2012 McKnight Composer Fellows and Visiting Composers Announced
2012 McKnight Composer Fellows and Visiting Composers Announced
The American Composers Forum today announced the recipients of this year’s McKnight Composition Fellowships, funded by the McKnight Foundation. These awards, which include $25,000 in unrestricted funds for each recipient, are meant to acknowledge excellence in the field of music composition. The four fellows were chosen from a total pool of 85 applicants. This year’s panelists were composers Nancy Galbraith (Pittsburgh, PA), Graham Reynolds (Austin, TX), and Huang Ruo (New York, NY).
The 2012 Composer Fellows are:
Viv Corringham is a vocalist and sound artist, based in Minneapolis, MN, who has worked internationally since the early 1980s. Her work includes music performances and audio installations. She is interested in exploring people’s special relationship with familiar places and how that links to an interior landscape of personal history, memory and association. Her ongoing project “Shadow-walks” has been presented in gallery shows from New York to Istanbul to Portugal.
Christopher Danforth is a composer living in Minneapolis, Minnesota. He studied composition under Henry Gwiazda at Moorhead State University, Moorhead, MN. He has won awards from the American Composers Forum, the Jerome Foundation, the American Music Center and Meet the Composer. His music has been featured in advertising campaigns, interactive websites, skateboarding videos and at new music festivals around the country including the 2011 MATA Festival in New York City and the 9th Annual New Music Festival at California State University, Fullerton.
Perhaps best known as a composer, improviser, sculptor and maker of masks and instruments, Minneapolis, MN composer Douglas R. Ewart is also an educator, lecturer, arts organization consultant and all around visionary. Throughout his acclaimed 40-year career, he has won awards from the Bush Foundation, Jerome Foundation, and McKnight Foundation, and has performed in Tokyo, Perth, Havana, Paris, Stockholm, London, Berlin, and throughout the United States.
Steve Tibbetts is a Saint Paul, MN-based musician known for his original approach to both composing and sound-forming. He plays acoustic and electric guitar as well as exotic percussive instruments. His musical compositions span several genres and styles including experimental, jazz, rock, ambient, and world music. Often more than one genre or style is found in a single composition. He has won 18 awards from the Minnesota Music Awards, as well as grants and fellowships from the Minnesota State Arts Board, Jerome Foundation, InterMedia Arts and the American Composers Forum.
In another McKnight funded program, two artists from outside Minnesota have been selected as Visiting Composers. Each receives $15,000 to spend a minimum of two months in Minnesota pursuing a self-designed community residency project:
Hugh Livingston (Oakland, CA) will be in residence with botanical gardens and arboreta in three Minnesota communities where he will create sound art installations designed to highlight the presence of music in the landscape, entice visitors to the gardens, and educate about ecological soundscapes while introducing new musical forms to community audiences.
Charles Peck (Cincinnati, OH) will partner with a group of schools, museums and organizations representing Minnesota’s large science community to introduce their students and members to electronic music and film composition while learning about science and exploring the connection between physical and musical gestures.
The McKnight Foundation is a multi-issue family foundation founded in Minnesota in 1953 by William L. McKnight and his wife, Maude L. McKnight. Through grantmaking, coalition-building, and encouragement of strategic policy reform, the Foundation seeks to improve the quality of life for present and future generations.
Support for individual artists has been a cornerstone of The McKnight Foundation's Arts program since it began in 1981. The Foundation believes that the arts cannot flourish or enhance community life without the ideas, energy, and drive of individual artists, and that artists cannot make these contributions without unfettered creative time. A fellowship can help an artist set aside a period of time for study, reflection, experimentation, and exploration; take advantage of an opportunity; or work on a new project. Currently, the Foundation contributes about $1.7 million per year to its statewide fellowships, and additional funds support individual artists in Greater Minnesota.
The American Composers Forum is committed to supporting composers and developing new markets for their music. Founded in 1973 as the Minnesota Composers Forum, the organization has grown from an innovative regional initiative into one of the nation’s premier composer service organizations. ACF boasts a worldwide membership of 2,000 artists, organizations and community members. The Forum is proud to administer these programs on behalf of the McKnight Foundation and offers its congratulations to all the recipients. # # #
- Login to post comments
