Michael Vincent (composer)
Encyclopedia
Michael Vincent is a Canadian
Contemporary classical music
composer situated in Toronto, Ontario
. He is noted for his innovative works which combine electronic and traditional instrumentation, as well as his work with spoken word
, which includes a full-length opera
Generation X with text by the Canadian Author Douglas Coupland
. Michael is a noted editor and author, writing numerous articles for Canada's largest classical music magazine La Scena Musicale, and Playing With Words: the spoken word in artistic practice, a collection of responses from over 40 leading contemporary composers and artists who have been invited to represent aspects of their creative practice with words, and in particular, the spoken word, for the printed page. Michael has studied with composers Osvaldo Golijov
, Tim Brady, Gary Kulesha
, Jean Claude Risset, Roberto Sierra
, David MacIntyre, Barry Truax
, Christos Hatzis
, and James Rolfe
. He has studied music at Victoria Conservatory of Music, McGill University
, and holds advanced degrees from Concordia University
(Montreal
, Quebec
), and Simon Fraser University
(Vancouver
, British Columbia
).
He is currently a doctoral candidate in composition and theory at the University of Toronto
Faculty of Music.
He is a member of the Canadian Music Centre
.
Concert Hall. In March 2003, and Bozzini String Quartet premiered his Three Ring Circus in April 2004, and during that same year, Terra Firma was premiered by the Wire Ensemble under The New Modes group.
Between November 2003 and February 2004, Michael has premiered three electroacoustic
works Sat There and Clapped, Advaita, and Three Stories for the Faint of Heart at the ÉuCue Concert Series at Oscar Peterson
concert hall in Montreal
, Quebec
. In late 2003, he won the Allan award for his work in mixed electroacoustic and instrumental forms, and has written articles and reviews for eContact! Electroacoutic music journal, and la Scene Musicale classical music magazine. For the past 6 years, Michael has been on staff at la Scene Musicale, acting as new editor, and news contributor.
Michael has collaborated choreographer Jennifer Mascall and videographer Jacqueline Levitin on a feature work for the Off Centre Dance Company entitled Just Barely, which premiered at SFU Burnaby Theatre on April 8 and 9, 2005. Michael has also worked with plunderphnics composer, John Oswald
on a concert inspired by Glenn Gould
for the Vancouver New Forms festival, which saw the premiere of his work Gouldberg Variations on September 15, 2005. He has joined forces with the Vancouver spoken word artists Barbara Adler on two unique pieces entitled Baby 81 and Little Museum. Little Museum has since been recorded on the spoken word CD Flusterblush released in July 2006.
Over the years 2005 and 2006, Michael wrote and adapted a feature length spoken word opera entitled Generation X
- the Opera, which was based on a novel by Canadian author Douglas Coupland
. Generation X- the Opera, premiered on March 17, 2006, at the SFU Burnaby Theatre, in Burnaby BC.
In February, 2007, Michael premiered three speech melody compositions titled Warnings from Punk Rock 101, West-Coast Cats, and Dying Ain't Bad Y'all at the Western Front in Vancouver BC, for the PuSh International Performing Arts Festival
.
Michael also contributed as one of four composers in a multi-interdisiplinary work entitled Triaspora, performed at the Chan Centre for the Performing Arts on September 21–22, 2007 by Juno Award
nominated performers Orchid Ensemble
and Moving Dragon Dance, with multimedia by Aleksa Dulic and Kenneth Newby
.
Most recently, the production was shown at the National Arts Centre
(NAC) in Ottawa
Canada
as part of BC Scene
In the spring of 2010, Michael premiered a newly commissioned work (Tombeau for an Ancient Chinese General) for dance at the Royal Ontario Museum
(ROM) as part of the International CanAsian Dance Festival, which was performed by Moving Dragon Dance and the TorQ Percussion Quartet.
Canada
Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...
