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"Deceptively laid back...inventive...unconventional."
- Mark Swed, Los Angeles Times "Wild...unearthly...lyrical...a voice worth listening to." - Jerry Kuderna, San Francisco Classical Voice "...illustrates the evocative power and emotional punch that can result when a composer goes all in..." - Paul Muller, Sequenza21 "...a plush and tightly constructed piece that is filled with colorful imagery...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 and guitarist whose music has been described as "deceptively laid back in an LA way...inventive....unconventional" (LA Times), and "wild...unearthly...lyrical...a voice worth listening to" (San Francisco Classical Voice).
Miller’s inspiration for creating music comes from his collaborators, his environment, his love of new sounds, guitar playing and storytelling. He has collaborated with Grammy nominated musicians including pianists Vicki Ray, Aron Kallay and soprano Tony Arnold, as well as many contemporary classical ensembles and organizations such as HOCKET, Juventas New Music Ensemble, Earplay New Chamber Music, the Boston New Music Initiative, the Los Angeles Percussion Quartet and the Panic Duo, among others. His compositions have been presented on the programs of many California based venues and series including San Francisco’s Center for New Music, Los Angeles’ Piano Spheres, Tuesdays at Monk Space, Hear Now Festival, Synchromy, People Inside Electronics, Carlsbad Music Festival, Microfest and the LA Conservancy. He has received honors from the MacDowell Colony, Earplay New Music, the ACF and CAPMT. In 2017, pianist Vincent Craig performed one of his compositions at Carnegie Hall.
In the fall of 2018, his album TO….OBLIVION: Historic Landmarks Around Los Angeles will be released; the work is a collection of pieces inspired by six lost landmarks in LA, each of some social significance, scored for solo electric guitar, sound effects and video.
Miller is on the faculty of California State University Long Beach, where he teaches music theory, composition and musicianship at the Bob Cole Conservatory of Music. During the Spring of 2017 at CSULB, he served as the Interim Graduate Advisor. He also works at Chapman University, where he initiated and developed a new Composition and Songwriting course for non-music majors, which has since become a required course for Music Technology minors. In November of 2018, he will serve as Composition Masterclass Clinician for the Music Association of California Community Colleges State Conference in San Diego.
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.
Miller’s inspiration for creating music comes from his collaborators, his environment, his love of new sounds, guitar playing and storytelling. He has collaborated with Grammy nominated musicians including pianists Vicki Ray, Aron Kallay and soprano Tony Arnold, as well as many contemporary classical ensembles and organizations such as HOCKET, Juventas New Music Ensemble, Earplay New Chamber Music, the Boston New Music Initiative, the Los Angeles Percussion Quartet and the Panic Duo, among others. His compositions have been presented on the programs of many California based venues and series including San Francisco’s Center for New Music, Los Angeles’ Piano Spheres, Tuesdays at Monk Space, Hear Now Festival, Synchromy, People Inside Electronics, Carlsbad Music Festival, Microfest and the LA Conservancy. He has received honors from the MacDowell Colony, Earplay New Music, the ACF and CAPMT. In 2017, pianist Vincent Craig performed one of his compositions at Carnegie Hall.
In the fall of 2018, his album TO….OBLIVION: Historic Landmarks Around Los Angeles will be released; the work is a collection of pieces inspired by six lost landmarks in LA, each of some social significance, scored for solo electric guitar, sound effects and video.
Miller is on the faculty of California State University Long Beach, where he teaches music theory, composition and musicianship at the Bob Cole Conservatory of Music. During the Spring of 2017 at CSULB, he served as the Interim Graduate Advisor. He also works at Chapman University, where he initiated and developed a new Composition and Songwriting course for non-music majors, which has since become a required course for Music Technology minors. In November of 2018, he will serve as Composition Masterclass Clinician for the Music Association of California Community Colleges State Conference in San Diego.
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.