✺ BIOGRAPHY
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RYAN BROWN’s music has been called “modern composed music at its best: nimble, expressive, ear-turning, and strange in an accessible way, highly virtuosic but never pretentious.” (Washington City Paper)
Ryan’s music has been performed by many groups, performers, and presenters, including pianist Lisa Moore, the California E.A.R. Unit, NOW Ensemble, the MATA Festival, and the Gaudeamus Festival (Netherlands). In 2007 French record label trAce released Banksy on the album Post-Minimalism.
Ryan has received an Emerging Composer Award from the Gerbode and Hewlett Foundations, and a Morton Gould Young Composer Award from ASCAP. Upcoming premieres and commissions include music for janus, the Paul Dresher Ensemble, and the Brooklyn Philharmonic.
In 2006, along with composer Jonathan Russell and clarinetist Jeff Anderle, Ryan co-founded San Francisco’s annual Switchboard Music Festival, an 8-hour music marathon bringing together composers and performers who are challenging traditional genre lines. Himself active as both an electric guitarist and electric bassist, Ryan has been a featured performer in works by Terry Riley, Steve Reich, and John Adams, as well as the premiere performance and recording of Steve Mackey’s Measures of Turbulence.
Ryan is a graduate of the San Francisco Conservatory of Music and California State University, Long Beach, and is currently getting his PhD at Princeton University. Visit his website at www.ryanbrownmusic.com.
“Great, satisfyingly cerebral stuff with a funky and appealing technique to back it up.” DC Theatre Scene
“Pushes the ensemble sound beyond the Western classical realm.” Santa Barbara News-Press
“This is modern composed music at its best; nimble, expressive, ear-turning and strange in an accessible way, highly virtuosic but never pretentious...It’s fun. It’s beautiful.” Washington City Paper
“The genuine enthusiasm the group evoked was infectious, and plenty of audience members bopped their heads along with the music.” San Francisco Classical Voice
