Erik Lindgren

Last updated

Erik Lindgren (December 15, 1954) is an American composer and pianist. He runs Arf! Arf! Records, and has led or been a member of several ensembles such as The Space Negros and Birdsongs of the Mesozoic.

Contents

Erik Lindgren EL-148h.jpg
Erik Lindgren

Early life

Lindgren was born in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania in December 1954. [1] He attended Northfield Mount Hermon School from 1969–1972 studying music with Joseph T. Elliott III, and received his BA in Music from Tufts University in 1976 where he worked with T. J. Anderson. In 1974–1975 he spent his junior year abroad in London studying composition at the Guildhall School of Music with Alfred Nieman and piano with Birgette Wild. [1] Lindgren received an MA in music composition and piano performance from the University of Iowa in 1977 where he studied with Donald Jenni, Richard Hervig and Peter Lewis.

Career

As a contemporary classical composer, Lindgren has a catalog of over seven dozen works, ranging from solo piano pieces to chamber music to orchestral works. He also owns Foot Foot Music BMI which publishes all of his original compositions. In 1978, Lindgren established Sounds Interesting Productions, a commercial recording studio and music production company based in Cambridge, MA. [1] In 1998, he relocated his facility to Middleborough, MA. National and regional credits include original scores for ABC, NBC CBS and PBS, Eastpak, Boston Globe, Basketball Hall of Fame, Jordan Marsh, Polaroid, Prentice Hall and the Christmas Tree Shops. Lindgren also markets The Well-Tempered Music Library that consists of seven CDs of stock commercial music that he composed and produced.

Lindgren was a founding member of the new music ensemble Birdsongs of the Mesozoic that Billboard Magazine described as “a mesmerizing venture into the space age jungle.” The quartet has toured extensively throughout the United States and Canada and held residencies at Dartmouth College, Emory University, Duke, UNCA and the Massachusetts College of Art. Birdsongs’ has recorded for the Rykodisc, Cuneiform and Ace of Hearts labels. The group has collaborated with Duplex Planet editor/National Public Radio correspondent David Greenberger on 1001 Real Apes" (2006), and with Atlanta bass baritone Oral Moses on "Extreme Spirituals" (2006).

The composer celebrated his 50th Birthday performing original works live with various ensembles at The Longy School of Music, Pickman Hall, Cambridge, MA (June 4, 2005). [2]

In 2012, Lindgren received a commission from the Georgia Symphony Orchestra to compose "Extreme Spirituals," a 6-movement 25-minute work for orchestra and bass baritone soloist. The performances featured Oral Moses, whom Lindgren has produced a half-dozen solo CDs for the Albany record label. "Extreme Spirituals" was performed by the Brockton Symphony Orchestra in April 2017 which included Oral Moses once again as the soloist.

In September 2015, Lindgren celebrated his 60th birthday as an artist-in-residence at his alma mater Tufts University in Medford MA. Culminating the week-long residency was a concert devoted to his original chamber works composed during the past decade.

Arf! Arf! Records/SFZ Recordings

For over twenty years, Lindgren has run the Arf! Arf! label which has released over seventy archival CDs documenting 1960s garage/psychedelic rock and "outsider" music. Arf! Arf! issued four CD retrospectives by Lindgren's 1980s experimental studio group The Space Negros. He has also produced over 100 records for artists as Willie Loco Alexander, the Rising Storm, The Turbines, The Cynics, Magic Mose & his Royal Rockers, featuring 'Blind Sam,' Ed “Moose” Savage And His Litany Of Complaints, and harmonica virtuoso Richard Hunter.

In addition, Lindgren runs the SFZ Recordings label which issued his 1999 release Erik Lindgren Scores (SFZ-001) containing acoustic chamber works with ambient visuals, and the 2006 release by the Frankenstein Consort Classical A-Go-Go (SFZ-004) containing original music for woodwind trio, piano, and percussion by one of his performing ensembles.

In 2014, a comprehensive two-CD, 50-track retrospective, Yin Yang A-Go-Go [1972-2005] (Arf Arf AA-105/106) was released in conjunction with Lindgren's 60th birthday.

In 2016, Lindgren's third solo CD Bespoke (Albany Troy 1632) was released containing recent original acoustic chamber works.

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Evan Ziporyn</span> American composer

Evan Ziporyn is an American composer of post-minimalist music with a cross-cultural orientation, drawing equally from classical music, avant-garde, various world music traditions, and jazz. Ziporyn has composed for a wide range of ensembles, including symphony orchestras, wind ensembles, many types of chamber groups, and solo works, sometimes involving electronics. Balinese gamelan, for which he has composed numerous works, has compositions. He is known for his solo performances on clarinet and bass clarinet; additionally, Ziporyn plays gender wayang and other Balinese instruments, saxophones, piano & keyboards, EWI, and Shona mbira.

Graham Fitkin is a British composer, pianist and conductor. His compositions fall broadly into the minimalist and postminimalist genres. Described by The Independent in 1998 as "one of the most important of our younger composers", he is particularly known for his works for solo and multiple pianos, as well as for music accompanying dance.