Contemporary classical music
Contemporary classical music
Contemporary classical music can be understood as belonging to the period that started in the mid-1970s with the retreat of modernism. However, the term may also be employed in a broader sense to refer to all post-1945 modern musical forms.-Categorization:...
composer situated in Toronto, Ontario
Ontario
Ontario is a province of Canada, located in east-central Canada. It is Canada's most populous province and second largest in total area. It is home to the nation's most populous city, Toronto, and the nation's capital, Ottawa....
. He is noted for his innovative works which combine electronic and traditional instrumentation, as well as his work with spoken word
Spoken word
Spoken word is a form of poetry that often uses alliterated prose or verse and occasionally uses metered verse to express social commentary. Traditionally it is in the first person, is from the poet’s point of view and is themed in current events....
, which includes a full-length opera
Opera
Opera is an art form in which singers and musicians perform a dramatic work combining text and musical score, usually in a theatrical setting. Opera incorporates many of the elements of spoken theatre, such as acting, scenery, and costumes and sometimes includes dance...
Generation X with text by the Canadian Author Douglas Coupland
Douglas Coupland
Douglas Coupland is a Canadian novelist. His fiction is complemented by recognized works in design and visual art arising from his early formal training. His first novel, the 1991 international bestseller Generation X: Tales for an Accelerated Culture, popularized terms such as McJob and...
. Michael is a noted editor and author, writing numerous articles for Canada's largest classical music magazine La Scena Musicale, and Playing With Words: the spoken word in artistic practice, a collection of responses from over 40 leading contemporary composers and artists who have been invited to represent aspects of their creative practice with words, and in particular, the spoken word, for the printed page. Michael has studied with composers Osvaldo Golijov
Osvaldo Golijov
Osvaldo Noé Golijov is a Grammy award–winning composer of classical music.-Biography:Osvaldo Golijov was born in and grew up in La Plata, Argentina, in a Jewish family that had emigrated to Argentina in the 1920s from Romania and Russia.Golijov has developed a rich musical language, the result of...
, Tim Brady, Gary Kulesha
Gary Kulesha
Gary Kulesha is a Canadian composer, pianist, conductor, and educator. Since 1995, he has been Composer Advisor to the Toronto Symphony Orchestra. He has been Composer-in-Residence with the Kitchener-Waterloo Symphony and the Canadian Opera Company . He was awarded the National Arts Centre...
, Jean Claude Risset, Roberto Sierra
Roberto Sierra
Roberto Sierra is a composer of contemporary classical music.Sierra studied composition in Europe, notably with György Ligeti in Hamburg, Germany...
, David MacIntyre, Barry Truax
Barry Truax
Barry Truax is a Canadian composer who specializes in real-time implementations of granular synthesis, often of sampled sounds, and soundscapes...
, Christos Hatzis
Christos Hatzis
Christos Hatzis is a Greek Canadian composer currently a professor at the Faculty of Music, University of Toronto.-Biography:Hatzis was born in Volos, Greece and received his early music instruction at the Volos branch of the Hellenic Conservatory...
, and James Rolfe
James Rolfe
James Simon Rolfe is one of Canada's leading composers of contemporary music. He studied composition with John Beckwith at the University of Toronto and Jo Kondo in Japan...
. He has studied music at Victoria Conservatory of Music, McGill University
McGill University
Mohammed Fathy is a public research university located in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. The university bears the name of James McGill, a prominent Montreal merchant from Glasgow, Scotland, whose bequest formed the beginning of the university...
, and holds advanced degrees from Concordia University
Concordia University
Concordia University is a comprehensive Canadian public university located in Montreal, Quebec, one of the two universities in the city where English is the primary language of instruction...
(Montreal
Montreal
Montreal is a city in Canada. It is the largest city in the province of Quebec, the second-largest city in Canada and the seventh largest in North America...
, Quebec
Quebec
Quebec or is a province in east-central Canada. It is the only Canadian province with a predominantly French-speaking population and the only one whose sole official language is French at the provincial level....
