Born in Rome, May 26, 1946
- Piovani is a film composer who has written several scores for Fellini.
- Piovani has also composed chamber music, a musical and a ballet.1
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PIOVANI, Nicola
Era: Contemporary
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PUJOL, Máximo Diego
Born in Buenos Aires, Dec 7, 1957
- Argentinian composer and guitarist Máximo Diego Pujol received his formal training at the Buenos Aires Conservatory of Music. The composer supported his training by playing tango and milongas at local nightclubs.
- As a composer, Pujol strives for “an ever-closer fusion of traditional Argentine Tango and formal academic concepts.2
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RAUTAVAARA, Einojuhani
Born in Helsinki, 9 Oct, 1928
Died in Helsinki, 27 July, 2016
[PRONUNCIATION / AY-no-yu-hah-ni ROW-ta-vah-ra]
- Einojuhani Rautavaara began studying music in his teens, earning a place Helsinki University for musicology and the Sibelius Academy for composition.
- In 1955, Jean Sibelius selected Rautavaara for a scholarship to study in the United States. Rautavaara spent two years studying with Vincent Persichetti at Juilliard. He also took part in the summer courses at Tanglewood given by Roger Sessions and Aaron Copland.3
- As a composer, Rautavaara cycled through several styles throughout his long career. In the 1950s, his music is most often characterized by neoclassical elements, while the 60s brought a shift toward the avant-garde and experiments in 12-tone techniques. In the 70s, the composer embraced Romanticism, ultimately reaching his final “mystical” phase with music featuring angels.4
- Rautavaara was quite prolific, writing eight symphonies, nine operas, 12 instrumental (and one choral) concertos, chamber music, choral music, and vocal works.5
Learn More
Short biography
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RICHTER, Max
Born in 1966
- Richter was born in Germany but raised in England. He was classically trained at the RAM and studied with Luciano Berio. Richter has also collaborated with artists in the genre of electronic music.
- Richter’s musical style contains elements of the classical tradition (drawing from many periods) and electronic, experimental, minimalist and rock influences.1
- Richter has released 11 solo albums for Deutsche Grammophon and has composed the scores for many films, including Ad Astra, Mary, Queen of Scots and Sarah’s Key. He has also composed several ballets, an opera, and worked on multimedia artistic collaborations.2
Sources
- “Max Richter: Biography,” Deutsche Grammophon (2018), accessed January 7, 2020, https://www.deutschegrammophon.com/us/artist/richter/biography.
- “Max Richter: Music,” MaxRichterMusic.com, accessed January 7, 2020, https://maxrichtermusic.com/blogs/studio-albums.
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RUTTER, John
Born in London, Sept 24, 1945
- In addition to his remarkably successful career as a composer of choral music, Rutter has also served as director of music at Clare College, Cambridge, founder-director of The Cambridge Singers, and an editor of choral music.6
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SABOYA, Lucas
Born in 1980 in Tunja, Boyacá
- Saboya studied music at the Escuela Superior de Música in Tunja, Boyacá.
- Saboya teaches at the Colombian University of Pedagogy and Technology.7
Biography (in Spanish) from the Orquesta Filarmónica di Bogotá
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SALINAS, Horacio
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SELAOCOE, Abel
Born in Sebokeng, South Africa, 5 March 1992
- Abel Selaocoe (“AY-bull sil-OW-cho-ay“) is a genre-pushing cellist and composer who has made a name for himself combining virtuosic cello and vocal performance with improvisation.
- Growing up in South Africa, Selaocoe received his first instruction on the cello at the African Cultural Organization of South Africa (ACOSA), an outreach program that provided one of the only opportunities for disadvantaged kids to access classical music. He went on to earn a scholarship at St. John’s College, followed by the Royal Northern College of Music in Manchester (UK).
