David Noon

Last updated
David Noon
Born (1946-07-23) July 23, 1946 (age 76)
Johnstown, Pennsylvania, U.S.
Education
Occupation(s) contemporary classical composer and educator

David Noon (born 23 July 1946) is a contemporary classical composer and educator. He has written over 200 works from opera to chamber music. Noon's composition teachers have included Karl Kohn, Darius Milhaud, Charles Jones, Yehudi Wyner, Mario Davidovsky, and Wlodzimierz Kotonski. He was a distinguished member of the faculty at the Manhattan School of Music for 30 years. [1]

Contents

Biography

David Noon was born on 23 July 1946 in Johnstown, Pennsylvania. He is of Pennsylvania Dutch, Welsh, and American Indian heritage. His formal musical education began at the age of 8 when he learned to play the clarinet. Subsequently, he took bassoon, flute, piccolo, and piano lessons. Throughout his childhood, he frequently performed in choirs, bands, orchestras, and chamber music ensembles. During his collegiate years at Pomona College, he continued to sing and play bassoon and piano. He also began the systematic study of composition. Following his undergraduate education, he attended New York University to study Medieval music with Gustave Reese. After receiving an MA in musicology at NYU, he attended Yale University, where he received an MMA and a DMA in composition. [2]

In 1972–73, he was a Fulbright Fellow in composition at the Music Conservatory in Warsaw, Poland. From 1973 to 1976, Noon taught music theory and composition and supervised the advanced ear-training program at the School of Music at Northwestern University. In 1976, he was composer-in-residence at the Wurlitzer Foundation in Taos, New Mexico. From 1996 to 1998, Noon was Composer Artist-in-Residence at the Episcopal Cathedral of St. John the Divine. [1]

A prolific composer, Noon has written 232 works, including chamber music, orchestral works, and choral compositions. He has written 11 string quartets, 3 piano concertos, the opera R.S.V.P., and many works featuring percussion. He has also written 2 books of poetry: Postcards from Rethymno and Bitter Rain; 3 historical novels: The Tin Box, Googie's, and My Name Was Saul; and 3 Nadia Boulanger mysteries, Murder at the Ballets Russes, The Tsar's Daughter, and The Organ Symphony.

He was on the faculty of Manhattan School of Music in New York City from 1981 to 2011, where he was chairman of the Music History Department (1981-2007), chairman of the Composition Department (1989–98), and dean of academics (1998-2006). [1] In 2007–08, Noon was a visiting professor of musicology and composition at the Central Conservatory in Beijing, China. Noon resides in New York City and on the Greek island of Crete. [1]

Awards

Fellowships and prizes

Compositions

Influenced by Stravinsky, Webern, and Boulez, Noon wrote serial music until 1975. It was in that year, in the finale of his String Quartet #1, that Noon abruptly wrote a volta in the style of a Renaissance viol consort. This was the beginning of Noon's conscious reference to styles, techniques, and formal procedures of the past. While often maintaining a fully chromatic harmonic and melodic language, Noon's music frequently makes allusions to tonal diatonicism. The sharp distinction between chromatically dissonant and diatonically tonal music has become a stylistic trait of Noon's work.

Formally, Noon's music is clearly indebted to the Classical tradition with his music being frequently informed by references to sonata-allegro, variation, rondo, and binary dance forms of the past. His early and continued interest in Medieval and Renaissance music has influenced many of his compositions with regard to choices of text (Boethius, St. Augustine of Canterbury, Sedulius Scottus, Columbanus, Alcuin, Villon, Petrarch), constructive techniques (including isorhythm), and basic melodic material (especially Gregorian Chant). The obvious influence of Medieval music can be heard in Noon's Alleluias for solo flute, winds & percussion, A Medieval Reliquary for baritone, flute, 'cello & harp, Tristan's Mirror and Miroir Estampie both for 2 pianos, and String Quartet #7 "le tombeau des troubadours." Blending Medieval and Renaissance with contemporary procedures has become a hallmark of Noon's pluralistic, Post-Modern work.

Alongside music for traditional ensembles, Noon has frequently written music for percussion from large ensembles such as his Symphonia Apocalyptica for 12 percussionists to solo works such as Hardcore for solo timpanist. While usually writing for traditional percussion instruments, Noon occasionally writes theatrical pieces for found percussion (music stand, pots & pans, playing cards, brooms), for example, his works Stand Up!, Hot Grease, Nasty Licks!, Table for One, Hit the Deck, and Swept Away.

Related Research Articles

Shulamit Ran is an Israeli-American composer. She moved from Israel to New York City at 14, as a scholarship student at the Mannes College of Music. Her Symphony (1990) won her the Pulitzer Prize for Music. In this regard, she was the second woman to win the Pulitzer Prize for Music, the first being Ellen Taaffe Zwilich in 1983. Ran was a professor of music composition at the University of Chicago from 1973 to 2015. She has performed as a pianist in Israel, Europe and the U.S., and her compositional works have been performed worldwide by a wide array of orchestras and chamber groups.

