Biographies
ELLIOTT MILES MCKINLEY
.jpg)
Elliott Miles McKinley’s music has been performed in the United States, Canada, and Europe. Commissions include those from the Pittsburgh New Music Ensemble, the Czech Philharmonic Chamber Music Society, the SOLI Chamber Music Ensemble, the Whatcom Symphony Orchestra, the Martinů String Quartet, the Estrella Consort, the Mirari Brass Quintet, and the Janaček Trio. The Minnesota Orchestra, the Warsaw Philharmonic, and the Czech Radio Symphony have performed his orchestral music, and his works have been featured on international festivals including the Alba International Music Festival in Italy, the Mid-American Contemporary Music Festival, Indiana State University’s Contemporary Music Festival, the SPARK Festival of Electronic Music and Art, as well as College Music Society and Society for Composers Inc. festivals. He is a recipient of a number of awards, grants, and fellowships including those from BMI, ASCAP, SCI, Meet the Composer, the American Music Center, the American Composers Forum, and Indiana University.
Also active as a performer and improviser, McKinley is a founding member of the electroacoustic improvisation ensemble, earWorm, where he plays a variety of keyboard and percussion instruments, and executes real-time sampling, looping, and effects processing for the ensemble. earWorm has several commercially available recordings, and performs on conferences and festivals in the Untied States such as the International Society for Improvised Music.
McKinley earned a Bachelor of Music degree in jazz studies from the New England Conservatory of Music, a Master of Music degree in composition from the University of Michigan, and a Ph.D. in composition from the University of Minnesota. He has taught music composition and theory at the University of Tennessee School of Music, Washington and Lee University, and was Assistant Professor of Music and Music Program Coordinator at Indiana University East. Currently he is Assistant Professor of Music Composition, Theory, and Technology at Roger Williams University.
SOLI Chamber Ensemble
Winner of 2013 CMA/ASCAP Adventurous Programming Award Celebrating its 22nd season this year, SOLI Chamber Ensemble has upheld its reputation for giving new voice to 20th and 21st century classical contemporary music and for its strong commitment to commissioning new works. Known for breathing life into the music of living composers, SOLI has twice been voted “Best Chamber Ensemble” by The San Antonio Current and continues to mesmerize audiences with its cutting edge performances around the country. Founded in 1994, San Antonio Texas based ensemble annually presents seasons of innovative programs and breaks down stereotypes linked with classical music by performing in art galleries and other intimate spaces, which allows allowing audiences to get up close to the performers and the music and therefore enhancing their concert going experience. SOLI’s touring schedule has taken them to such cities as Houston, Denver, Austin, Colorado Springs, Louisville and Dallas among many others. SOLI was one of the first chamber ensembles invited to perform in the first-ever classical music event at the South by Southwest (SXSW) Music & Media Festival in Austin, Texas. SOLI performed the music of Steve Reich, Elliott Carter, Michael Torke, and John Adams to a sellout crowd at this Boosey & Hawkes Music Company-sponsored program. SOLI’s strong commitment for commissioning new works has resulted in 45 amazing works over the past 20 years from both emerging and established composers. The ensemble has premiered works by Steven Mackey, Paul Moravec, Ned Rorem, Robert X. Rodriguez, Tim Kramer, David Heuser, Alexandra Gardner, Elliott McKinley, Erich Stem, Jack Stamps, and others. SOLI Chamber Ensemble is also deeply devoted to education. Each season, SOLI presents a series of short concerts for young people entitled “SOLI Saturday’s”. These concerts are designed to introduce the music of today and tomorrow to our next generation of listeners. As Trinity University’s Ensemble in Residence since 2008, SOLI performs frequently on the campus, conducts open rehearsals, advises, guides and coaches student chamber groups, and closely works with the student composers. Annually SOLI takes its residency program on tour to other universities and colleges throughout the U.S. Through the outreach programs, the Ensemble is able to reach audiences whom otherwise may not be able to attend live performances of any kind. SOLI uses the music of our time to reach people in hospitals, hospices, clinics and rehabilitation centers. SOLI Chamber Ensemble has received numerous awards including 2013 CMA/ASCAP Adventurous Programming Award and grants from the Aaron Copland Fund for Music, New Music USA’s Creative Connections, Meet the Composer, and the National Endowment for the Arts, The Russell Hill Rogers Fund for the Arts, the Argosy Foundation, The Amphion Foundation, The Tobin Endowment, the Cornyation Foundation, and the City of San Antonio, Department of Culture and Creative Development, among others.
For more information on the SOLI Chamber Ensemble please visit:
The Martinů Quartet
The Martinů Quartet, originally the Havlák Quartet, was formed in 1976 by the then students of the Prague Conservatoire, inspired by and modelled on such string quartets as the Vlach and the Smetana. They put favourable circumstances to good use by intensive practice and study of the quartet repertoire, resulting in seven prizes at important international competitions. They included the 2nd prizes at the ARD Munich, Evian (France), Yehudi Menuhin (Portsmouth, Britain) and The Prague Spring competitions.
These successes stood at the start-line of the Quartet’s brilliant international career, placing it firmly in the internationally respected Czech string-quartet tradition.
The original Havlák Quartet changed its name in 1985 as a token of its commitment to promote the work of one of the great masters of Czech music, Bohuslav Martinů. Their efforts have been rewarded by a MIDEM prize in Cannes in 2004 for the best CD of the year in the chamber music/solo category – the CD being the second of three NAXOS CDs with Martinů’s seven quartets and other chamber compositions.
Although the main weight of its repertoire is centred on the music of the world’s great composers, the Quartet takes pleasure in seeking out neglected works and in giving first performances of pieces by contemporary composers. It has received an MW Classical Music Web’s “CD of the Month’s” award for its recording of works by Sylvie Bodorová (Terezín Ghetto Requiem) and Ronald Stevenson. It is engaged on a long-term project of performing and recording the complete quartet output of the leading Czech composer resident in the USA, Tomáš Svoboda.
Apart from its busy concert schedule which takes in prestigious podiums at home and abroad, the Martinů Quartet plays on the Czech Radio, as it has done on the BBC, Radio France, ARD and ORF.
For more information on the Martinů Quartet please visit: http://www.martinuquartet.eu/
© NAVONA RECORDS LLC. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
Navona Records offers listeners a fresh taste of today's leading innovators in orchestral, chamber, instrumental, and experimental music as well as prime pieces of classic repertoire. Our music is meticulously performed by the finest musicians and handpicked to ensure the most rewarding listening experience.
223 Lafayette Road
North Hampton NH 03862
PRESS INQUIRIES
press (at) parmarecordings.com
603.758.1718 x 151
