Composers

Jay C. Batzner is currently on the faculty of Central Michigan University where he teaches music technology, electronic music composition, and music theory courses. Prior to this position Dr. Batzner was on the faculty of the University of Central Florida, Kansas City Kansas Community College, Metropolitan Community Colleges (Kansas City area), and Indiana University Southeast. He earned his doctorate in composition at the University of Missouri – Kansas City and holds degrees in composition and/or theory from the University of Louisville and the University of Kansas.

Jay's music is primarily focused around instrumental chamber works as well as electroacoustic composition. His music has been recorded on the Capstone, Vox Novus, and Beauport Classical labels and is published by Unsafe Bull Music. Dr. Batzner has received many honors for his compositional work, including awards or mentions from the Institut International de Musique Electroacoustique de Bourges (2008), the Areon Flutes International Composition Competition (2009), the VI Concurso Internacional de Miniaturas Electroacusticas (2008), the London International Film Festival (2008), and the UK Percussion Ensemble Composition Contest (2007). His video collaboration with visual artist Carla Poindexter, Carnival Daring-Do, has been screened at over two dozen film festivals and multimedia venues including the Spark Festival of Electronic Music and Art, the Third Practice Festival, and the Raindance, Moondance, Palm Beach International, and Fresno Filmworks Film festivals. Jay's podcast of electroacoustic music, The Unsafe Bull podcast, was nominated for a Weblog award for Best Podcast of 2007. Outside of his musical activities, Jay is a sci-fi geek, a burgeoning seamster, a home brewer, a claw hammer banjoist, and a former juggler.

Jason Bolte is an Assistant Professor of Music at Montana State University where he teaches courses in composition and music technology. Jason is a member of the organizational board of the Electronic Music Midwest Festival, and a founding board member and past President of the Kansas City Electronic Music and Arts Alliance. Jason earned a B.M. with an emphasis in Music Engineering Technology and a M.M. in Music Composition from Ball State University. He also holds a D.M.A. in Music Composition from the University of Missouri - Kansas City Conservatory of Music and Dance, where he was aChancellor’s Doctoral Research Fellow, a School of Graduate Studies Dean’s Doctoral Fellow, and anOvation Scholar. Before joining the faculty at MSU, Jason taught at the University of Central Missouri and the Kansas City Kansas Community College.

A composer of acoustic and electroacoustic music, his work has been performed throughout the United States, Europe, South America and Asia. In the summer of 2007, he was an Associate Artist in Residence at the Atlantic Center for the Arts with Master Artist Denis Smalley. Jason’s music has received awards and recognition from the International Competition for Composers "Città di Udine" (Finalist: 2010), ISCM Miami Section, World New Music Days (Selection 2010), VII ConcursoInternacional de MiniaturasElectroacusticas (Finalist: 2009), 2nd. International Electroacoustic Music Contest – CEMVA (Third Prize: 2008), 9th Electroacoustic Composition Competition Música Viva (Prizewinner: 2008), Bourges International Competition of Electroacoustic Music and Sonic Art (Selection: 2006, 2008), ASCAP/SEAMUS Student Commission Competition (Second Prize: 2008), ETH Zurich Digital Arts Week Soundscape Competition (Recognition: 2007), Music Teachers National Association and Missouri Music Teachers Association (Missouri Composer of the Year/Commission: 2007), and International Society of Bassists Composition Competition (First Prize, Media: 2005). Jason’s music is available on the Vox Novus and Miso Records labels. More information is available at www.jasonbolte.com.

