Biographical Information for John Muehleisen
Updated December 2011
Composer John Muehleisen specializes in works for choir and solo voice.
Since 1996, he has served as Composer-in-Residence and Artistic Advisor
for Seattle-based Opus 7 Vocal Ensemble, directed by Loren Pontén. He was
composer-in-residence for the Dale Warland Singers during their final season
in 2003–2004 and has been on the Advisory Board for Seattle’s Choral Arts
since 2009. John is honored to be composer-in-residence for Choral Arts for
the 2011–2012 Season. John’s works have been performed and recorded by
numerous ensembles in the US, Canada, and Europe, including Choral Arts,
Conspirare, the Dale Warland Singers, The Esoterics, the John Alexander
Singers, the Louisville Orchestra, Musa Horti (Belgium), Northwest Girlchoir,
Pacific Youth Choir, Schola Cantorum on Hudson, Seattle Girls Choir, Seattle
Pro Musica, Vocal Arts Ensemble (Cincinnati), and numerous college and
university choirs, including the Yale Schola Cantorum. His works have been
performed at the Sixth World Choral Symposium; at the National Endowment
for the Arts American Masterworks Choral Festival in Austin, TX in 2007; at
ACDA National and regional conventions in 2007, 2008, and 2009; and on new
music festivals including June in Buffalo, the Ernest Bloch Music Festival, Santa
Fe Chamber Music Festival in Seattle, the Minnesota Beethoven Festival, and the
Indiana State University Festival of Contemporary Music. Many of his growing
catalog of choral works have also been commercially recorded.
John received the 1988 Louisville Orchestra’s Orchestral Composition
Competition Award, and commissions and performances of his works have been
supported by grants from the American Music Center, Meet the Composer, the
Jerome Foundation, the Alice M. Ditson Fund of Columbia University, and the
National Endowment for the Arts. After completing a Bachelor of Music degree
in Saxophone Performance, John earned a Master of Music degree in Composition
from the University of Washington, where he studied with William Bergsma,
William O. Smith, and Diane Thome. During doctoral studies at Indiana
University he studied composition with John Eaton, Eugene O’Brien, and
Harvey Sollberger; as well as orchestration with Donald Erb. He has also
participated in master classes and extended residency programs with Lukas Foss,
Milton Babbitt, Earle Brown, and Bernard Rands.
John has received commissions from many esteemed choral ensembles, including
ChoralArts, Conspirare, the Dale Warland Singers, The Esoterics, Northwest
Girlchoir, Seattle Pro Musica, University of Wyoming, and Wake Forest
University. Commissions for the 2011–2012 season include a Christmas work
for South Bend Chamber Singers, a work based on Gertrude Stein poems for
San Francisco’s cutting-edge vocal ensemble Volti, and a major concert-length
oratorio entitled Pietà, jointly commissioned by Seattle’s Choral Arts and the
University of Missouri, Kansas City, to be premiered by Choral Arts
conducted by Robert Bode in March 2012.
