Witold LutoslaWski https://www.wisemusicclassical.com/composer/966/Witold-Lutos%C5%82awski/

Marta Ptaszyńska

Marta Ptaszyńska, composer, percussionist, and professor of composition, born in Warsaw, Poland, is the author of such well-known works as the Concerto for Marimba, Concerto for Saxophone, Winter’s Tale, Sonnets to Orpheus, and Moon Flowers, as well as numerous compositions for percussion (Siderals, Graffito, Spider Walk, Space Model, Letter to the Sun), which have been performed many times around the world.

Ptaszyńska has received commissions from orchestras including the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, Cincinnati Symphony, Cleveland Chamber Orchestra, Polish Chamber Orchestra, Sinfonia Varsovia, and the Wrocław Philharmonic Orchestra and from artists such as Contralto Ewa Podleś, marimba virtuoso Keiko Abe, percussionist Evelyn Glennie, and harpist Alice Chalifoux. She has also received commissions from the National Chopin Institute in Warsaw, Poland, the Kościuszko Foundation in New York, the Südwestfunk in Baden-Baden, Germany, the Caramoor International Music Festival, the International Harp Festival, and the Rockefeller Chapel in Chicago. She was commissioned by the Warsaw National Opera to write two operas for children (Mister Marimba and Magic Doremik) and by the Grand Opera Theatre in Łódź to write the opera The Lovers of the Valldemosa Cloister for Chopin’s Bicentennial. Her television opera Oscar of Alva, produced by Cracow Television, received both audience and critical acclaim at the International Festival of Television Operas in Salzburg in 1989. Mister Marimba’s opera for children, which was in the repertory of the National Opera in Warsaw from 1998 until 2006, has enjoyed phenomenal success and popularity for eight consecutive seasons with 114 performances.

Her Holocaust Memorial Cantata gained international recognition when performed several times in 1993 under the baton of Lord Yehudi Menuhin.

In her native Poland Ptaszyńska studied composition at the Academies of Music in Warsaw and Poznań. She also worked privately with Witold Lutosławski, who later became her mentor. As the French Government’s grant recipient, she studied with Nadia Boulanger in the early seventies and attended Olivier Messiaen’s analysis classes at the Paris Conservatory and Centre Bourdan de L’ORTF. In 1974 she received an Artist Diploma Degree in Percussion Performance at the Cleveland Institute of Music in Cleveland, where she worked with Cloyd Duff, Richard Weiner, and Donald Erb. Widely acclaimed as a virtuoso percussionist, she performed extensively as a soloist percussionist for several decades and has participated in many European and American festivals.

Her distinguished career as a composition teacher includes professorships at Bennington College in Vermont, the University of California in Berkeley and Santa Barbara, the Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music, Indiana University in Bloomington, and Northwestern University in Evanston. In 1998 Ptaszyńska was appointed a Professor of Music and in the Humanities at the University of Chicago. Since 2005 she holds an endowed chair of Helen B. & Frank L. Sulzberger Professor of Composition.

In 1965-70 Ptaszyńska was a president of the Circle of Young Composers of the Union of Polish Composers in Poland. In the years 1981-84, she also served as a member of the Board of Directors of the Percussive Arts Society (PAS) in the U.S. In 1991 she co-founded and was vice president of the American Society of Polish Music in New York for several years. As an artistic adviser, she arranged the music program of two Polish music festivals at the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts at Lincoln Center in New York in 1994 and 1996.

In 2002 Polish Music Publications in Cracow, Poland released a book about her music entitled Music – The Most Perfect Language, Conversations with Marta Ptaszyńska.

©2024 Marta Ptaszyńska. All rights reserved.

Kim Helweg

Kim Helweg (1956, Denmark) was initially influenced by the work of Penderecki and John Cage. But a chance encounter with American fusion music later drastically altered his course and led to an extended period of jazz/rock compositions – inspired primarily by Miles Davis, Joe Zawinul, and Chick Corea – culminating in a couple of rock symphonies and the rock operas Ulysses and Black Mass.
In 1985 and 1988 he won first prize for composition for The Danish Radio Concert Orchestra, and in 1986 his music for the drama The Kreutzer Sonata was awarded a prize in Monaco. By 1988, however, he was again writing for classical ensembles, and his works since that time include a Violin Concerto (commissioned by the Danish Broadcasting Corporation) a Cello Concerto, a concerto for percussion and orchestra Barocco Brasileiro written for the Safri Duo, Dvojnik – a concerto for two pianos and orchestra, 3 chamber concertos, ballets (such as Cupid and Psyche, commissioned and performed by the Royal Danish Ballet and Orchestra on the occasion of the Copenhagen European Capital of Culture in 1996), and Requiem Piazza Duomo for 1.000 performers.
Most recently the ballets The Return of Don Juan, Spiri and Silent Tales and the orchestra pieces Il Madrigale Di Giovanni, Paganini 2000 and Two and Stalingrad Symphonies have been performed, to which we can add presentations at contemporary music festivals in Canada, Finland, Poland, Argentina, Uruguay and in Belgium. Kim Helwegs’s first opera Stalingrad was performed in August 2002.

