Biography

Michael Tenzer (b. 1957) is a composer, performer, educator and scholar. He studied music at Yale (BA. 1978) and Berkeley (Ph.D. 1986). After teaching at Yale from 1986-96, he moved to U.B.C. where he teaches ethnomusicology, composition, music theory and gamelan performance, co-directs the doctoral program in ethnomusicology, and is currently Graduate Advisor for Music.

Tenzer's compositions for chamber, solo and orchestral media have been performed in North America, Europe, and Asia, featuring performers such as Pandit Swapan Chaudhuri (tabla), Alex Klein (oboe) and Evan Ziporyn (clarinet). His publications have been recognized with the Society for EthnomusicologyÕs Alan P. Merriam Prize (best book of 2000) and the 34th annual ASCAP-Deems Taylor award, and his research has been supported with grants from the National Endowment for the Humanities and Fulbright. Among his composition prizes are a Library of Congress/ Koussevitzky commission for a chamber work, Sources of Current. After its premiere the New York Times called it "deft, sophisticated and inventive." He received the Charles Ives Center award for his percus-sion quartet (1981), the DiLorenzo prize for the octet Daya (1985) for string quar-tet and clarinets, and the Morse Fellowship to complete his Symphony for Strings (1988). TenzerÕs music is available on New World, Canteloupe and Bali Stereo labels.

Since 1977, Tenzer has been deeply involved with the gamelan music of Bali, Indonesia. He carried out several years of research and writing about it on a series of fellowships, among them a Fulbright (1982), a grant from the Asian Cultural Council (1987) the Morse Fellowship (1989), and a National Endowment for the Humanities University TeacherÕs Fellowship (1994). An experienced performer and teacher of gamelan, Tenzer is the author of two books on the subject: Balinese Music (Periplus: 1991; 2nd ed. 1998) and Gamelan Gong Kebyar: The Art of 20th Century Balinese Music (University of Chicago Press 2000). He was the first Western composer invited to compose for Balinese ensembles in Bali and has completed a series of works of an increasingly experimental character for the gamelan since 1982, among them Sinar Jegog(1985), Situ Banda ("Bridge of Monkeys"; 1989), Banyuari ("Tributary"; 1992), and Talakalam for gamelan with tabla (1999). These works have been cited by Balinese critics as "an important and unique contribution to our cultural heritage". In 1979, Tenzer co-founded the Sekar Jaya gamelan ensemble in Berkeley, California, an organization of Americans dedicated to the performance of Balinese arts that is now internationally known. The group has toured to Bali four times (1985, 1992, 1995, 2000), and in 2000 was awarded the Dharma Kusuma Award for Cultural Service by the Balinese government, the highest such honor given.

Michael Tenzer personal site

Selected Publications:

2000: Gamelan Gong Kebyar : The Art of Twentieth Century Balinese Music

A Volume in the Chicago Studies in Ethnomusicology Series (Chicago: University of Chicago Press) Winner of the Alan P. Merriam Prize of the Society for Ethnomusicology and the 34^th ASCAP-Deems Taylor award. Home Page: http://www.press.uchicago.edu/cgibin/hfs.cgi/00/13871.ctl

"Theory and Analysis of Melody in Balinese Gamelan " in Music Theory Online , Spring issue. Home Page: http://boethius.music.ucsb.edu/mto/mtohome.html

1998 : Balinese Music 2^nd (revised) Edition; originally published 1991

(Charles Tuttle/Periplus Editions) Home page: http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/9625931694/o/qid=950595252/sr=8-2/104-4872531-3785212

1997: "The Life in Gendhing: Current Approaches to Javanese Gamelan" Indonesia #64

1996: "Orientalism in Western Music":

Essays in program book for Chicago Symphony and Brooklyn Philharmonic performances, Feb. 1996.

1993: "Western Music in the Context of World Music", in Music and Society

Vol. IX: The Twentieth Century, R. Morgan,Ed. (MacMillan: London and New York), p. 388-411.

Selected Recent Compositions and Performances:

2003- 05: Triptych of new works combining Balinese gamelan and Western chamber ensembles

2002: Commissioned New Piano Trio

Up to Your Ears Festival, Montreal.

1999: Talakalam for Balinese Gamelan, Tabla Trio, Tabla Soloist and Balinese drum soloist

(featuring Gamelan Sekar Jaya, Tabla Rasa, and soloists Swapan Chaudhuri and Wayan Suweca). Premiere performances in San Francisco, 9/24-26/99; also Indonesia, summer, 2000. See also Gamelan Sekar Jaya’s website: www.gsj.org

1996: Sources of Current for flute, oboe, harp, viola and cello

(Premieres with chamber players of Brooklyn Philharmonic and Chicago Symphony, 2/96)

1992 : Three Island Duets for two Clarinets

(Durham, 2/99; Manila 1/97; New York, 2/94; Ann Arbor, 3/93; New Haven, 1/93; Boston, 3/92)

Banyuari for Balinese Gamelan

(San Francisco and Bali, 6-7/92; SF, New York, New Haven, Providence and Boston, 4/94)

1991 : Gash Gold-Vermillion

for Flute/AltoFlute, Bb Clarinet/Bass Clarinet, Violin, Cello, Piano and Percussion (New Haven, 3/92)

