INTERNATIONAL ilSUONO CONTEMPORARY MUSIC WEEK
An Annual Summer Music Academy in Italy
PARTICIPANTS 2022
Fully Active Participants
-Category A: Mixed Media-
Ian Whillock (United States, 1997)
Ian Whillock is a composer, audio engineer, and percussionist based out of Austin, Texas. He primarily works with electronics and mixed ensembles. His work often uses destruction, recursion, abstraction, and recycling to explore ideas of stimulation, attention, focus, and meaning.
Recently, Ian has composed Interpretations for ten amplified players and multichannel electronics. Interpretations will be premiered by the University of Texas at Austin New Music Ensemble in December
2021. He is currently composing a new work for the University of Texas at Austin Percussion Ensemble to premiere in March 2022. Other recent compositions include void composed for the [Switch~ Ensemble], BLACKWATER for Hanatsu Miroir, and Ian’s debut commercial release: Salt Creek Recomposed. Ian has worked with a variety of other ensembles including Transient Canvas, Variasi Music, the University of Nebraska Percussion Ensemble, CHannel2 Percussion Duo, and Flat Water Trio. He has collaborated across mediums, working with painter Natalia Kraviec and the UNL Dance Studio. Ian has also composed for film, writing music for AC by Alessandro Giovanni Lunghi and Come Down, Draw Your Shape as Two by Brynne McGregor. In 2018, Ian was the recipient of the Ida M. Vreeland Award from the Glenn Korff School of Music for achievements in musical composition.
Outside of composing, Ian works as a recording, mixing, and mastering engineer. He focuses on capturing new recordings of independent and under-represented artists. Ian has worked with a wide variety of artists spanning genres, including Kraken Quartet, Russell Wharton, Trace Chamber Society, and Jessie Cox. As a producer, Ian works in the production company Blank House Media. His recordings have been featured on WQXR, I Care if You Listen, and NPR.
Ian is currently pursuing Master’s in Composition at the University of Texas at Austin Butler School of Music, where he is a Teaching Assistant of the Electronic and Experimental Music Studios (EEMS). He holds a Bachelor of Music in Composition from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. Ian has studied composition with Christopher Trapani, Januibe Tejera, Jason Thorpe Buchanan, Yevgeniy Sharlat, Greg Simon, and Kurt Knecht, and percussion with Dave Hall.
Roman Parkhomenko (Russia, 1993)
Roman Parkhomenko (1993) is a composer from Russia.
His music is performed in Russia, Italy, Switzerland, Spain, USA, Cyprus, Lithuania, Israel and Greece. Among the performers of his music: Divertimento Ensemble (Italy), Meitar Ensemble (Israel), MotoContrario Ensemble (Italy), Moscow Contemporary Music Ensemble, Studio for New Music, folk Instruments ensemble “Russia”, GAMEnsemble, Pro-Music Orchestra, Novosibirsk Youth Orchestra (Russia), etc.
His music was performed at international contemporary music festivals: CEME 2020 (Israel), VII St. Petersburg International New music festival reMusik.org 2020 (Russia), Europe and Asia 2017 (Russia), etc.
Roman Parkhomenko is a composer of the electroacoustic science opera DIVE, which premiered at the New Opera Moscow Theater (2021).
Since 2020 - co-founder and coordinator of the OpenCalls (reMusik.org project, St. Petersburg). Roman is a resident of the Moscow Contemporary Music Ensemble (MCME) in the 2020/2021 season.
Roman Parkhomenko - Fellow of the Composers Union of Russia.
Konstantinos Baras (Greece, 1993)
Konstantinos Baras is a Greek composer of instrumental and electroacoustic music. His music focuses on the recreation of saturated soundscapes through the use of aggressive gestures, instrumental preparation, and extended techniques. He is deeply interested in exploring various tools of Digital Signal Processing (DSP) and live interactivity to further extend the acoustic profile of traditional instruments. This allows Baras to create electroacoustic hybrids, enabling him to blend seemingly juxtaposing sounds
into a unified sonic structure. Baras organizes his compositions through various processes of iteration and fragmented circularity - manipulating the duration, density, and complexity of musical layering in order to shape heterogeneous sound blocks into unified phrasal structures.
Hristina Susak (Serbia, 1996)
Hristina Susak (born 1996) has been composing since she was eight. At the age of seven she started playing the violin and soon after that the piano. In 2013 (aged 17), she started her studies in the field of composition at the University of Music and Performing arts in Vienna. In 2019 she graduated in Music Theory and this year, she is finishing her Composition Studies in the class of Prof. Iris ter Schiphorst. She was awarded with the Prize of the City of Vienna for the section of music for the year 2021.