), and Simon Fraser University
Simon Fraser University
Simon Fraser University is a Canadian public research university in British Columbia with its main campus on Burnaby Mountain in Burnaby, and satellite campuses in Vancouver and Surrey. The main campus in Burnaby, located from downtown Vancouver, was established in 1965 and has more than 34,000...
(Vancouver
Vancouver
Vancouver is a coastal seaport city on the mainland of British Columbia, Canada. It is the hub of Greater Vancouver, which, with over 2.3 million residents, is the third most populous metropolitan area in the country,...
, British Columbia
British Columbia
British Columbia is the westernmost of Canada's provinces and is known for its natural beauty, as reflected in its Latin motto, Splendor sine occasu . Its name was chosen by Queen Victoria in 1858...
).
He is currently a doctoral candidate in composition and theory at the University of Toronto
University of Toronto
The University of Toronto is a public research university in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, situated on the grounds that surround Queen's Park. It was founded by royal charter in 1827 as King's College, the first institution of higher learning in Upper Canada...
Faculty of Music.
He is a member of the Canadian Music Centre
Canadian Music Centre
The Canadian Music Centre holds Canada's largest collection of Canadian concert music. The CMC exists to promote the works of its Associate Composers in Canada and around the world....
.
Bio
In 2002, his piece Essence was recorded on the CEC labels DISContact! III compilation album. Under direction of Tim Brady, Bradyworks ensemble premiered his Un-What? at Oscar PetersonOscar Peterson
Oscar Emmanuel Peterson was a Canadian jazz pianist and composer. He was called the "Maharaja of the keyboard" by Duke Ellington, "O.P." by his friends. He released over 200 recordings, won seven Grammy Awards, and received other numerous awards and honours over the course of his career...
Concert Hall. In March 2003, and Bozzini String Quartet premiered his Three Ring Circus in April 2004, and during that same year, Terra Firma was premiered by the Wire Ensemble under The New Modes group.
Between November 2003 and February 2004, Michael has premiered three electroacoustic
Electroacoustic music
Electroacoustic music originated in Western art music during its modern era following the incorporation of electric sound production into compositional practice. The initial developments in electroacoustic music composition during the mid-20th century are associated with the activities of composers...
works Sat There and Clapped, Advaita, and Three Stories for the Faint of Heart at the ÉuCue Concert Series at Oscar Peterson
Oscar Peterson
Oscar Emmanuel Peterson was a Canadian jazz pianist and composer. He was called the "Maharaja of the keyboard" by Duke Ellington, "O.P." by his friends. He released over 200 recordings, won seven Grammy Awards, and received other numerous awards and honours over the course of his career...
concert hall in Montreal
Montreal
Montreal is a city in Canada. It is the largest city in the province of Quebec, the second-largest city in Canada and the seventh largest in North America...
, Quebec
Quebec
Quebec or is a province in east-central Canada. It is the only Canadian province with a predominantly French-speaking population and the only one whose sole official language is French at the provincial level....
. In late 2003, he won the Allan award for his work in mixed electroacoustic and instrumental forms, and has written articles and reviews for eContact! Electroacoutic music journal, and la Scene Musicale classical music magazine. For the past 6 years, Michael has been on staff at la Scene Musicale, acting as new editor, and news contributor.
