Composers
Journeys
Orchestral works by American women
Nancy Van de Vate (b.1930) studied at the
Eastman School of Music, Wellesley College, and Florida State University,
where she earned a doctorate in composition. Her works are widely acclaimed,
and have been performed in major cities throughout the world. Van de
Vate is the recipient of a National Endowment for the Arts Composer's
Fellowship and is a first prize-winner of the Los Alamos Chamber Music
Competition. She has been a resident fellow at Yaddo, the MacDowell
Colony, and Ossabaw Island, and an instructor at several American colleges
and universities. Her articles on composers and composing have been
published in Music America, Symphony News, The International Musician,
Music Educators Journal, and The Instrumentalist. Van de
Vate was one of the founders of the International League of Women Composers
in 1975, which she chaired until moving to Indonesia in 1982. She now
resides in Vienna, Austria.
Kay Gardner (1941-2002), a self-taught composer,
was at the forefront of composers creating lyrical, improvisational,
and experimental music designed for meditation, relaxation, and healing.
A pioneer in the current movement to revive the ancient art of healing
through music, color, sound and light, Gardner toured internationally
presenting solo concerts and intensive workshops on music and healing.
From 1975 through 1987 (this CD's release date), five albums of her
works were released on several independent, women-owned labels. Selections
from these recordings have been broadcast internationally and have been
included in films and videos produced in England, Australia, New Zealand,
and in the United States for WGBH television's nationally televised
NOVA series. Gardner received awards from ASCAP, the Astrea Foundation,
the National Endowment for the Arts, Money for Women Fund, Meet the
Composer, and the Maine Composers Festival.
Libby Larsen (b.1950) earned her doctorate
in Composition from the University of Minnesota where she studied with
Dominick Argento, Paul Fetler, and Eric Stokes. She has received commissions
from many prestigious organizations for orchestral works; operas; musical
theater works for children's chorus, Orff ensemble and symphony; and
many other genres. Her music has been performed by most of the leading
orchestras in the USA. Her song cycles, published by Oxford, have already
become staples of both student and professional vocal recitals. A co-founder
and active board member of the Minnesota Composers Forum, Larsen has
also served on the National Endowment for the Arts Music Panel, Meet
the Composer National Advisory Committee, American Music Center Board
of Directors, and the ASCAP Board of Review. She was Composer-in-Residence
with the Minnesota Orchestra from 1983-1987.
Marga Richter (b.1926) was born in Reedsburg,
Wisconsin and received her early musical training in Minneapolis. She
earned her bachelor's and master's degrees at the Juilliard School,
studying composition with William Bergsma and Vincent Persichetti and
piano with Rosalyn Tureck. Among the sources of her many grants, commissions
and awards are the National Endowment for the Arts, Martha Baird Rockefeller
Fund, Harkness Foundation, Meet the Composer, National Federation of
Music Clubs and ASCAP. Richter's works, noted for their expressiveness
and economy of means, have been performed by 50 orchestras, including
the Buffalo Philharmonic, London Philharmonic, Minnesota Orchestra,
and the Milwaukee, Atlanta, Oakland, Oklahoma, Oregon, and Maracaibo
Symphonies.
Ursula Mamlok (b.1928) was born in Berlin,
Germany and began composing as a child. She came to the United States
in 1941 and continued her studies at the Mannes College of Music, where
she earned a bachelor's degree in composition, and at the Manhattan
School of Music, where she obtained her master's degree. Mamlok's honors
include two National Endowment for the Arts fellowships, a grant from
the City University of New York Faculty Research Foundation, and awards
from the American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters, National
Federation of Music Clubs, and the National Orchestra Association. Her
works are performed frequently at major festivals such as Tanglewood
and by prominent ensembles such as the Group for Contemporary Music,
ISCM, Music in Our Time, the Da Capo Chamber Players, New Music Consort
and Parnassus. Mamlok has taught composition at New York University
and the City University of New York, and is a member of the composition
faculty at the Manhattan School of Music.
Katherine Hoover (b.1937) lives in New York.
She was born in West Virginia and grew up in a Philadelphia suburb.
Hoover has received commissions and awards from the National Endowment
for the Arts, American Academy of Arts & Letters, Ditson Fund of
Columbia University, ASCAP, Meet the Composer, and many other organizations.
Her works have been presented throughout the United States and abroad
by such soloists and groups as John Cheek; Eddie Daniels; the Harrisburg
and Santa Fe Symphonies; Women's Philharmonic; the Dorian, Sylvan, Hudson
Valley and Richards Wind Quintets; Atlanta Chamber Players; New Jersey
Chamber Music Society; Alard Quartet; and the Huntingdon and Verdehr
Trios. As a flutist, Hoover has given concerto performances at Lincoln
Center, performed in all of New York's major halls, and made numerous
recordings. She holds degrees from the Eastman and Manhattan Schools
of Music and has taught at Juilliard; the Manhattan School of Music;
and Teachers College, Columbia University.
Jane Brockman's (b.1949) music is informed
by her extensive work in film, television, and dance, as well as the
formal structure of academia. She was the first woman to earn a doctorate
in Composition in the 150-year history of the University of Michigan.
She has been awarded fellowships to study in Paris and Vienna (Fulbright/Alliance
Française and Rackham Prize), as well as grants and honors from
the MacDowell Colony, the State of Connecticut, Meet the Composer, and
the Composers Conference. Her first orchestra piece won the Sigvald
Thompson Prize, and mentors include Ross Lee Finney, Leslie Bassett,
George Balch Wilson, Eugene Kurtz and Wallace Berry. She has taught
at the University of Connecticut, the Hartt School of Music, the University
of Rhode Island and the University of Michigan. After being awarded
a Composers' fellowship from Robert Redford's Sundance Institute, she
was inspired to leave her tenured professorship to score films in Los
Angeles. Today, in Santa Monica, her focus is entirely on concert music.
Her music, which is performed all over the world, is widely recorded,
and published by Diaphanous Music (distributed by Theodore Front Musical
Literature Inc.) and Arsis Press.