MUSIC

SERIES OF COMPOSERS 1 / 7

MORTEN LAURIDSEN ( February 27, 1943 )

The very first moment you listen to a composition of Morten Lauridsen you may start to have unique sensations, a marvelous mixture of mystic, romantic, reflexive, transcendent and internal feelings.

Each follower of any of his musical creations will continue to enjoy his magical works, one after the other, in a marvelous journey, creating a pleasant atmosphere of space and time, few times heard or thought before.

We celebrate his 80 years all this month with some of his best masterpieces.

Cheers Maestro Morten Lauridsen !!!

ALMO

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From Wikipedia, The Free Enciclopedia

Morten Johannes Lauridsen (born February 27, 1943) is an American composer. A National Medal of Arts recipient (2007),^[1] he was composer-in-residence of the Los Angeles Master Chorale from 1994 to 2001,^[2] and is the Distinguished Professor Emeritus of Composition at the University of Southern California Thornton School of Music, where he taught for 52 years until his retirement in 2019.^[3]

About

A native of the Pacific Northwest, Lauridsen worked as a Forest Service firefighter and lookout (on an isolated tower near Mount St. Helens), where he remained on this tower alone for 10 weeks. Lauridsen stated that it was a great time of self-reflection for him, and that it helped him realize that music needed to become a central part of his life. He attended Whitman College for 2 years, before traveling south to study composition at the University of Southern California with Ingolf Dahl, Halsey Stevens, Robert Linn, and Harold Owen.^[4] He began teaching at USC in 1967 and has been on their faculty ever since.^[3]

In 2006, Lauridsen was named an "American Choral Master" by the National Endowment for the Arts. In 2007 he received the National Medal of Arts from the President in a White House ceremony, "for his composition of radiant choral works combining musical beauty, power and spiritual depth that have thrilled audiences worldwide".

His works have been recorded on more than 200 CDs, five of which have received Grammy Award nominations, including O Magnum Mysterium by the Tiffany Consort, A Company of Voices by Conspirare, Sound The Bells by The Bay Brass, and two all-Lauridsen discs entitled Lux Aeterna by the Los Angeles Master Chorale led by Paul Salamunovich, and Nocturnes with the Polyphony choir and the Britten Sinfonia conducted by Stephen Layton. His principal publishers are Peermusic (New York/Hamburg) and Faber Music (London).

A recipient of numerous grants, prizes, and commissions, Lauridsen chaired the Composition department at the USC Thornton School of Music from 1990 to 2002 and founded the School's Advanced Studies program in Film Scoring. He has held residencies as guest composer/lecturer at over 100 universities and has received honorary doctorates from Oklahoma State University, Westminster Choir College, King's College, University of Aberdeen, Scotland, and Whitman College. In 2014 he was invited to be Honorary Artistic President of Interkultur/World Choir Games. In 2016 he was awarded the ASCAP Foundation Life in Music Award. In late February 2020, via an update on his Facebook page, Lauridsen revealed he had retired from the Thornton School of Music in the spring of 2019, after having taught classes there for over 50 years. He will still travel to university residencies and concerts worldwide.^[5]

Lauridsen now divides his time between Los Angeles and his home in the San Juan Archipelago off the northern coast of Washington State.