Jack Straw Productions
4261 Roosevelt Way NE
Seattle, WA 98105
FREE

Jack Straw Productions and Washington Composers Forum present Composer Spotlight, a series of talks and performances by composers, musicians, and scholars of new and innovative music every second Wednesday of each month. For more information about Composer Spotlight artists and the series, click here.

Composer Spotlight:
Rachel Matthews
Where Did This Come From?

Wed, April 14th, 7:30pm

Jack Straw Artist Rachel Matthews will discuss her unexpected transition from classically trained pianist to composer, and what it has meant for her life in music overall.  She will present and discuss selected works from her Jack Straw Productions Artist Support Program residency, as well as other works, including the premiere performance of her “House of Bedlam” and the Seattle premiere of “Circles” for flute and piano.   Performers include both of the composer’s sisters, violinist Ingrid Matthews and soprano Julia Matthews, and flutist Merrie Siegel, with Rachel Matthews at the piano.

Rachel Matthews is a graduate of the Oberlin Conservatory and the University of North Carolina School of the Arts, and holds a doctorate in piano performance from the Peabody Institute of Johns Hopkins University, where she was recipient of the Irving Lowens Memorial Prize and the Peabody Career Development Grant.  She maintains an active teaching studio in Seattle. Increasingly active in recent years as a composer, her works have been heard recently at the Iowa Arts Festival, the University of North Carolina School of the Arts, the Cottonwood Music Festival in Kansas and Pendulum New Music in Boulder, CO, as well as on radio stations around the country.  Rachel is recent recipient of grants and commissions including the American Composers Forum and 4Culture, and holds a residency this season with Jack Straw Productions’ Artist Support Program.  Her Voices of Trees for clarinet and piano was released in 2008 on the Origin Classical label.