The 2023 solo competition was the third collaboration of the BCMCC and Meg Quigley for a solo work, open to composers from around the world. The winning work was a required piece for the preliminary and final rounds of the 2024 Meg Quigley Vivaldi Competition. www.megquigley.org

WINNER:

Seas of the Moon by Roger Zare

HONORABLE MENTION:

Motet for our Time by Sunny Knable

A Golden Keep by Sean Penzo

Premiere:

Susan Nelson premiered Seas of the Moon at the Bowling Green State University New Music Festival, October 18th, 2024.

About the Composers:

Roger Zare has been praised for his “enviable grasp of orchestration” (New York Times) and for writing music with “formal clarity and an alluringly mercurial surface.” He was born in Sarasota, FL, and has written for a wide variety of ensembles, from solo instruments to full orchestra. Often inspired by science, mathematics, literature, and mythology, his colorfully descriptive and energetic works have been performed on six continents by such ensembles as the American Composers Orchestra, the Minnesota Orchestra, the Sarasota Orchestra, the Australian-based Trio Anima Mundi, the Donald Sinta Quartet, and the New York Youth Symphony. An award winning composer, Zare has received the ASCAP Nissim Prize, three BMI Student Composer Awards, an ASCAP Morton Gould award, a New York Youth Symphony First Music Commission, the 2008 American Composers Orchestra Underwood Commission, a 2010 Charles Ives Scholarship from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, a Copland House Residency Award, Grand Prize in the inaugural China-US Emerging Composers Competition, and many other honors. An active pianist, Zare performed his chamber work, Geometries, with Cho-Liang Lin, Jian Wang, and Burt Hara at the 2014 Hong Kong International Chamber Music Festival. He has been the 2023 FRA guest composer at Fermilab and composer-in-residence with the Chesapeake Chamber Music Festival, the Salt Bay Chamber Music Festival, the Chamber Music Festival of Lexington and the SONAR new music ensemble. Zare's collections of concert etudes for solo clarinet and bass clarinet are paired with written masterclasses by clarinetist Andy Hudson in Elements of Contemporary Clarinet Technique and SPACE BASS, both published by Conway Publications and distributed around the world.

Zare holds a DMA ('12) from the University of Michigan, where he studied with Michael Daugherty, Paul Schoenfield, Bright Sheng, and Kristin Kuster. He holds degrees from the Peabody Conservatory (MM '09) and the University of Southern California (BM '07), and his previous teachers include Christopher Theofanidis, Derek Bermel, David Smooke, Donald Crockett, Tamar Diesendruck, Fredrick Lesemann, and Morten Lauridsen. Zare currently serves as assistant professor of music at Appalachian State University and previously taught composition at Illinois State University.

Sunny Knable (b. 1983) is an award-winning composer, a multi-instrumental performer, an educator, and an author of multiple essays and books. Some of his awards include three Best Composition Awards from the Festival of New American Music and the ANALOG ARTS Iron Composers Award, for which he wrote a four-minute piece in five hours. Knable’s music has been described as "genius" (Anchorage Press), "great!" (TheWholeNote), "well-crafted" (New York Concert Review), "entertaining" (Audiophile Audition), "witty, romantic and lilting" (TheaterScene.net), offering up "sparks of color and inventiveness" (Sacramento Bee), and possessing a "wealth of thematic invention" (feastofmusic.com).  His prolific output is widely performed, including works for solos, chamber music, orchestra, and opera.  Dr. Knable is an Assistant Professor of Music at Central Connecticut State University and Music Director of The Church-in-the-Gardens.  He was an Adjunct Assistant Professor at Queens College and LaGuardia Community College for eight years.  He holds a PhD in Music Composition from Stony Brook University, a Master of Arts in Composition from Queens College (CUNY), and a Bachelor of Music degree in Composition, Piano Performance and Jazz Studies from CSU Sacramento.  His discography includes his debut album "American Variations" on Centaur Records; his second composition album with bassoonist Scott Pool and pianist Natsuki Fukasawa, "Song of the Redwood Tree" on MSR Classics; and his third composition album "Keys" featuring Faythe Vollrath and Matthew Lau on Trouvère Records.  His bassoon works, Song of the Redwood-Tree, The Busking Bassoonist, and Reflection of a Life, are published by TrevCo Music.  Trouvère Music Publishing publishes all other works.  He is the editor of the book "Looking Within: The Music of John Palmer," and the author of "The Quarantine Chronicle of a Composer" on Vision Edition, UK.  He resides in Forest Hills, NY, with his wife, son, and cat.

Born in Genova, Italy, and raised outside of Syracuse, NY, Sean Penzo is a composer, cellist, and writer known for a wide range of collaborations and compositions. He has held board positions in Ethos New Music Society and The Improv. Collective, among others, and is a co-founder of the Michigan-based non-profit, East Zodiac. Penzo has composed for ensembles which have performed and recorded his music internationally including Sonic Apricity, Akropolis Reed Quintet, and Quartetto Zuena. His most recent writing work has involved writing the libretto for Mateo Wojtczack’s, “Hero’s Awakening”, and the blog, Musician Coop. During his undergrad at SUNY Fredonia, he studied composition with Paul Coleman, Andrew Martin Smith, Rob Deemer, and Jamie Leigh Sampson, and cello with Natasha Farny. After Fredonia, he studied with Keith Fitch and Bryan Dumm in Cleveland, and graduated with a master's in music composition. 
       Penzo values performance just as much as composition. He enjoys working with live bands and playing the role of a studio musician--often recording remotely for clients of all genres. His recent endeavors have involved working with Shane Patterson, Todd Hobin, Isa Bruder, and The Junk Experiment. Currently based in Pittsburgh, PA, he regularly performs, records, and premieres works written by other composers.

2023 Judges:

Nanci Belmont, Louisiana State University

Michael Garza, Pan Pacific Ensemble

Peter Kolkay, Vanderbilt University

Nadina Mackie, Solo bassoonist, Founding past president of the Council of Canadian Bassoonists

Marissa Olegario, University of Arizona, Principal Bassoon- Tucson Symphony Orchestra

Jaquain Sloan, Acting Utility Bassoon/Contrabassoon with Detroit Symphony Orchestra

Catherine Van Handel, Principal Bassoon- Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra

Martin Van Klompenberg, Composer, Bassoon professor, North Dakota State University