Short Bio
Described as “the stuff of memory” (The Herald-Times) and “whirlwind… deftly explored contrasts of mood, from bombastic to introverted.” (The New York Times), Ryan’s music has been performed by Alarm Will Sound, the Albany Symphony Orchestra, the American Composers Orchestra, the Chelsea Symphony, Collage New Music, Contemporaneous, FLUX Quartet, the Society for New Music, and the Texas State University Wind Symphony.
He studied with Keith Fitch at the Mannes College of Music and with Claude Baker, David Dzubay, Don Freund, and Gabriela Ortiz at Indiana University’s Jacobs School of Music. He is an Associate Professor and Chair of the Music Department at Colgate University.
Long Bio
Music by Ryan Chase (b. 1987) has been described as "the stuff of memory" and “whirlwind… deftly explored contrasts of mood, from bombastic to introverted.” (The New York Times), Ryan’s music has been performed by Alarm Will Sound, the Albany Symphony Orchestra, the American Composers Orchestra, Boston New Music Initiative, the Chelsea Symphony, Collage New Music, Contemporaneous, FLUX Quartet, soprano Ariadne Greif, The Happenstancers, the Mexico City Woodwind Quintet, Musica Nova, the Society for New Music, and the Texas State University Wind Symphony. His scoring credits for public radio and television include Peggy’s Poetry and Zarg (WTIU-PBS), The Ernie Pyle Experiment (WFIU-NPR), The Wonderful Wizard of Oz (WFIU-NPR), and The Watcher in the Woods (WFIU-NPR).
His music has been presented at Tanglewood, the Aspen Music Festival, the Copland House, the Cannes Music Festival, the Hear Now Festival, the Mizzou International Composers Festival, the Poets Out Loud Festival, the Resonant Bodies Festival, the Santa Fe Chamber Music Festival, the California Summer Music Festival, PBS, and NPR. Accolades for his work include a Charles Ives Fellowship from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, a Fromm Commission from the Harvard Fromm Music Foundation, an Emmy® nomination, two consecutive BMI Student Composer Awards (including 2011’s William Schuman Prize for Most Outstanding Entry), two ASCAP Morton Gould Young Composer Awards, the Audience Choice Award from the American Composers Orchestra Underwood Readings, the Undergraduate Scholar Award from the Presser Foundation, the Northridge Composition Prize, the Brian M. Israel Prize from the Society for New Music, and the Suzanne and Lee Ettelson Composer's Award.
Ryan holds degrees from Mannes (B.M. 2008) and Indiana University (M.M. 2010, D.M. 2014), where his primary teachers were Claude Baker, David Dzubay, Keith Fitch, Don Freund, and Gabriela Ortiz. He is an Associate Professor and Chair of the Music Department at Colgate University.