From October 2021 she started teaching "Tonsatz" at Hochschule für Musik und Theater Leipzig. 2021 she was awarded with the Prize of City of Vienna for the Section of Music. She is selected as one of four winners of the Call for Scores from PHACE Ensemble and Ö1 Vienna. She also won Second Prize at the 3rd International Composers Competition “New Music Generation 2021”.
Since 2013 her compositions have been actively performed by some significant ensembles and orchestras throughout Europe, among them piece ''INFANS'' was performed by world renown Ensemble Intercontemporain in Philharmonie de Paris (2020), her string quartet ''PRISMA'' was performed by Arditti Quartet within the Wien modern Festival (2020), orchestral piece "Seven Days" was premiered by Tonkünstler Orchestra at the Grafenegg Festival within the Ink Still Wet Workshop with Toshio Hoskawa (2021), also chamber piece ''ANIMA'' was performed by ascolta ensemble within the ECLAT-Festival (Musik der Jahrhunderte) in Theaterhaus Stuttgart (2019); ''Skrik'' was premiered by Sepia Ensemble within the festival festival Poznańska Wiosna Muzyczna in Poznan (2019); and ''SKRIK'' for big Symphony Orchestra was premiered by Bruckner Orchester Linz with the conductor Markus Poschner at the Bruckneruni Linz (2018). During the season 2018/19 she was invited by Volkstheater in Vienna to compose and perform music for theater piece ''Watschenmann'' (by Berenice Hebenstreit). Some of her works has been published as for example piece ''Transformations for 4 Bassoons and Contrabassoon'' by Firma Doblinger within the project HolzBlechSchlag (2019) and her song ''LIE'' was featured soundtrack in movie „Gipsy Queen“ (by Hüseyin Tabak, 2019).
Since 2015, she has also been an active conceptual performance artist, which allows her to combine many fields of her interests and abilities: composition, mathematics, philosophy, dance, painting, and stage performance. She was selected among 12 artists by Marina Abramovic to participate in her masterclass (MSUB/MOCAB Belgrade 2019) in which she made a video-performance “Dies Irae.“
Besides composition and performance, she is also an active music theorist and researcher. Since 2016, she has participated at numerous conferences and congresses throughout Europe, where she has exposed many of her scientific and analytic works. Her presentation “Mathematical proportions and its impact on music in Sofia Gubajdulina’s Offertorium” was shown at the congress recherche du CIERA, Sorbonne-Université et de la Hochschule für Musik und Theater Leipzig 2017–2019 at Sorbonne-Université in Paris (2018). Another presentation, “Shostakovich’s orchestration. His symphonies 1-5 as a mirror of a cataclysmic Land”, was featured at Third Congress of the Society for Theory of Music (OTM) at the Moscow state Conservatory P.I Tschaikovsky (2017), and finally, her presentation “A new Perspective and multiple Ways to analyze Edgar Varèse’s Ionisation” was delivered at the Austrian Society of Music (2018).
Lauren Siess (United States, 1996)
Lauren Siess is an NYC-based composer, violist, and improviser. Mass, chaos, and irrationality are current inspirations for her work. By combining and manipulating found objects, she enjoys discovering the nuance and vibrancy inside of physical material. Past projects include works for Line Upon Line Percussion, National Sawdust Ensemble, SICPP Festival, and CATAngle. In 2022 she is developing projects for Alinea Ensemble and Sydeboob duo, a flute/ voice duo based in NYC/ Pittsburgh.
As a classical violist, Lauren has performed with Delirium Musicum, Jupiter Symphony Chamber Players, Shattered Glass, and International Contemporary Ensemble. Lauren graduated from the Juilliard School in 2019, where she was a student of Carol Rodland, and recipient of a Kovner Fellowship. She currently teaches privately in NYC, while studying composition with Sivan Cohen Elias. Lauren is on faculty as Professor of Viola and Chamber Music at the Mahanaim School in Huntington, NY; and teaches through City Strings and Piano.
-CATEGORY B: ACOUSTIC-
Joel Kirk (United Kingdom, 1996)
Marta Haladzhun (Ukraine, 1994)
Joel's interest in composition stems from the social anxieties associated with having a speech impediment as a child and living as an LGBTQIA+ identifying individual in today’s still somewhat polarized society. He is primarily interested in anxiety, irritation, awkwardness, and the grotesque/macabre as key points of inspiration for his music. Ranging from the highly mechanical to the extremely untethered, his pieces often occupy floating, ethereal, cloudy sound- worlds of dense, uncertain activity.
