Drew Schnurr

Andrew "Drew" Schnurr is an assistant professor of composition and media arts at University of North Texas. Schnurr is a Los Angeles composer, sound artist, theorist, and performer blurring traditional lines in media and musical genre. Schnurr’s wide-ranging experience in classical music, electronic music, rock, jazz, Latin music and other international music forms combined with his expertise in modern sound design, music production and audio technology, informs his diverse approach. Over the past decade, his works have been performed nationally and internationally at various festivals and venues including the Ford Amphitheater, Harris Hall (Aspen, CO), Forge (London, UK), and as a featured composer at the Chamber Music Festival of Lexington and highSCORE Music Festival in Pavia, Italy, while his scoring and sound design work has been featured on various television networks, and internationally on film screens and in galleries. Schnurr is acclaimed as an innovative solo performer playing traditional stringed instruments mixed with electronic sounds in live improvisation. His current creative work engages multiple levels of visual, music, and social culture.

Recent projects include a commission by renowned new music Dutch harpsichordist Goska Isphording with a 2015 Netherlands concert premiere, a commission and composer feature concert with the London-based RIOT ENSEMBLE in 2014, and a new commission presented by Providence New Music Premieres in 2013. Past commissions include works composed for performances at the Ford Amphitheater, Harris Hall, Regina Klenjoski Dance Company, members of the Hysterica Dance Company, International Design Conference Aspen, and music for a highly successful multi-media event in downtown Los Angeles entitled Persee: Orchestrated Perception, which Schnurr also produced. Upcoming projects include a concert commission by Fundación Música AntiquaNova (Buenos Aires), a commission by African-American Metropolitan Opera soprano Karen Slack to compose a song cycle based on lives of African warrior queens, a concert commission by St. Louis Orchestra principal harpist Allegra Lilly, and a commission by Los Angeles Opera librettist and director Richard Sparks.

Schnurr's composition work in film has been featured at international film festivals including Cannes, Raindance, Berlin, Feratum, Festival Internacional de Cine de Pasto, Rodando, Nocturna, Festival De Cine Acapulco, Honolulu, Santa Barbara, Monterey, Los Angeles, and New York. Schnurr's composing and sound design clients include the Los Angeles Philharmonic (designing the sound for the CELEBRATE: SALONEN website commemorating Esa-Pekka Salonen’s tenure with the orchestra), Sony Ericsson, Dodge, Yamaha, Wieden + Kennedy, Nike, Hyundai, Southwest Airlines, Google, 20th Century Fox, Paramount Entertainment, Live Earth, and Much Music USA. Schnurr’s electronic sound compositions composed in collaboration with artist Rebeca Mendez have been presented internationally including exhibits at the Beal Center for Art and Technology, ARCO Madrid 29th International Contemporary Art Fair, Museo de Arte Contemporáneo de Oaxaca (MACO), Beijing Art Nova exhibition, Venice 10th Arte Laguna Art Prize Exhibition, IV Bienal Ciudad Juárez / El Paso Biennial 2015 exhibition, and 2015 Istanbul Light Festival. On the double bass, Schnurr has performed extensively across the United States, Europe, and Japan, and with symphony orchestras including the Los Angeles Camarata Symphony, San Bernardino Symphony, and Kalamazoo Symphony.

Schnurr was on faculty at the UCLA Department of Design Media Arts from 2005 to 2011 where he taught sound and sonic-visual aesthetics. In 2013, he completed his PhD in composition from UCLA. He has since returned to UCLA, serving on faculty at the Herb Alpert School of Music, teaching electronic music and sonic arts. He previously studied bass performance and jazz studies at Western Michigan University and was recipient of a master's in double bass performance from the Thornton School of Music at the University of Southern California. Drew Schnurr has commercial releases of both film and concert music with German record label Coviello Classics (Hamburg) with distribution through NAXOS, and with Ludwig Records on iTunes. Planning is underway with production to begin in 2020 on Schnurr’s next international release with Coviello.

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