- As a composer, Selaocoe is dedicated to interweaving Western and non-Western musical traditions.1
- In an interview, Selaocoe said:
- “My goal in my musical life is to take this instrument that I’ve learned from a very young age in a classical manner and connect it to where I’m from, allowing the culture of a stringed instrument like the cello or violin to evolve as it visits different cultural spaces.”2
- In an interview, Selaocoe said:
Learn More
Composer’s website
Sources
- https://www.abelselaocoe.com/, accessed March 10, 2025.
- Kyle MacMillan, “South African cellist Abel Selaocoe makes his CSO debut at Ravinia,” Chicago Symphony Orchestra (2024), accessed March 10, 2025, https://cso.org/experience/article/19261/south-african-cellist-abel-selaocoe-makes-his.
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SHENG, Bright
Born in Shanghai, Dec 6, 1955
- Sheng was educated at the Shanghai Conservatory, Queens College CUNY, and and Columbia University. Leonard Bernstein was one of his teachers.
- Sheng has served as Composer in Residence for Lyric Opera of Chicago and Seattle SO, and he teaches at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor.
- China’s Cultural Revolution took place before Sheng had the chance to attend conservatory. During that time, from the age of 15, he was assigned to work in a traditional Chinese orchestra in a province bordering Tibet. He also spent this time studying Chinese folk music.8
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SILVESTROV, Valentin
Full name, alternate transliteration: Valentyn Vasil′yovych Sil′vestrov
Born in Kiev, Sept 30, 1937
- Silvestrov studied at the Kiev Institute of Construction Engineering before enrolling at the Kiev Conservatory (1958–64) to study harmony and counterpoint.
- In his article for Grove on Silvestrov, Virko Baley discusses the conflict between avant-garde and tradition as a major theme in Silvestrov’s work. Some compositions integrate these two impulses; at other times, he explores one or the other in a single work or period. Thus, he music can range in style from neoclassicism to minimalism to atonality.9
March 30, 2022 NYT article about Silvestrov’s status as a refugee from the current war in Ukraine
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SIMON, Carlos
Born in Washington, D.C., 1986
- As a composer, Simon’s work ranges from concert music for large and small ensembles to film scores with influences of jazz, gospel, and neo-romanticism.
- As of early 2025, Simon is currently the Composer-in-Residence for the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, the inaugural Boston Symphony Orchestra Composer Chair, and was nominated for a 2023 GRAMMY award for his album Requiem for the Enslaved. He is also an associate professor at Georgetown University.
- In 2021, Simon received the 2021 Sphinx Medal of Excellence, the highest honor bestowed by the Sphinx Organization to recognize extraordinary classical Black and Latinx musicians.10
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Composer’s Website
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SONDHEIM, Stephen
Born in New York, NY, Mar 22, 1930
Died in Roxbury, CT, Nov 26, 2021
- Stephen Sondheim was a groundbreaking musical theater composer and lyricist.
- Sondheim showed an inclination for music at an early age. By 15, he had already written his first musical. As a teenager, Sondheim studied with family friend Oscar Hammerstein, and in his early 20s, he studied with composer Milton Babbitt.
- Sondheim’s first Broadway success was as the lyricist for Leonard Bernstein’s West Side Story (1957), followed by Jule Styne’s Gypsy (1959).
- Sondheim’s first success as both composer and lyricist was A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum (1962).11
- Sondheim is considered to be among the most significant American composers of all time, particularly for his redefining the musical theater genre into a serious art form that explore the human condition and provide meaningful social commentary.
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Biography and chronology via Portland Center Stage
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STANKOVYCH, Yevhen Fedorovych
Born in Svaliava, Zakarpattya region, Ukraine, Sept 19, 1942
“Stankovych’s music, marked by a strikingly dramatic temperament and unfettered emotion, is supported by a full command of modernist techniques without allowing any one of these to predominate; and while the style is definably one of the late 20th century, folk themes of Ukraine’s various cultural groups have paramount importance in the substance of his language.”
Oxford Music Online12
- Stankovych studied at the Kyiv Conservatory under Borys Lyatoshynsky and Myroslav Skoryk, graduating in 1970.