Marta Haladzhun (1994) was born in Lviv, Ukraine. Studied composition at the National music academy in Kyiv, Ukraine(2014-2020). Currently she is studying at Hochschule für Musik und Theater in München (MA) with prof. Isabel Mundry. Additionally she participated at several workshops with Chaya Czernowin, Francesco Filidei, Sarah Nemtsov, Stefano Gervasoni, etc.
Her music was played by different ensembles like Nostri Temporis, Barcelona
Joel is currently studying for a PhD at SUNY Buffalo under David Felder. He previously studied at the University of Huddersfield under Aaron Cassidy. Joel has won several awards and prizes for his work, and in 2022 is looking forward to performances by the RNCM Brass Ensemble, the Roadrunner Trio, Barcelona Modern, Rosamund Brass, ensemble Suono Gialo, and the Divertimento Ensemble.
Modern Ensemble, Kwartludium Ensemble etc.
She has participated in festivals such as Contrasts International Contemporary Music Festival (Lviv, Ukraine), SoundsAroundMe (Vienna, Austria), “Festspiele Mecklenburg- Vorpommern” (Germany) etc.
In 2021 was rewarded at of the 12th pre-art Competition for young composers (CH) for the piece „Dust in crevices”.
Jean-Patrick Besingrand (United States, 1985)
Jean-Patrick Besingrand (b. 1985) is a composer and musicologist. His music plays on tone colors and explores different conceptions of temporality and silence.
He has received recognition from various competitions from around the globe. Since 2013, Jean-Patrick has participated in several festivals including Musica Festival, Voix Nouvelles Royaumont, Shanghai New Music Week Festival, Thailand International Composition Festival, Tokyo Media Interaction, St. Petersburg International
New Music Festival, and Red Note, among others. His music has been performed by ensembles such as the Orchestre National Bordeaux-Aquitaine, Court-Circuit, Dal Niente, Linéa, Mivos Quartet, JACK Quartet, Molinari Quartet, Platypus, Mise-En, Quince, Moscow Contemporary Music Ensemble. Jean-Patrick's music has also been performed by many soloists, notably Pierre Dutrieu, Yumi Suehiro, Geoffrey Deibel, Carla Rees, Mamiko Someda, Thomas Piercy, and Reison Kuroda.
Jean-Patrick holds a Master of Arts in Musicology from the University of Bordeaux, and diplomas in Analysis, Harmony, Counterpoint, Fugue, Composition, and Soundpainting from the Bordeaux Conservatory where he notably studied composition under Jean-Louis Agobet.
He also holds an Advanced Certificate in Composition from Carnegie Mellon University where he studied under Leonardo Balada.
Currently Jean-Patrick is a PhD candidate in composition at The Graduate Center, CUNY under Professor Jason Eckardt. He is also working on his doctoral thesis in Musicology at the Sorbonne in Paris. Since 2018, he has served as co-artistic director and co-founder of the composers' collective Tesselat.
John Aulich (United Kingdom, 1992)
John Aulich is a British composer based in the US. John has had works performed by ELISION Ensemble, Kathryn Williams, Richard Craig and Tom Bell. John’s music spans a number of broad themes, including viscerality, ambiguity of meaning, sensuality and touch, and the philosophical and political connotations of music and notation. John’s work is characterized by evocative, highly-charged and volatile sound-worlds stemming from the physicality of performance.
His work combines the erotic and the anxious, circumscribing a complex interplay of potential narratives that create fissures and ruptures in the listening experience. A particular focus of his recent work is a focus on abject, disgusting and surreal sound-worlds.
David Julián Carrillo (Colombia, 1992)
Composer and guitarist born in Bogotá (Colombia) currently residing in Bern. Completed his Master in Contemporary Jazz composition in the “Hochschule der Künste Bern” under Martin Streule and Dieter Ammann. Furthermore, he has attended to several composition workshops with renown composers namely Peter Eötvös, Heinz Holliger, Mauro Lanza, Oscar Bianchi and Alexander Schubert.
Interested in further artistic manifestations
related to visual arts, sound installations and performance, along from instrumental writing, currently studies a Master in Multidisciplinary Composition, under professors Xavier Dayer, Simon Steen-Andersen, Stefan Prins and Gilbert Nouno. Thereupon, ensembles like the ICTUS ensemble, VORTEX ensemble, Symphonisches Blasorchester Schweizer Armeespiel, and the kaleidoscope quartet among others, have performed some of his compositions.
Conjointly, is a founding and active member of the XYZ ensemble stablished in Bern, whose exploration focus lies in the hybrid interaction between instrumental, electroacoustic music, video and performance.