Dr. Ian Corbett is the Coordinator of the Audio Engineering Program, and Assistant Professor of Music Technology and Audio Recording at Kansas City Kansas Community College. He also owns and operates "off-beat-open-hats - recording and sound reinforcement", specializing in servicing the needs of classical and jazz ensembles in the Kansas City area. As an audio engineer, Ian's credits include releases on Innova, ICA, Look at You Records, and many non-commercial releases. He is a Co-Director and the Technical Director and Sound Engineer for Electronic Music Midwest, an electronic music festival held in Chicago and Kansas City. Ian previously spent several summers as the Assistant Manager of the Presentations (Audio) Department at Interlochen Center for the Arts. He has provided sound reinforcement for many headline artists including Bill Cosby, BB King, the Count Basie Orchestra, Dennis DeYoung (orchestra engineer), the Detroit Symphony Orchestra, Nanci Griffiths, Buddy Guy, The Kansas City Jazz Orchestra, The Kings Singers, Marilyn Maye, Jane Monheit, Randy Newman, Clark Terry, Nanci Wilson and many opening acts. He has provided sound system support for artists including the Boston Pops Orchestra, Canadian Brass, Chicago, The Chieftains, Rosemary Clooney, Bela Fleck and the Flecktones, Chris Isaak, Diana Krall, the Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra with Wynton Marsalis, Lisa Loeb, Kenny Loggins, the Glenn Miller Orchestra, the Neville Brothers, Bob Newhart, Peter, Paul and Mary, the Preservation Hall Jazz Band, Joshua Redman, Take 6, and Dwight Yoakam. Ian authors articles on audio recording related subjects occasionally for Sound On Sound magazine ("Europe's number 1 selling recording magazine"), most recently a multi-media article on audio mastering published on their first DVD + magazine issue. Since 2004 he has been a member of the Audio Engineering Society's Education Committee, and in 2006 mentored students at the AES' Convention in San Francisco, CA.

Ian's composition credentials include a Doctor of Musical Arts degree from the University of Missouri-Kansas City, a Fellowship Diploma from the London College of Music, and an M.M. degree from Emporia State University, KS. He has works published by Emerson Edition, HoneyRock Publishing, London College of Music and Media, Penfield Music Commission, Watermark Press, and his music appears in "Theory Essentials", and new regularcharacterset book by Dr. Connie Mayfield (Schirmer). He has works released on Mark Records and Miso Records labels. His competition successes include an Honorable Mention in the 2002 ASCAP Morton Gould Competition, First Prize in the 2002 Musica Viva Electroacoustic Music Competition (Lisbon, Portugal), First Prize in the 1999 Penfield Music Commission Project Composition Contest, and First Prize in the 1998 Hastings College Jazz Ensemble Composition Competition. In 1994 Ian was awarded a Fulbright Scholarship to study Jazz at Indiana University.

A saxophonist and clarinetist, Ian has performed in venues such as Sydney Opera House (Australia), Valencia's Palau de Musica (Spain), and London's Royal Festival Hall, and for many radio broadcasts in the United Kingdom. He holds a Licentiateship Teaching Diploma (clarinet) and Associateship Performance Diploma (alto saxophone) from the London College of Music. Ian also plays an electronic wind instrument, integrating technology into many of his live performances. In 1994, he produced and staged a multi-media concert of commercial studio works in the Mumford Theater, Cambridge, UK. As a studio musician, his saxophone playing (and horn arrangements) are featured on several deep-house tracks, released in 2002 on the Viva and Hed Kandi labels, and in 2004 his solo compact disc "If That's You", was released by off-beat-open-hats.

Mike McFerron is an associate professor of music and composer-in-residence at Lewis University in the Chicago area. He has been on the faculty of UMKC and the Kansas City Kansas Community College, and he has served as resident composer at the Chamber Music Conference of the East/Composers’ Forum in Bennington, Vt. McFerron is founder and co-director of Electronic Music Midwest.