Mario Davidovsky was an Argentine-American composer. Born in Argentina, he emigrated in 1960 to the United States, where he lived for the remainder of his life. He is best known for his series of compositions called Synchronisms, which in live performance incorporate both acoustic instruments and electroacoustic sounds played from a tape.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Per Nørgård</span> Danish composer (born 1932)

Per Nørgård is a Danish composer and music theorist. Though his style has varied considerably throughout his career, his music has often included repeatedly evolving melodies—such as the infinity series—in the vein of Jean Sibelius, and a perspicuous focus on lyricism. Reflecting on this, the composer Julian Anderson described his style as "one of the most personal in contemporary music". Nørgård has received several awards, including the 2016 Ernst von Siemens Music Prize.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Brian Cherney</span> Canadian composer

Brian Cherney is a Canadian composer currently residing in Montreal, Quebec.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ulrich Leyendecker</span> German composer

Ulrich Leyendecker was a German composer of classical music. His output consisted mainly of symphonies, concertos, chamber and instrumental music.

Daniel Asia is an American composer. He was born in Seattle, Washington, in the United States of America.

Margaret Brouwer is an American composer and composition teacher. She founded the Blue Streak Ensemble chamber music group.

Martin Boykan was an American composer known for his chamber music as well as music for larger ensembles.

Ursula Mamlok was a German-born American composer and teacher.

Robert Paterson is an American composer of contemporary classical music, as well as a conductor and percussionist. His catalog includes over 100 compositions. He has been called a "modern day master" and is primarily known for his colorful orchestral works, large body of chamber music and clear vocal writing in his operas, choral works, vocal chamber works and song cycles.

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 (1988–1992) and the Canadian Opera Company (1993–1995). He was awarded the National Arts Centre Orchestra Composer Award in 2002. He currently teaches on the music faculty at the University of Toronto.

John Musto is an American composer and pianist. As a composer, he is active in opera, orchestral and chamber music, song, vocal ensemble, and solo piano works. As a pianist, he performs frequently as a soloist, alone and with orchestra, as a chamber musician, and with singers.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">David Ludwig (composer)</span> American composer of classical music (born 1974)

David Serkin Ludwig is an American composer, teacher, and Dean of Music at The Juilliard School. His uncle was pianist Peter Serkin, his grandfather was the pianist Rudolf Serkin, and his great-grandfather was the violinist Adolf Busch. He holds positions and residencies with nearly two dozen orchestras and music festivals in the US and abroad. His choral work, The New Colossus, was performed at the 2013 presidential inauguration of Barack Obama.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Tigran Mansurian</span> Armenian composer and teacher (born 1939)

Tigran Yeghiayi Mansurian is a leading Armenian composer of classical music and film scores, People's Artist of the Armenian SSR (1990), and Honored Art Worker of the Armenian SSR (1984). He is the author of orchestral, chamber, choir and vocal works, which have been played across the world. He was nominated for Grammy awards in 2004 and 2017.

Roger John Goeb was an American composer.

Malcolm Lipkin was an English composer.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Han Lash</span> American composer of concert music (born 1981)

Han Lash is an American composer of concert music who has taught at Yale School of Music, Mannes School of Music, and the Indiana University Jacobs School of Music.

Andy Akiho is an American musician and composer of contemporary classical music. A virtuoso percussionist based in New York City, his primary performance instrument is steel pans. He took interest in becoming a percussionist when his older sister introduced him to a drum set at the age of 9. Akiho first tried his hand at the steel pan when he became an undergraduate at the University of South Carolina. He began taking several trips to Trinidad after college to learn and play music. From there, he started writing pieces of his own.

Alex Burtzos is an American composer based in New York City and Orlando, Florida.

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 Manhattan School of Music. Faculty biography: David Noon Archived 2006-09-03 at the Wayback Machine . Accessed 29 November 2010.
  2. ↑ David Noon. Ars Nova biography Archived 2011-07-17 at the Wayback Machine . Accessed 29 November 2010.
  3. ↑ Page, Tim. "Philharmonic Ensemble Plays at Asia Society". The New York Times (March 27, 1985). Accessed 30 November 2010.
  4. ↑ Barnett, Rob. CD Review: Sonata da Camera. MusicWeb International (July 2008). Accessed 29 November 2010.
  5. ↑ Kozinn, Allan. Review: "No Reason They Can't Be Medieval, Too". The New York Times (August 17, 2002). Accessed 29 November 2010.
  6. ↑ Kozinn, Allan. Review: "Debussy From a Duo And Friends". New York Times (April 4, 1990). Accessed 29 November 2010.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.