1990 : Cycles and Arcs for Clarinet, Percussion and 2 Cellos (San Francisco, 6/90; New York, 5/92)

1989 : Symphony in Three Movements for String Orchestra

Situ Banda for Balinese Gamelan (Bali, 7/89; 7/91)

1988 : Puppets for Harp and Marimba (Vancouver, 10/97; New Haven, 1/91; Auckland, 8/91)

Calendar for Piano Solo (New Haven, 12/89)

1987 : Lelambatan for Orchestra (Berkeley, 3/86)

Best Man's Wish for Piano (various)

Sinar Jegog for Balinese Gamelan (Bali, 7/85; 7/87; 7/91)

Recordings in Release:

2001 : "Three Island Duets" on This is Not a Clarinet

(Evan Ziporyn, Clarinets, Canteloupe Records CD 21002). http://www.canteloupemusic.com

1993 : Banyuari and Situ Banda,

New World Records CD 80430-2 (these works are also released on the Indonesian Bali Stereo label.)Home pages for New World CD: http://www.newworldrecords.org/cgibin/search/disc.pl?catalog_id=80430 or http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/B0000030HL/002-7875841-4396212

1987 : Sinar Jegog and Pascima Segara Madu on the Bali Stereo label.

Teaching Interests/Courses Taught:

Ethnomusicology:

• Ethnomusicology: History and Issues
• Intellectual Controversies in Ethnomusicology
• Transcription, Analysis and Composition
• Cross-Cultural Interaction in Music
• Music of Indonesia
• Gamelan Music: Theory and Analysis
• World Music Cultures

Composition/Theory:

• Composition Seminar and Private Tutorials
• 20th Century Methods and Analytic Techniques
• World Music for Theorists and Composers
• Tonal Analysis
• Orchestration
• Undergraduate Theory sequence (2 years)

Performance/Musicianship:

• South Indian Rhythmic Practice
• Balinese Gamelan Performance
• Jazz Theory

Other Professional Activities (Performance, Invited Teaching, Service)

2003-04 : Invited Visiting Research Associate, Centre National du Recherche Scientifique, Laboratoire du Civilizations et Cultures Orale, Paris

2001: Visiting Professor of Ethnomusicology, Spring quarter, UCLA

1998: Board of Directors and Programming Committee, Vancouver New Music

1996: Founder and Director, Gamelan Gita Asmara, a UBC/Vancouver Balinese gamelan ensemble

1993-6 : Founder and Director, Gamelan Jagat Anyar, A Yale-New Haven gamelan ensemble. Performances at Asia Society, Brooklyn Academy of Music, plus others

1982-92: Received commisions, directed, and performed as lead drummer in my own compositions for Balinese gamelan in the villages of Lodtunduh, Pengosekan, Kaliungu Kaja, and at the National Music Academy, Bali, Indonesia

1986-88: Founder and Director, Gamelan Sekar Kembar, a Yale-New Haven Gamelan Ensemble

1979-86: Co-Founder, Director, and Chairman of the Board for Gamelan Sekar Jaya, an independent company of American musicians and dancers specializing in Balinese performing arts. In 1985 I led the group on an unprecedented tour to Bali, at the invitation of Bali's governor. An award-winning video about the tour, "Kembali", has been on Cable and PBS. I returned to Indonesia with the group for a second tour in 1992, and again in July, 2000. See also www.gsj.org.

Selected Presentations, Papers and Panels:

2001: Society for Ethnomusicology Conference, Detroit: "Further Approaches to Musical Periodicity."

Society for Ethnomusicology Northwest Chapter conference: "José Maceda: A Universalist’s Paradoxes Of Southeast Asian Music".

2000: Organizer and participant for joint session "New Histories of Western Music" at Musical Intersections 2000 conference in Toronto; reading paper entitled "José Maceda: A Universalist’s Paradoxes Of Southeast Asian Music".

1999: Presenter on SMT Special Session: "Gamelan Theories, Western Theories: Developing Analytic Approaches to the Melodic Strata of Java and Bali" SMT Conference, Atlanta

1997: Panelist on "Challenging Cultural Boundaries: Cowell's ‘Whole World of Music’ and its Legacy", Henry Cowell Centennial Conference, Institute for Studies in American Music, March 14.

United States Delegate, Asian Composers' League Conference/Festival, Manila, Philippines, January 20-26, 1997. (Paper presented and composition performed)

1996 : Presenter on "Music in the Culture of Academia", symposium at Wesleyan University

Asian Interactions with Western Music, Lecture at Asia Society, New York

Orientalism in Music, pre-concert lectures and panel discussions for the Chicago Symphony, February 8, 9 and 10

1993 : Grounding Musical Topic, Whitney Humanities Center, Yale University

1992 : Constructing a Grammar for Balinese Solo Drumming Patterns, Society for Ethnomusicology Conference, Seattle

1991 : Chair, Creativity and the Limits of Traditional Transmission in Contemporary Composition, panel at 2nd International Indonesian Music Conference, U.C. Berkeley

1990 : Organizer and Presenter on Cultural Interactions and Reactions in the World of Composition, joint session at AMS/SMT/SEM conference in Oakland, CA