McFerron’s music has received critical acclaim and recognition. Perspectives for orchestra was awarded first prize in the Louisville Orchestra Composition Competition (2002), was a recipient of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra’s "First Hearing" Program (2001), was awarded an honorable distinction in the Masterprize International Composition Competition (2003), and an honorable mention in the Rudolf Nissim Prize (2001). McFerron was chosen the winner of the Cantus Commissioning/Residency Program (2003), and he was a recipient of the 2005 CCF Abelson Art Song Commission. His music was a finalist in the 2004 Confluencias Electronic Miniatures II International Competition, the 2005 Truman State/MACRO Composition Competition, the 2005 American Modern Ensemble Composition Competition, the 2002 Swan Composition Competition, the 1999 Salvatore Martirano Composition Contest, and the 1997 South Bay Master Chorale Choral Composition Contest. McFerron has been a composers fellow at the MacDowell Colony (2001), June in Buffalo (1997), and the Chamber Music Conference of the East/Composers’ Forum in Bennington, Vt (1999). His music has been featured on SCI National Conferences, SEAMUS National Conferences, University of Richmond’s 3rd Practice Festival, Spark Conference, Annual Florida Electroacoustic Music Festivals, Spring in Havanna, the MAVerick Festival, several SCI regional conferences, and concerts and radio broadcasts across the U.S. and throughout Europe. He has received commissions from Cantus, SUNY-Oswego, GéNIA, the Chamber Music Conference of the East/Composers' Forum, Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art in Kansas City, Jesus Florido, Thomas Clement, Lewis University, Sumner Academy of Arts and Science, and three times by the Metropolitan Youth Symphony Orchestra. McFerron’s music can be heard on numerous commercial CDs as well as on his website at http://www.bigcomposer.com.

David D. McIntire was born in upstate New York and has had some training on the clarinet. Weekly exposure to Protestant hymnody and performing in a small town band were experiences that provided his entry into music. Later encounters with the music of Charles Ives offered new perspective to these modest origins. Hearing the music of Sibelius in the fifth grade also made a deep impact. He has maintained his livelihood through playing, teaching, composing, and writing about music. Has had an inexplicable interest in electronic and modern music since his early teen years, to the exasperation of several of his teachers. Also played clarinet and saxophone in a number of eccentric and overly idealistic musical groups, most notably the Colorblind James Experience, the Whitman/McIntire Duo, and the Hotheads. He holds music degrees from Nazareth College of Rochester, Ithaca College and recently received a DMA in composition at the University of Missouri-Kansas City where he was awarded a Preparing Future Faculty Fellowship. He is also completing a master’s degree in musicology at UMKC; his thesis is on the postminimalist style known as Totalism. His research interests include soundscape composition, minimalism and postminimalism, the "American Mavericks" tradition, and the music of Harrison Birtwistle. He also serves on the boards of Electronic Music Midwest and newEar Chamber Ensemble.

Originally an orchestral French Horn player hailing from Indiana, Tony has spent most of the last 20 years freelancing in live theatre as a composer and sound designer. His work has been heard on stages and at festivals across the country and internation- ally. He completed his undergraduate work at Ball State University, received a Master's in Computer Music and New Media from Northern Illinois University and is currently pursuing a doctorate in Music Composition at the University of Illinois.

"The word 'viral,' comes to mind as a trendy but disquietingly accurate image for Robert Voisey's infectious enthusiasm. He is always ready to mutate and reinfect the process as indicated to maintain the highest degree of project fever" -60x60: netsuke for the musical mind -- Richard Arnest, Sounding Board, Spring 2011.

"With few opportunities and much competition, young composers show creativity in just getting heard." And in Chris Pasles's article in the Los Angeles Times, Robert Voisey is highlighted as one of those composers.

Composing electroacoustic and chamber music, Robert Voisey's aesthetic oscillates from the romantic to Post Modern Mash-Up. His work has been performed in venues throughout the world including: Carnegie Hall, World Financial Center Winter Garden Atrium, and Stratford Circus in London.

Robert Voisey is also the Director of the 60x60 project, an international electronic concert series promoting thousands of composers throughout the globe. He is also the Director of both the Composer’s Voice concert series, as well as the Fifteen Minutes of Fame project.

More information is available at www.robvoisey.com.