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"Wild...unearthly...lyrical...a voice worth listening to."
- Jerry Kuderna, San Francisco Classical Voice "Deceptively laid back...inventive...unconventional." - Mark Swed, Los Angeles Times "Two Autumns is a plush and tightly constructed piece that is filled with colorful imagery...Soprano Chelsea Beatty muttered, whispered, and hummed her lines to haunting effect. To accompany her, the flute, violin, clarinet, and cello fused their phrases into close dissonances, which shimmered like moonlight on water. -Aaron Keebaugh, Boston Classical Review "Beautiful...quirky...ingeniously wrought gestures, as much timbral as melodic....it's the kind of music that -- now euphonious/now jarring, now calm/now flighty -- is exciting to live in." - Damjan Rakonjac, The Artificialist |
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Alexander Elliott Miller is a composer, guitarist and teacher currently based in Southern California. As a composer, he writes music to explore new sound worlds while retaining a fundamental lyricism and rhythmic drive. He has collaborated with and been commissioned by Grammy-nominated musicians including Vicki Ray, Tony Arnold and Aron Kallay, ensembles including Earplay New Chamber Music, the Boston New Music Initiative, the Los Angeles Percussion Quartet, What's Next? Ensemble, Brave New Works, TEMPO Ensemble, Quintet Attacca and others. His music has been presented on concert series including People Inside Electronics, Synchromy, the Carlsbad, TUTTI, Hear Now, NEON, Aspen and Bowdoin Music Festivals, and received honors including the Earplay Donald Aird Composers Award and a MacDowell Fellowship.
In addition to his work as a composer, Miller is a Co-Director and guitarist of the What's Next? Ensemble, an Los Angeles based new music collective formed in 2008 that he manages with his colleagues Ben Phelps, Jack Stulz and Vimbayi Kaziboni. The group has been called a "superb ensemble" and "overwhelming" (Opera West) and one that plays with "panache" and is "ready for any main stage keen enough to know what's what" (LA Times). Besides presenting its own critically acclaimed concerts, What's Next? has collaborated with the Long Beach Opera, Carlsbad Music Festival, Dutch composer Jacob TV, served as the Ensemble in Residence at UC-Riverside and, since 2009, produced the Los Angeles Composers Project, an annual concert series that has featured performances of new music by over 60 California-based artists.
With backgrounds in rock, classical and jazz guitar, Miller has performed extensively both as an electric guitarist for the What's Next? Ensemble and as a frequent performer of his own compositions for solo classical guitar, especially his work Flatiron. He has performed as a guest guitarist with the Long Beach Opera and the Color Field Ensemble.
He currently teaches composition and music theory at California State University Long Beach and Chapman University. He previously served on the faculties of Illinois State University, the University of Southern California, West Chester University of Pennsylvania and California Lutheran University, and has worked with high school students, leading after-school music education programs in Los Angeles with funding from the American Composers Forum.
He holds a Doctor of Musical Arts degree in Composition from the University of Southern California, a Master of Music in Composition from the Eastman School of Music, and Bachelor of Music degrees in Composition & Guitar Performance from the University of Colorado at Boulder, with additional studies in Max/MSP at UC Berkeley's Center for New Music & Audio Technology (CNMAT).
His works are published by HoneyRock Percussion Performance Literature (Pennsylvania) and VP Music Media (Italy).
In addition to his work as a composer, Miller is a Co-Director and guitarist of the What's Next? Ensemble, an Los Angeles based new music collective formed in 2008 that he manages with his colleagues Ben Phelps, Jack Stulz and Vimbayi Kaziboni. The group has been called a "superb ensemble" and "overwhelming" (Opera West) and one that plays with "panache" and is "ready for any main stage keen enough to know what's what" (LA Times). Besides presenting its own critically acclaimed concerts, What's Next? has collaborated with the Long Beach Opera, Carlsbad Music Festival, Dutch composer Jacob TV, served as the Ensemble in Residence at UC-Riverside and, since 2009, produced the Los Angeles Composers Project, an annual concert series that has featured performances of new music by over 60 California-based artists.
With backgrounds in rock, classical and jazz guitar, Miller has performed extensively both as an electric guitarist for the What's Next? Ensemble and as a frequent performer of his own compositions for solo classical guitar, especially his work Flatiron. He has performed as a guest guitarist with the Long Beach Opera and the Color Field Ensemble.
He currently teaches composition and music theory at California State University Long Beach and Chapman University. He previously served on the faculties of Illinois State University, the University of Southern California, West Chester University of Pennsylvania and California Lutheran University, and has worked with high school students, leading after-school music education programs in Los Angeles with funding from the American Composers Forum.
He holds a Doctor of Musical Arts degree in Composition from the University of Southern California, a Master of Music in Composition from the Eastman School of Music, and Bachelor of Music degrees in Composition & Guitar Performance from the University of Colorado at Boulder, with additional studies in Max/MSP at UC Berkeley's Center for New Music & Audio Technology (CNMAT).
His works are published by HoneyRock Percussion Performance Literature (Pennsylvania) and VP Music Media (Italy).