- His compositional output consists primarily of music for orchestra, choir, chamber ensemble, and stage (ballet and opera).13
- The recipient of many awards and accolades, Stankovych was recognized by UNESCO’s World Tribune as one of 10 best works of 1985 for his Chamber Symphony No. 3, and he won the Taras Shevchenko State Award in 1986.14
- Many of the composer’s larger works were written in response to tragic events in Ukraine’s history. For example, Dictum (1987) is a massive symphony commemorating the Chernobyl disaster.15
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SVOBODA, Tomas
Born in Paris, Dec 6, 1939
Died in Portland, OR, Nov 17, 2022
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SZYMKO, Joan
Szymko is pronounced “SHIM-koh” (IPA: [ʃɪmko]
Born in Chicago in 1957
- Szymko is a Portland-based choral composer and conductor.
- Szymko studied choral music education at the University of Illinois Urbana and composition at the University of Washington.
- Szymko became Artistic Director of Portland’s Aurora Chorus in 1993 and served in that position for 26 seasons. She recently retired from the position and is now Artistic Director Emerita.
- Szymko’s choral music has been commissioned by many ensembles within and outside of Portland, and has been published by Oxford University Press, earthsongs, and many other publishers.16
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TAKEUCHI, Marika
Born March 14, 1987 in Kawasaki, Japan
- Takeuchi is a composer of concert music, film music, and music for video games. She is currently based in Los Angeles.
- Takeuchi studied film scoring at the Berklee College of Music in Massachusetts.17
Takeuchi’s profile with the Alliance for Women Film Composers
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TAMUSUZA, Justinian
Born in 1951 Kibisi, Uganda
- Tamusuza began his musical training studying Kigandan traditional music: “singing, playing drums and tube-fiddle, endingidi.”18
- Tamusuza studied at Queens University in Belfast,19 and completed a doctorate in composition at Northwestern University.20
- Tamusuza has taught at Makerere University in Kampala, Uganda21 and at Northwestern University.22
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TANAKA, Karen
Born in Tokyo, Japan, April 7, 1961
- Tanaka studied at the Tōhō Gakuen School of Music, Toyko, where her teachers included Akira Miyoshi. She studied subsequently in France and in Florence, where her teachers included Luciano Berio.20
- Karen Tanaka currently teaches Composition and Experimental Sound Practices at the California Institute of the Arts in Valencia, California.21
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TATE, Jerod Impichchaachaaha’
Born in Norman, OK, July 25, 1968
- Jerod Impichchaachaaha’ [Im-pih-CHAH-chah-ha] Tate (Chickasaw) is an American composer and pianist.
- Tate’s middle name, Impichchaachaaha’, means “their high corncrib” and is his inherited traditional Chickasaw house name. A corncrib is a small hut used for the storage of corn and other vegetables. In traditional Chickasaw culture, the corncrib was built high off the ground on stilts to keep its contents safe from foraging animals.
- Beginning his professional studies as a pianist, Tate earned his Bachelor of Music in Piano Performance from Northwestern University and his Master of Music in Piano Performance and Composition from The Cleveland Institute of Music.
- Blending stories with music, Tate’s Native culture deeply influences his compositions for symphony, ballet, and opera.
- In addition to works based on his own Chickasaw culture, Tate has also written works based on the music and languages of several other tribes, including Choctaw, Navajo, Ojibway, Creek, Lakota, Hopi, Salish/Kootenai, and more.
- In 2021, Tate was appointed a Cultural Ambassador for the U.S. Dept of State, and in 2025, Tate won the Wise-Hinrichsen Award in Music from the American Academy of Arts and Letters.22
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Composer’s website
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TIN, Christopher
Born in California, 1976
- Christopher Tin is a GRAMMY Award-winning composer of both concert and media music.
- Tin attended Stanford University and the Royal College of Music with studies in composition and English Literature.
- Fun fact: Simultaneously with his admission to RCM, Tin received the first Fulbright grant given for film scoring.
- In 2000, Tin became an intern for Hans Zimmer, writing music for television commercials and for a wide range of television stations, including PBS, the History Channel, and the Discovery Channel.
