Andrew Norman: Berlin Prize and further Updates

Andrew Norman has been awarded the prestigious Berlin Prize in Music Composition. Beginning in the fall of 2009, Norman will spend a year in residence at the American Academy in Berlin. The Academy provides the composer-in-residence with new experiences and professional opportunities by offering a world-class venue for his music as well as a network of professional mentors and colleagues. Norman will also have a concert of his music performed by members of the Berlin Philharmonic and compose a new work for the Scharoun Ensemble Berlin.

In recent months, Norman's work for eight violins, Gran Turismo, was featured on the Wordless Music Series in New York and his work for solo viola, Sabina, had its world premiere on the Young Concert Artists concert series along with a performance of Lullaby for piano and mezzo-soprano sung by Sasha Cooke. His new orchestral work, Unstuck, was given its premiere performance by the Zurich Tonhalle-Orchestra under the direction of Michael Sanderling in September, 2008.

Norman recently completed a residency with the Des Moines Symphony (Joseph Giunta, Music Director) where the orchestra performed his piece Drip Blip Sparkle Spin Glint Glide Glow Float Flop Chop Pop Shatter Splash. The composer used this piece in several successful educational outreach programs with students from local elementary schools and high schools and with members of the local youth orchestra. In this piece, each verb in the title is assigned a sound. Students first connected specific sounds in the piece to the words, then devised their own set of words and related sounds. It all culminated in a completely new piece composed by students using their newly minted sounds. Kimberly Glinn, music specialist at Hubbell Elementary in Des Moines comments on the experience:

Andrew Norman came to our school and worked with our fifth graders. After studying Drip Blip in music class, they had lots of questions about his scoring, inspiration and music training. Together they created an original composition using body percussion. They also performed it for themselves during the session. It remains one of the highlights of their music year and really brought their symphony experience to life.

Recently, Norman has published his new website - check it out at www.andrewnormanmusic.com

• Andrew Norman - Profile