Partially Active Participants
Chih-Yun Wang (Taiwan, 1995)
Taiwanese composer, Chih-Yun Wang (b.1995) Chih-Yun received her B.M. and M.M. in music and composition at Taipei National University of the Arts (TNUA). She is currently pursuing her DMA degree program in composition at TNUA where she studied with Tsung-Hsien Yang and Ching-Mei Lin. Additionally, She has participated in master classes with Yu-Hui Chang, Mei-Feng Lin, Jean Geoffroy, Keiko Harada and Lei Liang.
Her work has been premiered and program-
Lila Wildy Quillin (United States, 1999)
Lila Wildy Quillin is a Montreal-based composer originally from the Atlantic coast of Maryland. Having spent much of her life investing in the visual arts, film, and architecture as well as composition, Lila is especially dedicated to exploring the relationships between music and other fields of design. In her young career she has worked with performers and ensembles including JACK Quartet, the Zodiac Trio, Elena Urioste, Tom Poster, and Anthony McGill.
med at many events included e.g., NSO - Jun Märkl & Saint-Saëns Concert 2021 of Taiwan Philharmonic, the National Symphony Orchestra (NSO), WanSong Concert 2020 (has commissioned by MIT Saxophone Ensemble, Taipei, Taiwan), The International Computer Music Conference (ICMC) 2018 (Daegu, Korea), TNUA & Tokyo College of Music (TCM) Friendship Concert 2019 (Tokyo, Japan), TNUA Percussion Ensemble Concert 2017, Taipei Intercollegiate Student Composers Concert in 2015, 2016 and 2019. Recently, Her work Ling selected for performance in the ACL Young Composers Competition 2022. Chih-Yun has received a number of awards and honors for her work, including Weiwuying Contemporary Music Platform, International Call for Composition & Peter Eötvös Composition Masterclass in 2020 (Cancelled due to COVID-19), “Orchestra Members’ Choice Prize” and “Honorable Mention Prize” in 2017 Composition Competition of National Taiwan Symphony Orchestra (NTSO), TNUA Emerging Young Artists Prize in 2017,2nd Prize in Taiwan Choral Association Composer Award (First Prize N/A), and 1st Prize of Student Music Composition Competition in Taichung City in 2012.
Lila is currently pursuing her Master's degree in composition with Philippe Leroux at McGill's Schulich School of music. She holds her bachelor's degree in composition from New England Conservatory, where she studied with Efstratios Minakakis, John Mallia, and Michael Gandolfi under the Presidential Distinction Scholarship. She has also studied with Dr. Judah Adashi at Peabody Preparatory, where she was the recipient of The Peabody Preparatory Achievement Award in Composition in 2016 and 2017. She was the composer-in-residence for the Chamber Music by the Sea festival in 2020 and 2018, and has attended New Music on the Point (2021), Zodiac Music Festival and Academy (2019), Curtis Summerfest Young Artist Summer Program (2016), and Interlochen Arts Camp (2015). She has been a finalist in the 2019 Kaleidoscope Chamber Orchestra Composition Competition and 2017 ASCAP Morton Gould Young Composer Awards, as well as an Emerging Composer in the Tribeca New Music Competition in 2016 and 2017. Her performed works include numerous orchestral pieces, as well as chamber, solo, and vocal pieces.
In her free time, Lila enjoys studying piano and playing clarinet in improvisation-based ensembles, as well as sketching, painting, and animating short films. She aspires to collaborate with as many musicians and artists across the world as possible, not only to have the chance to be inspired by foreign cities and dialogues, but also to explore all the intricate and compelling ways music can borrow from and communicate with art.
Sara Stevanovic (Serbia, 1998)
Sara Stevanovic (1998, Serbia) graduates from Ludwig-Maximilians-University in Munich, Germany with a B.A. in Musicology and Languages in 2018 and in 2021 she gets her bachelor's degree in Composition from Conservatory “Giuseppe Verdi” in Ravenna, Italy.
Sara takes part in diverse masterclasses, including ones with S.Sciarrino, T.Murail, M.Lanza, C.Bauckholt, M.Momi, J.Maria Staud, etc. She writes music for Mixtur Festival (ESP), Festival Crossroads (AU), UML
Festival (FIN), Divertimento Ensemble (IT), EstOvest Festival (IT), Festival START BAHN: Staatstheater Darmstadt (GE), Exquisite Corpse: Staatstheater Nurnberg (GE), Festival ECHI–Sguardimurati (IT), Ravenna Festival–giovani artisti (IT), Festival Contemporanea (IT), etc.
Sara speaks Serbian, English, German and Italian and describes her music as a „constant research that polemicizes in both content and form different sensations and reflections of the contemporary world“.