Music Theory
& Composition

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Mission Statement and Learning Outcomes

Thoughts on SOM

Mission at SOM

Curriculum Vitae

Adam Silverman
Assistant Professor — Music Theory

Room 335, Swope Music Building
Phone: 610-738-0448
asilverman@wcupa.edu

Thoughts on SOM
I’ve found the School of Music at West Chester to be a fertile environment for students to build musical skills, grow as individuals and be inspired by each other and by the faculty.  As a relatively new faculty member here, I have been consistently impressed by my students, by my colleagues in the Theory & Composition department, and by the faculty of the School of Music, all of whom show great dedication to learning from each other and embracing music as an ever-engrossing passion.

Mission at SOM
In teaching aural skills and music theory, I have the privilege of encountering almost every student in the School of Music in my classroom.  Whether a student is majoring in education, performance, theory and composition, or is pursuing a minor in music, my goal is to build an understanding of what makes good music great, and to deepen a student’s connection with the principles that guide music making and listening.  In the process, I hope to broaden students’ horizons, embracing styles from throughout history and across the globe and using them to discover common musical trends as well as unique differences.

Curriculum Vitae

Education
University of Miami School of Music, Vienna Musikhochschule,
DMA Yale 2003

Adam Silverman is one of America’s fastest-rising composers. His works have been commissioned and performed by The New York City Opera, Eighth Blackbird, The Tanglewood Music Center Orchestra, The Brooklyn Symphony, The Albany Symphony Chamber Orchestra, The Amelia Piano Trio, The Corigliano Quartet, The Flux Quartet, Prism Saxophone Quartet, Relache, Real Time Opera, The Yale Philharmonic, and others. His works have been performed at venues including Lincoln Center, Carnegie Hall, The Kennedy Center, The Library of Congress, The Metropolitan Museum, La Jolla Chamber Music Society, and The Spoleto Festival.

Silverman’s works include classical concert works (the piano trio “Sturm” and three string quartets), rock-based music for live performers and electronics (“Strawberry Fields Continued” for percussion, cellos, and recording), opera (“Korczak’s Orphans”), conceptual music-theater (“Telemusic” for phones and percussion and “The Mostly True Story of Professor Leon and Me”) and educational music as composer-in-residence for The Commission Project.

Silverman’s music often incorporates theatrical elements, and his opera-in-progress “Korczak’s Orphans” was recently featured in a showcase by the New York City Opera, performed by their orchestra and soloists under the baton of NYCO’s Music Director George Manahan. Another work, “In Another Man’s Skin,” was performed dozens of times across the country throughout 2001-2003 by Eighth Blackbird, who memorized and staged the work with choreography that accentuated musical elements. Based on a text from Vladimir Nabokov’s Lolita, Silverman’s “stars, cars, bars” has been performed recently on tour throughout Australia, and in New York as the closing piece of the “Say What” Festival by Music Journeys, Inc. In 2005, he composed music for inParenthesis Theater’s production of Olivier Cadiot’s “AWOL” (“Le Colonel des Zouaves”), for solo actor and men’s chorus.

Since 1998, he has directed the Minimum Security Composers Collective, a group of which he is co-founder. Dedicated to the presentation of new music, Minimum Security has worked with over a dozen ensembles in the creation of new music by the four Minimum Security directors and guests, with more than eighty works so far presented by thirty-three composers. With this group, Silverman has created the Minimum Security Ensemble, the “Di/verge” tour, “Maurice Sendak Music,” has participated in outreach events at Centro Musica in Modena, Italy, in Iowa through the Chamber Music America/NEA Rural Music Residencies program, at the Norfolk Music Festival, the Juilliard School, and Northwestern University.

Silverman has received residencies, fellowships and grants from The Tanglewood Music Center (ASCAP-Leonard Bernstein fellowship), Yaddo, MacDowell Colony, American Music Center, Yvar Mikhashoff Trust for New Music, Atlantic Center for the Arts, Bowdoin Music Festival, The Commission Project, Yale School of Music, and Kunsthalle Krems (Austria).

Silverman studied composition at Yale (Doctor of Musical Arts, 2003), the Vienna Musikhochschule, and the University of Miami School of Music with Martin Bresnick, Anthony Davis, Ben Johnston, Ezra Laderman, Ned Rorem, Kurt Schwertsik, and Evan Ziporyn, and at festivals with Louis Andriessen, Chen Yi, and Osvaldo Golijov. From 2004-2006, he taught music at City University of New York, and currently serves as Assistant Professor of Music Theory and Composition at West Chester University in Pennsylvania.

Two recent compact disks were released internationally that include compositions by Dr. Silverman.  “Dream of Me,” a recording by pianist Lara Downes, was released in 2006 on Tritone Records, featuring Silverman’s work “Nocturnes and Reveries.”  “Sustenance,” a recording by guitarist Daniel Lippel and his group Flexible Music, was released on New Focus Recordings in 2007, containing Dr. Silverman’s composition “Three Fell Swoops.”

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