Music composition: Where are they now?

Princeton’s graduate program in music composition has produced prominent young composers and music leaders. Here’s a small sampling:

Julia Wolfe *12 co-founded Bang on a Can, a New York City-based collective dedicated to innovative new music. Her composition “Cruel Sister” was commissioned by the Munich Chamber Orchestra, premiered in the United States at the Spoleto Festival, and was released in 2011 by Cantaloupe Music. Wolfe has collaborated with theater artist Anna Deveare Smith, architects DillerScofidio+Renfro, filmmaker Bill Morrison, and choreographer Susan Marshall, among others.

Nicholas Brooke *97 *03, who teaches at Bennington College in Vermont, has received a Guggenheim Fellowship, a Rockefeller Foundation residency, and an ASCAP Young Composer's Award. His work has been performed throughout the United States and Europe, including at the Lincoln Center and Spoleto festivals.

Nathan Michel *07 and his band, Hospitality, released their first full-length album in 2012, have been touring widely, and have been featured on NPR and in Wired, among other outlets.

Sean Friar *09 won the prestigious Rome Prize in 2011 for composing; he is now teaching at UCLA. Recent commissions run the gamut from string quartets and wind quintets to a junk car percussion concerto and music for laptop orchestra.

Ted Coffey *05 is touring with the choreographer Bill T. Jones as Jones’ composer. He teaches at the University of Virginia. 

Lisa Coons *11, a professor at Western Michigan University, has won a commission from the American Composers Orchestra, the only orchestra dedicated to the creation, performance, and promulgation of music by American composer s.

Gregory Spears *07 and Stefan Weisman *11 have had major works commissioned by the American Opera Projects and won numerous composing honors. The New Yorker described Spears last year as “an avatar of the new ‘alt-classical’ movement,” while The New York Times described a work by Weisman as “ personal, moody and skillfully wrought.”