- Tin’s breakout hit was “Baba Yetu” (2005), a choral work for the video game Civilization IV.
- Additional fun fact: “Baba Yetu” was the first piece for video game to be both nominated and win a GRAMMY award.23
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Composer’s website
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TORKE, Michael
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TOWER, Joan
Born in New Rochelle, NY, Sept 6, 1938
- Tower studied composition at Bennington College and Columbia University. She has taught at Bard College since 1972.24
- Tower’s early works were serialist (influences included Milton Babbit), but since 1976 her work has moved in a more tonal direction.25
- Major honors include a Guggenheim Fellowship (1977), acknowledgement at the 2009 Kennedy Center Gala for Women in the Arts,26 and a Grammy award for her one-movement symphonic work Made in America (2008).27
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TURRIN, Joseph
Born in Clifton, NJ, January 4th, 1947
- Joseph Turrin is an American composer, orchestrator, conductor, pianist, and teacher.
- As a composer, Turrin’s work spans multiple genres, including orchestral works, chamber music, and music for film and stage.25
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UÉBAYASHI, Yuko
Born in Kyoto, 1958
- Yuko Uébayashi is a Japanese-born composer who has lived in France since 1998.
- Biography from RII’s Elevate album:
- Japanese-born composer Yuko Uébayashi grew up emersed in music. She began composing as a young child and emerged into the professional sphere while still a teenager. Throughout early adulthood, Uébayashi built a career in Kyoto as a freelance composer and arranged music for film scores. In 1998, she followed her musical inspiration to Paris, where she would spend the next 20 years actively writing new works. In 2018, Uébayashi left the French capital and relocated to the South of France.
When creating her pieces, the composer often starts with someone specifically in mind, drawing inspiration from the artistry of fellow prominent musicians. In fact, Uébayashi only accepts commissions from people with whom she feels a distinct connection. Stylistically, Uébayashi’s music is often described as impressionistic while also evoking Japanese film music.
- Japanese-born composer Yuko Uébayashi grew up emersed in music. She began composing as a young child and emerged into the professional sphere while still a teenager. Throughout early adulthood, Uébayashi built a career in Kyoto as a freelance composer and arranged music for film scores. In 1998, she followed her musical inspiration to Paris, where she would spend the next 20 years actively writing new works. In 2018, Uébayashi left the French capital and relocated to the South of France.
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UNG, Chinary
Born in Takeo, Nov 24, 1942
- Chinary Ung is an American composer of Cambodian descent. Ung was first exposed to Western classical music in his late teens, after which he pursued pursued the art form formally.
- Ung was one of the first graduates of the Ecole de Musique, Phnom Penh and received a degree in clarinet performance.
- In 1964, Ung emigrated to the U.S. He received a DMA with distinction from Columbia University (1974), where his principal composition teacher was Chou Wen-chung.
- Regarding his music, Ung has described it in the following way: “If East is yellow, and West is blue, then my music is green.” His compositions blend Asian aesthetics with contemporary classical techniques.26
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Biography via the composer’s website
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UNGAR, Jay
Born in The Bronx, New York on Nov. 14, 1946
- Jay Ungar is a folk musician and composer best known for his original work, Ashokan Farewell, which was used as the theme song for the Ken Burns docuseries, The Civil War.
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VASKS, Pēteris
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WALLEN, Errollyn
Born in Belize, 10 April 1958
- Errollyn Wallen CBE is a prolific British composer whose works have been performed at the BBC Proms, the 2012 Paralympic Games, and the jubilees of Queen Elizabeth II.
- *CBE stands for Commander of the British Empire.29
- As an emerging composer in the 1980s, Wallen struggled with breaking down barriers to women in the field, especially women of color. Consequently, she co-founded, along with other female composers, musicians and administrators, the organization, “Women in Music,” promoting works by underrepresented voices in the field.30
- In August 2024, Wallen was appointed Master of the King’s Music (the first Black woman to do so).
