Composer in Residence Maurice Saylor, born in Neptune, New Jersey, graduated with a BM. and MM. in Music Composition from The Catholic University of America. His music has been performed by the Contemporary Music Forum, at the Bowling Green New Music & Art Festival, the Delius Festival and throughout the United States, Central America, Europe and the Middle East with broadcasts over commercial and Public Radio.
Mr. Saylor has received grants from the Maryland State Arts council and The American Composers Forum. He has received three awards from the Delius Composition Competition and songs from his set Laudis Corona took both first prizes in song at the 2005 Diana Barnhart American Song Conference. He was the featured composer for the 2006 Diana Barnhart American Song Forum. Other awards include the 1987 David Lloyd Kreeger Creativity Award in composition; the 1987 Church and the Artist Award; the 1985 National Capital Area Composer's Consortium Composition Competition; and the 1985 Omaha Symphony Guild New Music Competition.
Mr. Saylor served as Composer-in-Residence for Cantate Chamber Singers from September 2002 – June 2004 culminating in the creation of Saylor's magnum opus, The Hunting of the Snark: an Agony in Eight Fits which received its world première performance as a featured work on Cantate’s May 1, 2004 series concert, Fantasy and Myth. Cantate’s Executive Board has approved plans to make a professional recording of The Hunting of the Snark when Mr. Saylor returns as composer-in-residence effective for September 2006 through Spring 2008 to write another major choral work, this time a concerto for cello and vocal orchestra.
Mr. Saylor has received commissions from the US Air Force, The Catholic University of America, George Washington University, the Eakins String Quartet, and from numerous instrumental and vocal soloists.
He has served on the board of the Capital Composers Alliance of Washington D.C. since 1987 and as Executive Director since 1991. He is a member of BMI. In 2005 he and Andrew Earle Simpson founded the Snark Ensemble to present live performances of the composer/performers' new scores for vintage silent films. The versatile ensemble performs on a wide variety of instruments including many reviled by society and/or rejected by people of good taste and common sense. The ensemble debuted in the Spring of 2005 at the Benjamin T. Rome School of Music Film Series at The Catholic University of America where he is head Information Wrangler at the Music Library. Their score to Kick the Dog was presented at the International Dance Festival in New York City July, 2006. The Fireworks Ensemble will present Mr. Saylor’s score to the 1928 Charlie Bowers silent film There It Is! as part of their tour “Cartoon.”
Mr. Saylor is also head of the Music Library at The Catholic University of America where he has worked as a music information wrangler for over twenty years.
Select scores and sound files of Mr. Saylor’s music may be accessed on the Internet at www.SibeliusMusic.com.
From reviews:
"Maurice Saylor's String Quartet in D is a wonderfully absorbing piece, full of contrasting ideas. The sustained phrases, angular motifs, swirling figures, glissandi and other special effects were played with astounding virtuosity by the Eakins Quartet. Especially fascinating was the second movement in which Saylor uses long arching passages to build to a climax of luxuriance." -- Norman Middleton , The Washington Post.
"In the 1987 String Quartet in D by Maurice Saylor...the details were what captured one's interest. Saylor has investigated a palette of textures as varied as his repertoire of thematic transformations, and his piece...projected an extraordinary feeling of cohesion and evolution." -- Joan Reinthaler, The Washington Post.
"The resoundingly silly Risseldy, Rosseldy arranged by Maurice Saylor concluded the cycle with whimsical amusement." -- Gail Wein, NewMusicBox.org
"In most cases, brevity precluded all but the broadest gestures, although the one-two punch of Maurice Saylor's Terse Metamorphosis: Citizen to Soldier...made an impression." -- Andrew Lindemann Malone, Washington Post.
"Maurice Saylor's Alta Quies, a cycle containing five bleak poems by A.E. Housman, made a fine finale: evocative, communicative, powerful music..." -- Andrew Lindemann Malone, Washington Post.
"Maurice Saylor is a very skilled composer with a unique musical "vision." We were lucky enough to be present at the premiere of his Hunting of the Snark a few weeks ago - it is a powerful masterpiece, well performed by Gisele Becker's Cantate Singers and the 'Snarkestra'." -- Carl Banner, Washington Musica Viva