Presentation of the Quantum scales was done at Institut Henri Poincaré, Sorbonne Université, Paris, France July 2, 2018. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GIVBaZkxZF4

Kim Helweg’s music has been regularly performed in Europe, North America, South America, and South Korea, and since 1992 his works have been commissioned from Italy, Canada, Argentina, Brazil, Finland, Germany, Holland, Sweden, USA, England, Serbia, Austria and China. The CD labels are Chandos, Olympia, Rondo, Focus, IRCO, and Classico among others.© Ankerstjerne Music 2019

From past programs

Mark Francis’ musical career has varied from teaching, composing, performing, and writing to orchestral administration. He has studied composition with Walter Hartley and James Eversole, and guitar with Joanne Castellani, Clare Callahan, and Joseph Fratianni. He holds a D.M.A. in composition from the University of Kentucky and has taught at Mississippi State University, Centenary College, Northwestern State University, Emory University, Midwestern State University, and Power Academic and Performing Arts Complex.

He has received 10 ASCAP Standard Awards and 8 ASCAP Plus Awards for his compositions. His works have been performed internationally and have been part of the Corcoran Gallery Contemporary Music Series in Washington, D.C. The Jackson State University Orchestra premiered his composition on the words of Martin Luther King, Jr., The Trumpet of Conscience, at the Library of Congress in 2007. Conners Publications and Imagine Music publish his compositions.

Edna Alejandra Longoria is a Mexican-American composer born in McAllen, Texas, and raised in Reynosa, Tam. México. Longoria obtained a MM in Music Composition at the Bob Cole Conservatory of Music at CSULB, and a BM in Music Composition from UTSA. Edna’s music has been premiered by various ensembles and musicians such as Verdant Vibes ensemble, North/ South Consonance Ensemble, Chatter ensemble, Sonic Apricity, Elixir Piano Trio, Los Angeles Percussion Quartet, pianist Clare Longendyke, flutist Iwona Glinka, soprano Noel Archambeault among others.

Ms. Longoria’s music has been performed at the Weill Recital Hall at Carnegie Hall, the SCI National Conference, the Music by Women Festival, the SCI Region VI Conference, the LunArt Festival, and the Alba Composition Festival. Edna’s piece Danzas cautivas won the 2019 call for scores at the LunArt Festival. In addition, Miss. Longoria won the 2019 San Antonio Performing Arts Grant Award. Edna’s music has been premiered in the US, Mexico, and Europe.

Barry Brake became a professional musician at age 14. He played piano at the Gunter Hotel as a high-school student, before earning a degree in composition from Baylor University where he studied under composer Richard Willis.

He is now a freelance composer, arranger, performer, and producer of music, with numerous film soundtracks, stage shows, commercials, and CDs to his name. The San Antonio Current has described Barry Brake as a “respected pianist-composer” whose music “captivates us all.” He has collaborated with the San Antonio Symphony, lead singer Jon Anderson of Yes, lead singer Paul Rogers of Bad Company, and numerous local performers. He’s a founder and the pianist of the Jazz Protagonists, for whom he’s the main composer. Last fall he wrote a series of string quartet arrangements for the Avanti String Quartet and jazz-rock singer-songwriter Kara Stevens. He lives in Mahncke Park with his wife and two young daughters.

Joel Love

“Lux (Light) is movement three from my first string quartet. As a whole, the string quartet depicts a transformation from dark to light. The final movement (Lux) is intended to be a celebration of light.” Joel was commissioned to compose a new work, Lightscape, for the opening of light artist James Turrell’s The Color Inside in 2013. The Houston Chronicle commented that Lightscape “evocatively captures the emotion of The Color Inside.” Joel is the only two-time winner of the PARMA Recordings Composition Competition, which selected Lux and Synchronicity in Purple Minor for publication. His first work for a wind ensemble, Aurora Borealis, was selected as a finalist in the 3rd International Franck Ticheli Composition Contest. Joel recently completed a D.M.A. in Composition from the University of Texas at Austin and holds degrees from The University of Houston’s Moores School of Music (M.Music) and Lamar University’s Mary Morgan Department of Music (B.Music).