Daniel Asia, Composer and Conductor, was born in Seattle, Washington in 1953. He has been the recipient of the most competitive grants and fellowships in music including a Meet the Composer/Reader’s Digest Commission, United Kingdom Fulbright Arts Award Fellowship, a Guggenheim Fellowship, four NEA Composers Grants, an M.B. Rockefeller Grant, McDowell Colony and Tanglewood Fellowships, ASCAP and BMI composition prizes, and a DAAD Fellowship for study in the Federal Republic of Germany. Rivalries, for orchestra, was a semi-finalist in the 1986 Friedheim Competition of the Kennedy Center. Mr. Asia was Composer in Residence under the auspices of the Meet the Composer Orchestral Residency Program with the Phoenix Symphony from 1991 to 1994. The composer’s major orchestral works include At The Far Edge, Black Light, two song cycles, a trumpet concerto, and four symphonies. He has also written extensively for chamber ensembles and solo performers.
Working with many renowned soloists, ensembles, and orchestras, Mr. Asia has been commissioned by the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra, Phoenix Symphony, Seattle Symphony Orchestra, Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra, American Composers Orchestra, Jacksonville Symphony Orchestra, Chattanooga Symphony, Grand Rapids Symphony Orchestra, New Jersey Symphony Orchestra, North Carolina Symphony Orchestra, Tucson Symphony Orchestra/Syde Family, Seattle Youth Symphony Orchestra, Colorado Philharmonic Orchestra, Koussevitsky Music Foundation, Fromm Music Foundation, D’Addario Foundation for the Performing Arts/Domus, Oberlin Woodwind Quintet, Musical Elements, Benjamin Verdery/guitar, André-Michel Schub/piano, Jonathan Shames/piano, John Shirley-Quirk and Sara Watkins/baritone and oboe, and Robert Dick/flute.
In recent years Mr. Asia’s music has also been performed by the Brooklyn Philharmonic Orchestra, Aspen Festival Chamber Orchestra, Northwest Chamber Orchestra, and numerous chamber ensembles. His music has been played throughout the United States, including the major venues of New York such as Carnegie Hall and Recital Hall, 92nd Street Y, Merkin Hall, the Great Hall at Cooper Union, and those of London including Queen Elizabeth Hall (South Bank), St. John’s, Smith Square, and Wigmore Hall. His works have been recorded in London for the BBC by the BBC Singers and Lontano.
After receiving his B.A. degree from Hampshire College, where he studied music and European History, Mr. Asia attended the Yale School of Music, receiving the Master of Music degree. His major teachers include Jacob Druckman, Stephen Albert, Gunther Schuller, Isang Yun, Arthur Weisberg, Bruce MacCombie, Ronald Perera, and Randall McClellan.
Mr. Asia is also the founder and present Co-Music Director of the New York-based contemporary ensemble Musical Elements. The Ensemble has performed in all the major halls of New York and was in residence at the 92nd Street Y, 1986-9. Musical Elements records for Composers Recordings, Inc.
Assistant Professor of Contemporary Music and Wind Ensemble at the Oberlin Conservatory from 1981 to 1986, Mr. Asia resided in London from 1986 to 1988 working under the auspices of a U.K. Fulbright Arts Award and a Guggenheim Fellowship. He is presently Associate Professor of Composition, and head of the Composition Department, at The University of Arizona, Tucson.
Web: http://www.presser.com/Composers/info.cfm?Name=DANIELASIA