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Composers Bureau

Paul Siskind

Biography

Paul Siskind's music encompasses many genres, including orchestral, band, choral, chamber music, piano, opera, art song, and big band jazz. His works have been performed and commissioned by renowned ensembles across the country and abroad, including the Minnesota Orchestra, the Omaha Symphony, the Arditti String Quartet, the Dale Warland Singers, the New Amsterdam Singers, Continuum, Counterinduction, the Minnesota Contemporary Ensemble, and the Mi-bemol Saxophone Ensemble.

His major honors include: the 1999 New Music Delaware Composition prize; the 1996 Minnesota Orchestra Perfect Pitch Program; the 1995 G. Schirmer Young American's Art Song Competition; the 1995 Friends and Enemies of New Music Contest; the 1994 Omaha Symphony Guild Prize; and a Composition Fellowship from the McKnight Foundation in 1993. He has also received other awards, grants, and commissions from ASCAP (including honorable mention in the 1994 Rudolph Nissim Competition), Meet The Composer, the Puffin Foundation, the American Music Center, the National Federation of Music Clubs, the Jerome Foundation, the Minnesota State Arts Board, and the Leif Ericksson International Festival.

Dr. Siskind was invited to attend the first international Words and Music Conference in 1994, sponsored by the Latin American Music Center at Indiana University. He has also been a guest composer at the 1996 Western Illinois University New Music Festival, and the University of Colorado's Artsweek '92. Other festival performances include the 1999 New Music Delaware Festival, the 1993 Crane Festival of New Music, and numerous conferences of the College Music Society and the Society of Composers.

Dr. Siskind is on the faculty of the Crane School of Music, SUNY-Potsdam; he has also taught at a number of other schools throughout the Midwest. He completed his Ph.D. in Composition at the University of Minnesota, after studies at Queens College, the Crane School of Music, and Tufts University (where he also completed a degree in biology); his teachers have included such diverse figures as Dominick Argento, Thea Musgrave, Pauline Oliveros, Robert Starer, Robert Washburn, Arthur Frackenpohl, Elliot Del Borgo, Paul Steinberg, and T. J. Anderson.

Along with teaching, Dr. Siskind has worked as a Composer-in-Residence for the Education Department of Minnesota Opera, Music Director of One Voice Mixed Chorus, Twin Cities Events Coordinator for the American Composers Forum, and as an Auditor for the New York State Council on the Arts.

His music is published by G. Schirmer Inc. and Sweet Child Music, and has been recorded by the Minnesota Contemporary Ensemble (on Innova), pianist Jeffrey Jacob (on New Ariel) and the Heartland Men's Chorus. Sample scores/tapes are available upon request.

Compositions

OPERA

  • In Mighty Silence, chamber opera (1992, 60')

ORCHESTRA/BAND

  • Fanfaronade, for brass ensemble (2002, 2')
  • The Perilous Adventures of Comet, the Wonderdog, for concert band (1998, 7')
  • Fantasy Variations on a Fragment by Schoenberg, for orchestra (1991/95, 5')
  • Lim'not Yahmeinu (...to number our days), for string orchestra (1993, 8')

CHORUS

  • Fill My Dreams, Stir My Soul, for SATB chorus and chamber ensemble (2001, 25')
  • Benediction, for SATB chorus and keyboard (2000, 2') (G. Schirmer)
  • Salme 131, for SATB chorus and keyboard (1998, 4')
  • Four Madrigals, for SATB chorus a cappella (1997, 8') (G. Schirmer)
  • Everyone Suddenly Burst Out Singing, for SATB chorus and piano (1995, 2') (G. Schirmer)
  • Bright Morning Stars Are Rising, versions for SATB, SSAA, and TTBB chorus a cappella (1994, 4') (G. Schirmer)
  • A Dream Deferred, for tenor solo with SATB or TTBB chorus and piano (1994, 6') (G. Schirmer)
  • On Aging, for SATB chorus and piano (1985, 15')

CHAMBER MUSIC

  • Suite: 75 for T.J., for vibraphone (2003, 6')
  • Memoriale, for alto saxophone and marimba (2003, 5')
  • Celli Celesti, for two cellos (1999, 6)
  • Antiphochrome, for saxophone ensemble (1993, 7')
  • Rituale, for soprano saxophone and percussion (1991, 11')
  • Duo-Bagatelles, for clarinet and cello (1990, 10')
  • Delusions of Grandeur and The Grand Delusion, for string quartet (1988, 22')
  • Three Epiphanies, for cello (1987, 12')
  • Claptrap, for percussion ensemble (1987, 8')
  • Consequential Suite, for flute and piano (1984, 14')

VOICE

  • Thr(e.e. cummingS)ongs, for tenor, flute, and guitar (2002, 9')
  • Some Epigrams, for middle high voice and piano (1986, 10')
  • Some More Epigrams, for middle/high voice and piano (1989, 10')
  • Even More Epigrams, for middle/high voice and piano (1997, 11')
  • A Few More Epigrams, for middle/high voice and piano (2000, 6')
  • Of Loss and Loneliness, for mezzo-soprano and cello (1990, 12'

KEYBOARD

  • Filial Frolic, for two pianos, eight hands (2003, 6')
  • Andere Klange, for piano (2001, 7')
  • Exemplificatory Etudes, for piano (1999, 8')
  • Four Eclations, for organ (1991, 4')
  • Fantasy-Variations on a Fragment by Schoenberg, for piano (1991, 5')

JAZZ BAND

  • Splendance (1984)
  • Proverbial Thumbs (1984)
Further Information

Contact Information

The Crane School of Music
SUNY-Potsdam
Potsdam, NY 13676
(315) 267-3241
E-mail:siskinpa@potsdam.edu


Last updated 12/12/05
Sigma Alpha Iota ©2003

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