- As a composer, Wallen has written over 20 operas and a large catalogue of orchestral, chamber, and vocal works.31
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Composer’s website
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WHITACRE, Eric
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WHITBOURN, James
Born in Royal Tunbridge Wells, Kent, 1963
- British composer and conductor James Whitbourn began his career in the BBC as a composer, conductor, producer and presenter. He received his formal education from Magdalen College, University of Oxford.
- As a composer, Whitbourn’s output primarily consists of vocal and choral music. His music is performed around the world, most frequently in North America and Europe.
- Whitbourn has been commissioned to compose the music to mark several national and international events, including the BBC’s title music for the funeral of Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother and music for the national commemoration of 9/11 at Westminster Abbey.
- As of 2022, Whitbourn is Fellow and Director of Music at St Edmund Hall, Oxford, Senior Research Fellow at St. Stephen’s House, Oxford, Director of Music at Harris Manchester College, Oxford and a member of the Faculty of Music in the University of Oxford.32
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WILLIAMS, John
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WYERS, Giselle
- Giselle Wyers is a composer and conductor who specializes in choral music.
- Wyers is the Chair of the Voice / Choral department at the University of Washington, and holds the institution’s Donald E. Petersen Endowed Professor of Choral Music.
- Wyers holds degrees from the University of California at Santa Cruz, Westminster Choir College and the University of Arizona.34
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YORK, Andrew
Born in Atlanta, GA in 1958.
- Andrew York is a GRAMMY Award-winning classical guitarist and composer whose music blends the styles of both ancient and modern.
- York grew up in a family of musicians, where gatherings often included American and English folk music as well as traditional Celtic songs.
- York spent 16 years as a member of the Los Angeles Guitar Quartet, from 1990-2006, writing many compositions and arrangements for the ensemble.35
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Composer’s website
Pieces
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ZHOU Long
Born in Beijing, July 8, 1953
Zhou is the composer’s surname. It is appropriate to refer to him as Zhou Long or Dr. Zhou.
Pronunciation: IPA [dʒoʊ lɔŋ]
Pronunciation: Phonetic “jo long”
A guide for pronouncing Chinese names
- Dr. Zhou is a contemporary Chinese-American composer whose music combines Chinese folk influences and modernist classical influences.
- Zhou grew during the Cultural Revolution, when Western influences (including music) were discouraged. For this reason, he spent part of his childhood working on a state farm.
- Zhou studied at the Beijing Conservatory when it was reopened after the Cultural Revolution, and he completed his doctorate at Columbia University.
- Zhou teaches at the University of Missouri-Kansas Conservatory of Music.
- Zhou is married to the composer Chen Yi.36
- Biography from Oxford University Press
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ZWILICH, Ellen Taaffe
Born in Miami, April 30, 1939
- American composer and violinist Ellen Taaffe Zwilich (pronounced “tayf ZWIL-ik”) is one of the nation’s most frequently played living composers.
- Zwilich pursued her doctorate at Julliard, and in 1975, she became the first woman to earn a DMA in composition from the institution. Previously, she had been a member of the American Symphony Orchestra under Leopold Stokowski.
- Zwilich is a prolific composer in virtually all media:
“Concise, economical and clean in texture, Zwilich’s music might be classified under the rubric ‘neo-classic’ were it not for its very ‘neo-romantic’ expressive force.”
Grove Music Online
- One interesting period of writing in particular – Beginning in the 1980s, Zwilich tasked herself with writing a series of concertos for the more neglected orchestral instruments, including the trombone, flute, oboe, and bassoon.
- Fun fact– Zwilich was the first woman to win the Pulitzer Prize in Music in 1983. She won the prestigious award for her Symphony No. 1, which helped catapult her international career.37
- The composer’s list of additional accolades is impressively long and includes the Elizabeth Sprague Coolidge Chamber Music Prize, the Arturo Toscanini Music Critics Award, and an Academy Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters. She was also the first Composer’s Chair in the history of Carnegie Hall, and she was designated Musical America’s Composer of the Year in 1999. 38
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Composer’s website
Short biography from the Library of Congress