Elizabeth Vercoe

Elizabeth Vercoe has been hailed by the Washington Post as “one of the most inventive composers working in America today.” Active as a composer in the United States and abroad, she has been a fellow at the Civitella Ranieri Center in Italy, the St. Petersburg Spring Music Festival in Russia, The Cite Internationale des Arts in Paris, and the MacDowell Colony in New Hampshire. Her music has been performed by the Memphis Chamber Symphony, the Women’s Philharmonic, the Boston Musica Viva, Alea III, the Great Noise Ensemble, and counter) induction. Awards include grants from the National Endowment for the Arts, Meet the Composer, the Artists Foundation, and the Massachusetts Arts Council.

Lauded by Gardner Read as “an exceptionally gifted composer with a fine technical command and a keen sensitivity to sound materials,” she has attended concerts of her music in London, Paris, Bangkok, and at Lincoln Center and Tanglewood. Since receiving her doctorate at Boston University she has promoted women’s music as Director of the Women’s Music Festival/85 and in articles and talks. In addition she has written about copyright termination to assist composers with “orphan works” from companies no longer in business. A sometime academic, she has taught at Westminster Choir College and Regis College and held the Acuff Chair of Excellence at Austin Peay University.

Vercoe has recorded on Navona Records, Owl, Capstone, and Centaur, and is published principally by Arsis Press, the American Composers Alliance, Noteworthy Sheet Music, and Certosa Verlag (Germany). Her music includes the Herstory series of vocal works on texts by women, staged monodramas on Joan of Arc and John Brown, Changes for orchestra, a violin concerto and a series of solo instrumental works, including Sonaria for cello, that exploit extended techniques for the instrument involved. A dissertation (J. Capaldo, Elizabeth Vercoe: Composing Her Story) about her vocal music is available online.