Long Bio

Andrea Clearfield is an award winning American composer of music for orchestra, chorus, instrumental and vocal soloists, chamber ensembles, dance, film and multi-media collaborations. She has been praised by The Philadelphia Inquirer for her “virtuosity”, “compositional wizardry” and “mastery with large choral and instrumental forces”, the New York Times for her “graceful tracery and lively, rhythmically vital writing”, and by the L.A. Times for her “fluid and glistening” orchestration. Her works for orchestra, chorus, instrumental and vocal soloists, chamber ensembles and dance are performed widely in the U.S. and internationally.

Performances include Kabo Omowale (2008) commissioned and premiered by The Philadelphia Orchestra for narrator, chorus and orchestra and performed again by The Philadelphia Orchestra with Charlotte Blake Alston and the Philadelphia All City Choir in January, 2010. Other recent works include Dream Variations (2008), commissioned by The Debussy Trio and premiered with the Los Angeles Master Chorale at Walt Disney Concert Hall; Lung-Ta (2009) for Network for New Music at The University of the Arts, Philadelphia; Our Better Angels (2009), choral cantata for the Turtle Creek Chorale at Meyerson Symphony Center, Dallas and Rhapsodie (2008), for flute, harp and string trio for Dolce Suono Chamber Music Concert Series, premiered at First Unitarian Church in Philadelphia. Her trio, “…and low to the lake falls home” (A Memoriam for Joseph and Margaret Wincenc) was commissioned by internationally renowned flutist Carol Wincenc and premiered at the Morgan Library on Feb. 22, 2010 by Les Amies Trio: Carol Wincenc and New York Philharmonic Principal players, Cynthia Phelps (viola) and Nancy Allen (harp).

She has composed seven cantatas/oratorios for chorus, soloists and orchestra, and she will be writing another oratorio for Singing City Chorus and the Chamber Orchestra of Philadelphia for performance in April, 2011 as part of The Kimmel Center for the Performing Arts Festival. Her cantata, The Golem Psalms, was commissioned and premiered by the Mendelssohn Club, Alan Harler, artistic director, with Sanford Sylvan, baritone, and the Chamber Orchestra of Philadelphia in 2006 and the work was performed again at Verizon Hall in the Kimmel Center, Philadelphia on March 21, 2010. Her hour-long cantata on breast cancer, The Long Bright, commissioned by David Wolman, was premiered at the Kimmel Center, 2004 with soprano Hila Plitmann, the Temple University Music Prep Children’s Chorus and Orchestra 2001 and was performed again at Royce Hall in Los Angeles on March 11, 2010. Fire and Ice, choral cantata with soloists and orchestra to the poetry of Robert Frost, commissioned by The Handel Society of Dartmouth College in celebration of their 200 Year Anniversary, was premiered in 2007 at the Hopkins Center at Dartmouth College, Robert Duff, conductor. Her cantata on biblical women, Women of Valor, was premiered at Royce Hall with the Los Angeles Jewish Symphony in 2000 and a story on the work was broadcast nationally on NPR’s “All Things Considered”. The chamber version will be premiered at the Mozarteum in Austria in 2011.

Her Violin Concerto, Romanza, was commissioned and premiered by Orchestra 2001 with soloist Gloria Justen in 2007 and recorded with the Russian Philharmonic in Moscow. The Rim of Love, commissioned by Astral Artists, was premiered at the Kimmel Center in 2006 with Disella Larusdottir and Symphony in C under the direction of Rossen Milanov. The River of God (2003) commissioned by the American Guild of Organists for chorus and organ, was premiered at the inaugural ceremony for the new organ at Bryn Mawr Presbyterian Church, PA and the west coast premiere took place at Disney Hall with the Los Angeles Master Chorale in 2006.

Ms. Clearfield was recently awarded the American Academy in Rome Fellowship from the American Composers Forum, 2010. She has been awarded residencies at Yaddo, where she was the recipient of the Aaron Copland Residency for an American Composer, The MacDowell Colony, Blue Mountain Center, Ucross Foundation, Djerassi Resident Artists Program, where she was awarded the Hannah S. and Samuel A. Cohn Memorial Foundation Fellowship, Virginia Center for the Creative Arts, Ragdale, The Banff Centre, I-Park, Tyrone Guthrie Centre, Millay Colony and the Wurltizer Foundation among others. This summer she will be a composer fellow at the Oberpfalzer Kunstlerhaus in Schwandorf, Germany. She has received numerous grants and awards from organizations including the NEA, ASCAP, the Leeway Foundation, the American Music Center, the American Composers Forum, the Independence Foundation, the Pennsylvania Council on the Arts, Meet the Composer and the International Alliance for Women in Music. Her works are published by Oxford University Press, Jomar Press and International Opus and have been recorded by MSR Classics, Crystal Records, 2L Norwegian and Albany Labels and Centaur Records.

She has served on the composition faculty at The University of the Arts since 1986. A native of Philadelphia, she received a D.M.A. in composition from Temple University where she was a student of Maurice Wright, a two-time winner of the John Heller Memorial Award for Excellence in Composition and the first composer to receive the prestigious Presidential Fellowship. She was honored by Temple University in 2004 as a distinguished alumna. She received an M.M. in Piano from The University of the Arts as a student of Susan Starr, and a BA in Music from Muhlenberg College where she studied with her mentor Margaret Garwood, graduating with Summa Cum Lauda and Phi Beta Kappa honors. Other teachers include Jonathan Kramer (orchestration) and George Tsontakis (composition). Ms. Clearfield has been the pianist in the Relâche Ensemble since 1990. Active as a pianist, she has performed and recorded with numerous groups, including the Court of the Dalai Lama. A strong believer in creating community through music, she is also the founder, producer and host of the Philadelphia Salon a concert series featuring contemporary, classical, jazz, electronic, multimedia and world music, celebrating its 23rd year and winner of the Best of Philly Award, 2008.