Birdsongs of the Mesozoic is an American musical group founded in Boston, Massachusetts, United States, in 1980.

Earle Brown was an American composer who established his own formal and notational systems. Brown was the creator of "open form," a style of musical construction that has influenced many composers since—notably the downtown New York scene of the 1980s and generations of younger composers.

Julian Anderson is a British composer and teacher of composition.

Samuel Hans Adler is an American composer, conductor, author, and professor. During the course of a professional career which ranges over six decades he has served as a faculty member at both the University of Rochester's Eastman School of Music and the Juilliard School. In addition, he is credited with founding and conducting the Seventh Army Symphony Orchestra which participated in the cultural diplomacy initiatives of the United States in Germany and throughout Europe in the aftermath of World War II. Adler's musical catalogue includes over 400 published compositions. He has been honored with several awards including Germany's Order of Merit – Officer's Cross.

Edward Gregson is an English composer of instrumental and choral music, particularly for brass and wind bands and ensembles, as well as music for the theatre, film, and television. He was also principal of the Royal Northern College of Music.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Myroslav Skoryk</span> Ukrainian composer and teacher (1938–2020)

Myroslav Mykhailovych Skoryk was a Ukrainian composer and teacher. His music is contemporary in style and contains stylistic traits from Ukrainian folk music traditions.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Roger Miller (rock musician)</span> American singer-songwriter and instrumentalist

Roger Clark Miller is an American singer, songwriter and multi-instrumentalist best known for co-founding Mission of Burma and performing in Alloy Orchestra/The Anvil Orchestra.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Alexander Vustin</span> Russian composer (1943–2020)

Alexander Kuzmich Vustin, also Voustin or Wustin was a Russian composer. His works, including the opera The Devil in Love, were played and recorded internationally.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Kenneth Hesketh</span> British composer

Kenneth Hesketh is a British composer of contemporary classical music in numerous genres including dance, orchestral, chamber, vocal and solo. He has also composed music for wind and brass bands as well as seasonal music for choir.

Edward Cowie is an Australian composer, author, natural scientist, and painter.

Jeroen van Veen is a Dutch classical pianist and composer. He has worked both as a soloist and in collaboration with other pianists. Some of his collaborations include duo work with his brother Maarten and his wife Sandra.

Andrew Toovey is a British composer of contemporary classical music. He is the recipient of composition awards including the Tippett Prize, Terra Nova Prize, the Bernard Shore Viola Composition Award and an RVW Trust Award. Two portrait CDs of his music were released on the Largo label in 1998, and many individual pieces are represented on others CD labels including NMC. His music is partially published by Boosey and Hawkes, and most of his output is available to view on YouTube on his own channel. There is a comprehensive website (www.andrewtoovey.co.uk) where all of Toovey's music can be seen in PDF format with a complete worklist, timeline outlining events of each year and performance list. He has worked extensively on education projects for Glyndebourne Opera, English National Opera, Huddersfield Festival, the South Bank Centre and the London Festival Orchestra, and has been composer-in-residence at Opera Factory and the South Bank Summer School. He is now a full-time composer, but used to teach part-time at Bishop Ramsey School, Ruislip, Middlesex and Alperton Community School in Wembley. He currently teaches composition at the Royal Birmingham Conservatoire part of BCU.

Huw Thomas Watkins is a British composer and pianist. Born in South Wales, he studied piano and composition at Chetham's School of Music in Manchester, where he received piano lessons from Peter Lawson. He then went on to read music at King's College, Cambridge, where he studied composition with Robin Holloway and Alexander Goehr, and completed an MMus in composition at the Royal College of Music, where he studied with Julian Anderson. Huw Watkins was awarded the Constant and Kit Lambert Junior Fellowship at the Royal College of Music, where he used to teach composition. He is currently Honorary Research Fellow at the Royal College of Music.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Thomas Larcher</span> Austrian composer and pianist

Thomas Larcher is an Austrian composer and pianist.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Graham Waterhouse</span> English composer (born 1962)

Graham Waterhouse is an English composer and cellist who specializes in chamber music. He has composed a cello concerto, Three Pieces for Solo Cello and Variations for Cello Solo for his own instrument, and string quartets and compositions that juxtapose a quartet with a solo instrument, including Piccolo Quintet, Bassoon Quintet and the piano quintet Rhapsodie Macabre. He has set poetry for speaking voice and cello, such as Der Handschuh, and has written song cycles. His compositions reflect the individual capacity and character of players and instruments, from the piccolo to the contrabassoon.

Jason Eckardt is an American composer. He began his musical life playing guitar in heavy metal and jazz bands and abruptly moved to composing after discovering the music of Anton Webern.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Reinbert de Leeuw</span> Dutch conductor (1938–2020)

Lambertus Reiner "Reinbert" de Leeuw was a Dutch conductor, pianist and composer.

Gregory Rose is a conductor, composer, arranger, and music director. He has conducted orchestral, choral and ensemble premieres throughout Europe and the Far East.

References

  1. 1 2 3 ERIK LINDGREN (December 2004)
  2. "American Composers Forum New England" (PDF). Spring 2005. Archived from the original (PDF) on October 11, 2008. Retrieved November 2, 2008.