Robert Strizich - Guitar
CREATIVE WORK, AWARDS AND PUBLICATIONS
Robert Strizich has composed works for orchestra, chorus, chamber ensembles, solo instruments and electroacoustic media, and his music has been performed throughout the United States, as well as in Europe. His work has been recognized by a number of grants, awards and fellowships, including those from the National Endowment for the Arts, the National Endowment for the Humanities and the Helene Wurlitzer Foundation. His compositions and editions are published by Bèrben Editore, Drake Mabry Publishing, Éditions Doberman-Yppan, Fallen Leaf Press, Heugel et Cie., Turquoise Guitar Editions and Opus 18 Editions.
PERFORMANCES AND RECORDINGS
A number of noted soloists have performed Strizich"™s music, including Carol Plantamura and Randall Wong (voice), Gloria Cheng, Guy Livingston and Andreas Werz (piano), Cem Duruí¶z, Michael Lorimer and George Sakellariou (guitar), Leta Miller (flute), Sabine Evers and Eva Legêne (recorder). His orchestral and ensemble works have been played by the American Composers' Orchestra (New York City), Música Aperta (Washington, D.C.), the Wesleyan Ensemble of the Americas (Middletown, CT), Ensemble Nova (Santa Cruz, CA) and Ensemble Treibholz (Zürich). Some new music series and festivals that have presented his works include Earplay and Composers Inc. (San Francisco, CA), the Festival of New American Music (California State University, Sacramento, CA), and New Music Works and April in Santa Cruz (Santa Cruz, CA).
Ensemble Nova, the new music ensemble at UC Santa Cruz, has recorded Strizich"™s Tombeau (for baroque flute and harpsichord), Fantasia (for recorder quartet) and Aphorisms (for solo recorder) on a CD released by Musical Heritage Society. Additional performances of his works can be heard on CDs and DVDs issued by Transatlantic Records (Corporate Miniatures, for voice and piano), Turquoise Guitar Editions (La guitarra, for soprano and guitar), hEar Zenith MusiC (Sonoras Fragancias, for guitar) and Wildboar (Contreparties, for baroque lute and harpsichord).
RECENT PREMIERES
One of Strizich"™s most recent works, Corporate Miniatures (for voice and piano) was performed throughout Europe and the US during 2008 and 2009 by pianist Guy Livingston. Spelling Peace (for four guitars and harpsichord) was premiered in 2007 at UC Santa Cruz. His new guitar concerto, In and Out of Blue (for guitar and chamber orchestra), was given its first performance in 2006 at Wesleyan University by guitarist Cem Duruí¶z, with the Wesleyan Ensemble of the Americas conducted by Angel Gil-Ordoñez. Other recent premieres include Epitaphs for solo piano, performed in 2004 by Andreas Werz at California State University, Fresno, and Sonoras fragancias for solo guitar, which was also performed in 2004 at CSUF by Corey Whitehead. His setting of García Lorca's La Guitarra, for soprano and guitar, was premiered in 2003 by Lauren Rasmussen and Mesut Ozgen in the UC Santa Cruz Arts & Lectures series.
EARLY MUSIC
Although he now devotes himself exclusively to composition, in past years Strizich led a parallel career as a guitarist, performing in particular on the baroque guitar and lute. As an early music specialist, he concertized extensively as a soloist, accompanist and ensemble player in both the USA and Europe, and recorded for Doberman-Yppan, EMI, Intrada, Musical Heritage Society, MusicMasters, Titanic, and 1750 Arch Records.
EDUCATION, TEACHING AND SCHOLARSHIP
Robert Strizich received a B.A. in music and an M.A. in composition from the University of California at Berkeley. A Hertz Fellowship from UC Berkeley enabled him to spend several subsequent years in Switzerland, studying at the Musikakademie in Basel. After returning to the USA, he completed a Ph.D. in composition at the University of California at San Diego, where his teachers included Robert Erickson, Will Ogdon, Bernard Rands, and Roger Reynolds. He has taught composition, music theory, music history and performance at Wellesley College, Trinity College (Hartford), the San Francisco Conservatory of Music, San Francisco State University, the University of California at Santa Cruz and California State University, Fresno. He is also the author of various articles on contemporary music and historical performance practice.