Michael has collaborated choreographer Jennifer Mascall and videographer Jacqueline Levitin on a feature work for the Off Centre Dance Company entitled Just Barely, which premiered at SFU Burnaby Theatre on April 8 and 9, 2005. Michael has also worked with plunderphnics composer, John Oswald
John Oswald (composer)
John Oswald is a Canadian composer, saxophonist, media artist and dancer. His best known project is Plunderphonics, the practice of making new music out of previously existing recordings .-Philosophy:Oswald coined the term "plunderphonics" to describe his craft in a paper called which he...
on a concert inspired by Glenn Gould
Glenn Gould
Glenn Herbert Gould was a Canadian pianist who became one of the best-known and most celebrated classical pianists of the 20th century. He was particularly renowned as an interpreter of the keyboard music of Johann Sebastian Bach...
for the Vancouver New Forms festival, which saw the premiere of his work Gouldberg Variations on September 15, 2005. He has joined forces with the Vancouver spoken word artists Barbara Adler on two unique pieces entitled Baby 81 and Little Museum. Little Museum has since been recorded on the spoken word CD Flusterblush released in July 2006.
Over the years 2005 and 2006, Michael wrote and adapted a feature length spoken word opera entitled Generation X
Generation X
Generation X, commonly abbreviated to Gen X, is the generation born after the Western post–World War II baby boom ended. While there is no universally agreed upon time frame, the term generally includes people born from the early 1960's through the early 1980's, usually no later than 1981 or...
- the Opera, which was based on a novel by Canadian author Douglas Coupland
Douglas Coupland
Douglas Coupland is a Canadian novelist. His fiction is complemented by recognized works in design and visual art arising from his early formal training. His first novel, the 1991 international bestseller Generation X: Tales for an Accelerated Culture, popularized terms such as McJob and...
. Generation X- the Opera, premiered on March 17, 2006, at the SFU Burnaby Theatre, in Burnaby BC.
In February, 2007, Michael premiered three speech melody compositions titled Warnings from Punk Rock 101, West-Coast Cats, and Dying Ain't Bad Y'all at the Western Front in Vancouver BC, for the PuSh International Performing Arts Festival
PuSh International Performing Arts Festival
The PuSh International Performing Arts Festival is held in Vancouver, British Colombia each year. Produced over 20 days each January, the PuSh Festival presents work in the live performing arts: theatre, dance, music and various hybrid forms of performance...
.
Michael also contributed as one of four composers in a multi-interdisiplinary work entitled Triaspora, performed at the Chan Centre for the Performing Arts on September 21–22, 2007 by Juno Award
Juno Award
The Juno Awards are presented annually to Canadian musical artists and bands to acknowledge their artistic and technical achievements in all aspects of music...
nominated performers Orchid Ensemble
Orchid Ensemble
The Orchid Ensemble is a musical ensemble based in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada Its led by Lan Tung from Taiwan on erhu, with Haiqiong Deng from China on guzheng and Jonathan Bernard from Canada on various percussion instruments...
and Moving Dragon Dance, with multimedia by Aleksa Dulic and Kenneth Newby
Kenneth Newby
Kenneth Newby is a Canadian composer, performer and media artist. His art and research involve explorations in computational poetics, theorizing the role of encoded practices in new media, cultural encoding and the development of interactive and generative techniques for the composition,...
.
Most recently, the production was shown at the National Arts Centre
National Arts Centre
The National Arts Centre is a centre for the performing arts located in Ottawa, Ontario, between Elgin Street and the Rideau Canal...
(NAC) in Ottawa
Ottawa
Ottawa is the capital of Canada, the second largest city in the Province of Ontario, and the fourth largest city in the country. The city is located on the south bank of the Ottawa River in the eastern portion of Southern Ontario...
Canada
Canada
Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...
as part of BC Scene
In the spring of 2010, Michael premiered a newly commissioned work (Tombeau for an Ancient Chinese General) for dance at the Royal Ontario Museum
Royal Ontario Museum
The Royal Ontario Museum is a museum of world culture and natural history in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. With its main entrance facing Bloor Street in Downtown Toronto, the museum is situated north of Queen's Park and east of Philosopher's Walk in the University of Toronto...
(ROM) as part of the International CanAsian Dance Festival, which was performed by Moving Dragon Dance and the TorQ Percussion Quartet.
