Matthew Dexter, bass-baritone, received the 2022-2023 Presser Award. Considered the most prestigious undergraduate award in music at UNT, the Presser Foundation Undergraduate Scholar award is presented annually to a student, at the conclusion of his or her junior year, who has shown extraordinary musical and academic accomplishments. The winner is nominated and selected by the UNT music faculty and receives the award from the Presser Foundation, which awards annual scholarships, grants and funds for furthering music education and music in America. The organization was founded in 1916 by Theodore Presser, music publisher and philanthropist.

Marques L.A. Garrett joins us as Associate Professor of Choral Activities in the Division of Ensembles and Conducting. He earned a PhD in Music Education in Choral Conducting at Florida State University, the MM from the University of North Carolina at Greensboro and a BA from Hampton University. As a highly sought-after composer, his largest work to date, "Dreamland: Tulsa 1921" was a collaboration with librettist Sandra Seaton commissioned by Dallas, Texas based Turtle Creek Chorale telling the story of the Greenwood District of Tulsa, Oklahoma. His research areas include vocal music of Black composers, non-idiomatic choral music of Black composers, the choral music of R. Nathaniel Dett, Negro spirituals and choral conducting/rehearsal techniques. He is the editor/compiler of "The Oxford Handbook of Choral Music by Black Composers" published by Oxford University Press. Dr. Garrett comes to Denton from the Glenn Korff School of Music at the University of Nebraska – Lincoln.

Kourtney Strade-Austin (PhD ‘22, Performing Arts Health) has accepts the position of Assistant Professor of Voice/Choir at the University of Wisconsin-La Crosse.

University of North Texas Associate Professor of Cello, Horacio Contreras, with fellow Reveron Piano Trio’s, Simón Gollo and Ana María Otamendi, have released Iberoamérica: Trios by Villa-Lobos, Turina, and Ponce. Released by Ibs Classical. Photo: Natali Herrera-Pacheco.

UNT Professor of Music Theory, David Bard-Schwarz, has a published chapter titled, “Modes of Understanding Disruption in the First Movement of Mahler’s Ninth Symphony,” in the book Ästhetische Normativität in der Musik. Edited by Tobias Janz and Jens Gerrit Papenburg, the publisher is Verlag Vittorio Klostermann edit the book.

Giant Boykin is a UNT alumnus, having earned his master's degree in interdisciplinary and jazz studies in Spring 2022. Prior to his master's degree, Giant earned a bachelor's degree in music performance from the University of Texas at Tyler. See more of his story.

Michael Crawford becomes Lecturer in Music Education along with additional teaching duties in the Percussion Area starting Fall 2023. In May 2021, Michael graduated from @UNT with his PhD in Music Education. 

The Houston Symphony Chorus director and UNT Professor of Choral Studies, Allen Hightower, shown being acknowledged by Itzhak Perlman at the conclusion of the Houston Symphony performance of “Requiem” by Mozart recently conducted by Perlman at Jones Hall for the Performing Arts in Houston.

Tamar Sella joins us as Assistant Professor of Ethnomusicology in the Division of Music History, Theory and Ethnomusicology. Her current research is “an ethnographic study of contemporary Mizrahi performance and cultural memory that seeks to illuminate the ways in which ongoing Jewish diasporic formations reframe colonial and racial logics in Israel/Palestine.” She holds a BA from the University of California, Berkeley and a PhD from Harvard University. She comes to us from Rice University where she is the Samuel W. and Goldye Marian Spain Postdoctoral Fellow.

The 2023 Presser Foundation Graduate Award winner is Colin Stokes. He is a UNT College of Music PhD student in the Division of Composition Studies. His proposal was titled “Otherness Together, a collaborative intermedia piece exploring issues of racial identity, transnationality, and otherness.” The piece will be created in collaboration with United Arab Emirates-born Palestinian visual artist Qais Assali. According to the Presser Foundation, "The program is designed to encourage and support, in a special way, the advanced education and career of truly exceptional graduate music students who have the potential to make a distinguished contribution to the field of music."

Assistant Professor of Jazz Piano, Dave Meder, releases “New American Hymnal.” The recording features fellow UNT faculty member Philip Dizack on trumpet. Meder describes the project “think of it as a "book of worship" for our American "civic religion."