COMPOSER

Biography

Monica Chew (she/her) is an Oakland composer and pianist who celebrates presenting rarely performed music and new works from around the world. A “gifted player with an affinity for deeply sensitive expression” (Whole Note), she has composed since 2017 and couldn’t be happier about it. Her work has been featured as part of the Gabriela Lena Frank’s Creative Academy for Music, Verdant Vibes, Hot Air Music Festival, and Left Coast Chamber Ensemble’s Intersection program. Her writing has been reviewed as “monumental” and “stunning” by San Francisco Classical Voice. Prior to 2015, she worked nearly a decade as a principal software engineer on security and privacy at Mozilla and Google. She lives in Oakland with her husband, an 1899 Steinway B, a clavichord, and a disused violin.

Librettist

Biography

Megan Cohen (she/her) is a librettist and theatermaker based in the San Francisco Bay Area. Past production and development partners for her plays and operas include Houston Grand Opera, Washington National Opera, Berkeley Rep, Cutting Ball Theater, Edinburgh Fringe Festival, Opera Theater Unlimited, Melbourne International Comedy Festival, the Neo-Futurists, Playwrights Foundation, and Southbank Centre. After creating 100+ original theatrical works in her 20-year career, she now also works with writers from all over the world as a private writing coach. More at www.megancohen.com

Composer

Biography

“Expressive sonic spaces engaging performers and audiences alike in communal experiences that comfort, entertain, disquiet, challenge and inspire,” is an apt description of the music of Valencio Jackson Jr. His growing body of compositional work draws from a postmodernist, American minimalist approach, popular idioms, and musical elements of his West Indian roots... a contemporary musical language that often posits a lyrical challenge to the divide between popular and classical music.

Jackson’s music has been presented at many festivals and conferences including those hosted by Society of Composers, Inc., National Association of College Wind and Percussion Instructors, Music Educators National Conference, International Clarinet Association, the Estate Whim Candlelight Concert Series, as well as in recital at Carnegie Hall. Upcoming performances of his work include a performance of chamber art songs by Trio Montage in Dublin, Ireland at Clarinetfest 2024.

Jackson holds degrees from University of Delaware (B.A.), Towson University (M.M.), and is currently completing a D.M.A. in Composition at the University of Georgia, studying with Dr. Emily Koh. He has also studied with Adrian Childs, Peter van Zandt, and Jonathan Leshnoff. He is currently on the music faculty at Mercer University after recently relocating from Baltimore MD, where he was on the music faculty at Towson University. He maintains his professional affiliations as a member of Phi Mu Alpha Sinfonia and ASCAP.

Composer

Biography

Ben Zucker engages in acts of creative juxtaposition and speculation as a composer, audiovisual artist, and multi-instrumentalist. Acclaimed as a "master of improvisation" (IMPOSE Magazine), and “more than a little bit remarkable” (Free Jazz Blog), they have contributed to experimental music scenes across North America and the UK with “stirring compositions…built on a lifetime of musical curiosity” (Chicago Reader), as well as albums, multimedia situations, and frequent performances on vibraphone, brass, voice, and electronics. Following studies at Wesleyan University (BA), Brunel University London (MA), and Northwestern University (PhD), they currently live in Chicago.

Composer

Biography

Dr. Lisa Neher (she/her, “NEER”) is an award-winning composer and new music mezzo on a mission to transform audiences through sound, story, and vulnerability. Praised as “a small woman with a very big voice” and “especially alive” (Oregon ArtsWatch), Neher’s performance credits include Third Angle New Music, Really Spicy Opera, Portland Columbia Symphony Orchestra, Opera Theatre Oregon, New Music Gathering, Resonance Ensemble, Experiments in Opera, Renegade Opera, and Big Mouth Society. She is a member of Portland Opera Chorus.

Described as a “visionary composer” (Willamette Week) and a “maestro of beautifully wacky noises” (Oregon ArtsWatch), Neher’s compositions are inspired by the climate crisis, the tender love of family and friends, and the eerie mystery of deep ocean life. She has been commissioned and performed by the National Association of Teachers of Singing, Cincinnati Song Initiative, Third Angle New Music, FearNoMusic, Dinosaur Annex, and New Opera West, among others. www.lisanehermusic.com.

Librettist

Biography

Caitlin Vincent is an award-winning librettist and lyricist whose writing has been praised as ‘nuanced and honest’ (DC Theatre Scene), ‘intriguing’ (The Baltimore Sun), and ‘luminous’ (The Huffington Post). Vincent’s works have been performed by Washington National Opera, Pittsburgh New Music Ensemble, the University of Connecticut, the Schubert Club of Minnesota, Semperoper Dresden, the Oxford Lieder Festival, and Wigmore Hall, among others. In August 2017, Vincent and composer Douglas Buchanan won the 2017-19 Sackler Music Composition Prize for Bessie and Ma, an opera about aviator Bessie Coleman and Governor Miriam “Ma” Ferguson. In 2022, Vincent and composer Timothy C. Takach won the Domenic J. Pellicciotti Opera Composition Prize for Computing Venus, an opera based on the life of astronomer Maria Mitchell, which will premiere at SUNY Potsdam in Fall 2024. A classically-trained ballet dancer and former professional opera singer, Vincent is on faculty at the University of Melbourne.