Nelson, and alumna Jessica Leza. UNT percussionist Julie Licata was featured in two of the works.

Undergraduate composer Kris Peysen’s chamber ensemble piece, Seeker, was selected as the winner of the 9th Annual Russell Horn Young Composer’s Project. In addition to a cash prize, the work was performed by Voices of Change at Caruth Auditorium (SMU campus) on 2 March 2008. Doctoral composer Da Jeong Choi received Honorable Mention in the competition.

The interactive composition LÜ (for erhu and msp) by doctoral composer Jing Wang was selected for inclusion in the International Women's Electroacoustic Listening Room Project at California State University, Fullerton, on 1 March 2008.

Czardas (for erhu and string orchestra), orchestrated and arranged by doctoral composer Jing Wang, was performed by Ms. Wang and the Cobb Symphony Orchestra in Atlanta, Georgia, on 23-24 February 2008.

Greg Dixon participated as a guest composer at Capital University's NOW Music Festival in Columbus, OH, in February 2008. His piece for snare drum and computer, Imprints, was performed at the festival by UNT percussionist Julie Licata.