Announcement

It is with sadness that we report the passing of Professor Phil Winsor on 23 January 2012. Prof. Winsor was a member of the UNT composition faculty from 1982 through 2010, during which time he served as co-founder and director of CEMI and as chair of the composition division (1996-97). We share the sentiments of Phil's many friends, colleagues, and former students in conveying our condolences to the Winsor family during this time of mourning and remembrance.

In lieu of flowers, the family requests that donations be sent to:

Phil Winsor Scholarship Fund
UNT College of Music
Attn: Beth Jackson
1155 Union Circle #311367
Denton, Tx 76203

About the Program

The composition program at the University of North Texas is one of the largest and most diverse in the nation, with approximately 70 composition students and seven faculty members representing a variety of compositional aesthetics and approaches. Regular guest composer residencies, visiting new music specialists, and dozens of events each year provide students with a rich educational and artistic experience.

An interdisciplinary center within UNT’s Division of Composition Studies, the Center for Experimental Music & Intermedia (CEMI) provides a unique environment for the exploration of time-based arts and is internationally renowned for its long history of innovation, particularly in the realm of electroacoustic music. Students, faculty, guests, and collaborators from a variety of disciplines engage in research, creation, and performance in CEMI’s six production studios and the Merrill Ellis Intermedia Theater.

Music Now is the weekly composition departmental meeting, an open forum for the exchange of ideas and information about the creation, performance, and understanding of recent music. These forums, which are typically scheduled Mondays at 11:00-11:50 am, feature presentations by UNT faculty and students as well as visiting composers, scholars, and interpreters of new music.

Nova is the new music ensemble of the University of North Texas. In keeping with its mission to present a diversity of musical, aesthetic, and cultural experiences, Nova’s repertoire ranges from 20th century classics to works that incorporate the latest musical innovations. Students in the ensemble have opportunities to work with faculty and guest composers and are occasionally joined by faculty and guest performers. Performances and workshops have included music by composition students as well.

The Spectrum concert series features new solo and chamber works for instruments and voices by student composers; Centerpieces concerts feature works created at the Center for Experimental Music and Intermedia utilizing new technologies and intermedia.

The Composers Forum is a student organization devoted to coordinating performances and bringing new works to public attention. The organization was formed to foster the spirit of collaboration between composers, performers, and artists of all kinds throughout the UNT community.

The Initiative for Advanced Research in Technology and the Arts (iARTA) is an interdisciplinary research cluster represented by faculty from across a wide spectrum of the arts, engineering and sciences. iARTA activities include scholarship, creative research and technical development at the leading edges of emergent media practice; the resulting research areas are represented by diverse forms such as telematic performance, immersive installation, robotic sculpture, mobile networks, and art-science collaboration. The cluster also publishes the MOEBIUS Journal, which explores the intersection of theory and practice in electronic arts.

2012-13 Guest Artists

Upcoming Events

  • Sep
    18
    Music Now
    • Randy Foster, Licensing and Business Development Manager for Naxos [tentative]
    • Merrill Ellis Intermedia Theater
    • 11:00am

Recent Division News

  • Alumna composer Michelle Alonso (BM 2011) has been awarded a Helene Wurlitzer Foundation Residency Fellowship for the summer of 2012. The fellowship provides three months of free housing for artists to work at the Foundation, located in Taos, New Mexico.

  • In July 2012, doctoral composer Mark Oliveiro's work Calliphora, for bass recorder and electronics, was performed at the Australasian Computer Music Conference, at Griffith University in Brisbane (Australia). The work will also be performed in October 2012 at the Electronic Music Midwest Festival in Chicago.

  • Dream of a Thousand Keys, the dissertation composition by alumna Da Jeong Choi (PhD 2011), was premiered on 8 March 2012 by the Joven Orquesta Provincial de Málaga as part of the International Women's Day celebration in Spain. The performance was featured on Canal Sur TV.

  • Alumnus Jon Anderson's electroacoustic work for fixed media, dash.em, was selected for performance at the regional Society of Composers Inc. Conference hosted by Clarke University. His work for fixed media and video luft am morgen, was selected for performance at the 2013 New York City Electroacoustic Music Festival at the Graduate Center at CUNY. Both works were also invited for performance at the 2013 Electronic Music Midwest Mini-Festival, part of the New Sounds Festival 2013 hosted by Western Michigan University.

  • Alumna composer Christina Rusnak has been selected as Composer-in-Residence at Homestead National Monument in spring 2012 to commemorate the 150th anniversary of the Homestead Act. The residency will provide three weeks of housing at the monument, located near Beatrice Nebraska.

  • There Are Ghosts, a video work by alumnus composer Brian Hernandez (MA 2011), has been selected for performance at the international film and video festival, CINESONIKA, which takes place 18-19 February 2012 in British Columbia, Canada. In addition to the performance, all accepted works will be eligible for international distribution on DVD, public exhibition, museum curatorial, video on demand, and touring festival.

  • Doctoral composer Mark Oliveiro's composition for Soprano and Piano, Il Garrot, was awarded an Honorable Mention Citation in the International Music Prize for Excellence in Composition 2011, sponsored by the National Academy of Music.

  • After receiving an American Composers Forum Encore Grant (2011) to compose a new work for the new music ensemble Pictures on Silence, doctoral composer Mark Oliveiro’s composition Tanox has been made the subject of a short promotional video documentary, released early this year by the American University (Washington DC).

  • Baayami: from the sky, a new solo work for saxophone and foot-percussion by doctoral composer Mark Oliveiro, was premiered at the World Saxophone Congress in Edinburgh, Scotland in July 2012.

  • Ten UNT-affiliated composers were selected to participate in the SEAMUS 2013 Conference at McNally Smith College in St. Paul, MN, 18-20 April 2013: faculty composers Panayiotis Kokoras and Jon Christopher Nelson; doctoral composer Mark Oliveiro; alumni composers Jon Anderson, Greg Dixon, Eli Fieldsteel, Dave Gedosh, Elainie Lillios, and L. Scott Price; and former faculty composer Butch Rovan.