League of American Orchestras Announces Commissions for Female Composers

Andreia Pinto-Correia and Xi Wang have been selected to receive orchestral commissions of $15,000 each as part of the League of American Orchestras' Women Composers Readings and Commissions program, administered with the American Composers Orchestra and EarShot and supported by the Virginia B. Toulmin Foundation. Partner orchestras to premiere the works will be announced at a later date.

This year's Women Composers Readings and Commissions program included readings with Buffalo Philharmonic, Berkeley Symphony, and American Composers Orchestra. The program featured career development workshops, as well as mentoring opportunities with composers such as Robert Beaser, Derek Bermel, Rob Deemer, Gabriela Lena Frank, Kevin Puts, Ken Ueno, and Melinda Wagner. Adjudicators for the commission awards were composers Melinda Wagner and Chen Yi, and conductor Joana Carneiro.

Jesse Rosen, the League's President and CEO, said, "We are thrilled to be able to support these two very talented composers, and are grateful to the Virginia B. Toulmin Foundation for helping us raise the profile of women composers in the United States."

"In two short years the Toulmin Foundation's support of women composers has already made a substantial impact on the field. By leveraging the EarShot network, we are providing needed exposure and development opportunities to some incredibly talented and deserving composers, and through the commissions and performances with multiple orchestras we will start to see and hear performances with orchestras around the country," said Michael Geller, President of American Composers Orchestra.

This is the second year of the Women Composers Readings and Commissions program. Commission recipients in 2014 were Julia Adolphe, whose viola concerto for New York Philharmonic Principal Viola Cynthia Phelps will be premiered by the New York Philharmonic at a later date, and Melody Eötvös, whose work Red Dirt | Silver Rain was premiered recently by American Composers Orchestra and Music Director and Conductor George Manahan at Carnegie Hall's Zankel Hall as part of the SONiC: Sounds of a New Century festival.

Andreia Pinto-Correia

Andreia Pinto-Correia is a 2015 John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation Fellow. Honors include commissions from the European Union Presidency, Fromm Music Foundation at Harvard University, Boston Symphony Orchestra Brass Quintet, American Composers Orchestra at Carnegie Hall, Tanglewood Music Center, Albany Symphony Orchestra, and Culturgest National Bank of Portugal. Her work Timaeus, a concerto for orchestra commissioned by the Boston Symphony's Tanglewood Music Center in memory of Elliott Carter, was recently premiered at the opening concert of the Contemporary Music Festival's 75th anniversary to rave reviews by The Boston Globe. Her works have been performed by the Minnesota Symphony Orchestra, Berkeley Symphony Orchestra, Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation Orchestra, Orquestra Metropolitana de Lisboa, and the Borromeo and the Mivos String Quartets. She has also been the recipient of a League of American Orchestras/ New Music USA Music Alive Composer Residency, a Rockefeller Foundation Center Fellowship, a Civitella Ranieri Foundation Fellowship, the Alpert Award in the Arts/Ucross Residency Prize, and the Toru Takemitsu Composition Award by the Japan Society. In addition, she was the curator of the Fertile Crescent Festival for Contemporary Music at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton. Future commissions include works for the National Symphony Orchestra and the National Dance Company, in Portugal; a work for American virtuoso Peggy Pearson for oboe and string trio (oboe quartet); and a piano trio for the extraordinary Horszowsky Trio.

Xi Wang

Since arriving in the USA from her native China in 2001, Xi Wang has pursued a whirlwind of musical activities that have made her a rising star in new music. Her unique fusion of Asian and Western instruments and techniques with theatrical and choreographic elements has captivated audiences. She is increasingly in demand for orchestral, chamber, and vocal music.

Xi Wang's original concert music has been performed worldwide by notable orchestras and ensembles such as the Minnesota Orchestra, Atlanta Symphony, American Composers Orchestra, Shanghai Philharmonic, Spokane Symphony, Voices of Change, Soli Chamber Ensemble, Tippet String Quartet, among others. She is the recipient of the Charles Ives Fellowship from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, the National Endowment for the Arts award, Meet the Composer, New Music USA, American Music Center, MacDowell Colony residency, as well as prizes from the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers (ASCAP).

Xi Wang received her B.M. from the Shanghai Conservatory of Music, M.M. from the University of Missouri-Kansas City, and D.M.A. from Cornell University. Currently, she is an Associate Professor at the Meadow School of Arts of Southern Methodist University. She was a participant in ACO's 2010 Underwood New Music Readings.

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