Rebecca Oswald

Rebecca Oswald is an award-winning composer with many areas of experience and excellence, currently living in Oregon. In 1998 Rebecca earned her BMus in Music Theory and Composition, summa cum laude, from Westminster Choir College of Rider University. In 2001 she earned her MM in Composition from the University of Oregon School of Music. In November 2011 Rebecca released "Whereas", a concept CD of thirteen original solo piano works inspired by poetry. In April 2011 two of Rebecca's orchestral works ("Finding the Murray River" and "Sleep, Child") were released by PARMA Recordings, on the Navona label, as part of a compilation CD of modern orchestral works called "Light and Shadow". In 2005 Rebecca released "October Wind," a retrospective CD of thirteen original piano works dating from 1981 to 2005, and one art song for tenor and piano. IndieAcoustic selected track 10, Periwinkle Blue, on her October Wind CD as one of their "Songs of Note 2005." And in July 2009, track 7, Regatta, from her October Wind CD was nominated for a 2009 Just Plain Folks Song Award in their Solo Piano category. Rebecca has played her solo piano music for audiences all over the U.S. as well as in Canada, the U.K., France, Dominican Republic, and Spain. Rebecca's instrumental concert music catalog includes works for solo instruments including a piano sonata, various chamber ensembles, full orchestra, a clarinet concerto, and one 22-minute choral/orchestral work. Concert pianist Mary Au has performed Rebecca's Sonata no. 1 several times since summer 2011. Two of Rebecca's orchestral works won readings by the Women's Philharmonic in San Francisco (reading sessions in 1998 and 2001). Her popular woodwind quintet Aesop’s Fables has been performed at least 25 times, including numerous performances by the Arrieu Quintet of Oregon State University and by the Jewel Winds Quintet in upstate New York. Bowerman, Man of Oregon is a 22-minute symphonic biography about Bill Bowerman, famed inventor of the waffle-soled running shoe, co-founder of NIKE, and track and field coach for the University of Oregon and U.S. Olympic team. The Central Oregon Symphony premiered it on their three October 2007 concerts, and in July 2008 the Oregon Bach Festival Orchestra performed a larger reorchestration of this same work as the centerpiece of a special Bowerman gala tribute concert. And Rebecca has written many other instrumental works. Rebecca composes for all types and sizes of choral ensembles, a cappella or accompanied, and often writes her own choral texts, whether sacred or secular. Here are a few highlights from her choral catalogue: Her SSA choral work Let Him Return received Top Honors in the 2002 Waging Peace Through Singing international choral composition competition. Reciprocity, an 11-minute SATB multi-lingaul, multi-faith choral work was commissioned by the Foundation for Universal Sacred Music and premiered in fall 2005 at the First Festival of Universal Sacred Music in New York City. This ecumenical piece quotes the original teachings of the ethic of reciprocity throughout humankind’s history in the teachers’ native languages, going as far back as 3100 B.C. Journeys to Freedom: Rännakud Vabadusse is a nine-minute work for double SATB chorus and treble chorus, plus four winds and percussion, incorporating folksongs from Estonia and the U.S. in celebration of human freedom and dignity. It was performed by each of its three commissioning choirs in Maryland in spring 2007. In 2008 she wrote the Alma Mater for Linn-Benton Community College in Albany, Oregon. And Rebecca has written many other choral works. Enjoying great variety in her musical output, Rebecca wrote, recorded, and produced the music for two Taiwanese CD-ROM strategy games in 1997 and 1998. In 2003 she orchestrated the soundtrack for the independent, critically acclaimed film Westender. She composed, recorded, and produced the soundtrack for the three-hour video documentary series A History of the University of Oregon (2001, 2007). She also wrote, recorded, and produced the theme song for the weekly interview show UO Today. For more information please visit Rebecca Oswald's official website, www.rebeccaoswald.com. Read more on Last.fm. User-contributed text is available under the Creative Commons By-SA License; additional terms may apply.