Awards
- 2011 Karen Kieser Prize in Canadian Music - Honourable Mention" - University of TorontoUniversity of TorontoThe University of Toronto is a public research university in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, situated on the grounds that surround Queen's Park. It was founded by royal charter in 1827 as King's College, the first institution of higher learning in Upper Canada...
- 2008-2012 Full-Tuition Fellowship" - University of TorontoUniversity of TorontoThe University of Toronto is a public research university in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, situated on the grounds that surround Queen's Park. It was founded by royal charter in 1827 as King's College, the first institution of higher learning in Upper Canada...
- 2010 Project Award" - Ontario Arts CouncilOntario Arts CouncilThe Ontario Arts Council is a publicly-funded Canadian organization in the province of Ontario whose purpose is to promote and assist the development of the arts for the enjoyment and benefit of all Ontarians...
- 2006 Graduating Project Grant" - Simon Fraser UniversitySimon Fraser UniversitySimon Fraser University is a Canadian public research university in British Columbia with its main campus on Burnaby Mountain in Burnaby, and satellite campuses in Vancouver and Surrey. The main campus in Burnaby, located from downtown Vancouver, was established in 1965 and has more than 34,000...
- 2006 Arts Service Award" - Simon Fraser UniversitySimon Fraser UniversitySimon Fraser University is a Canadian public research university in British Columbia with its main campus on Burnaby Mountain in Burnaby, and satellite campuses in Vancouver and Surrey. The main campus in Burnaby, located from downtown Vancouver, was established in 1965 and has more than 34,000...
- 2004 Graduate Fellowship" - Simon Fraser UniversitySimon Fraser UniversitySimon Fraser University is a Canadian public research university in British Columbia with its main campus on Burnaby Mountain in Burnaby, and satellite campuses in Vancouver and Surrey. The main campus in Burnaby, located from downtown Vancouver, was established in 1965 and has more than 34,000...
- 2003 Alain Award in Electroacoustic Composition" - Concordia UniversityConcordia UniversityConcordia University is a comprehensive Canadian public university located in Montreal, Quebec, one of the two universities in the city where English is the primary language of instruction...
Stage
- Koong (2010, 15'42")
- Triaspora: Overture (2007, 9'30")
- Generation X - The Opera (2006, 51')
- Just Barely (2005, 11'11")
Chamber
- Quel Bon Hiver (2011, 10'36")
- How They Come Singing (2011, 4'50")
- What Times Is It There? (2010, 8'54")
- Tombeau for an Ancient Warrior (2010, 15'42")
- Jack (2008, 5'30")
- Mothertongue (2008, 9'30")
- West Coast Cats (2006, 9'37")
- The Brevity of the Appellation (2005, 10'3")
- Until You Are Satisfied (2005, 10'3")
- Le Cirque de Calder (2004, 11'51")
- Warnings from Punk Rock 101 (2003, 8'34")
- Last of the Gallant Heroes (2003, 4'08")
- Un-What (2003, 4'40")
- Music to Rise to (2002, 3'36")
- Four Set Mutations (2002, 15'20")
Solo
- A Mobile of Gulls (2011, 4'40")
- Gawkey Music (2011, 7'46")
- Max and the Life of Big Machines (2010-11, 16'18")
- The Girl w/ X's for Eyes (2010, 4'40")
- The Busy Life (2010, 6'06")
- Haunting Lomax (2010, 10'06")
- Flesh Colour (2008, 14'12")
- The Filth and the Fury (2007, 7'11")
- Dying Ain’t Bad Y’all (2006, 3'38")
Electroacoustic
- Little Museum (2006, 5'25")
- Baby 81 (2005, 5'15")
- Gouldberg Variations (2005, 11'11")
- Terra Firma (2004, 15’)
- Three Stories for the Faint of Heart (2004, 15 minutes)
- Advaita (2003, 8'26")
- Sat There and Clapped (featuring Kevin Austin) (2003, 6'08")
- Essence (2002, 2'50")