Composer Richard Festinger has achieved international recognition for his extensive catalogue of vocal and instrumental compositions. The 2011 Tanglewood Festival of Contemprary Music, describes Festinger’s music as “notable for its combination of propulsive energy with an impeccable sense of poise and balance,” and WQXR Radio in New York has dubbed him “an American master.”
Since 1990 Festinger has been a professor of composition at San Francisco State University where he is also artistic director of the Morrison Artists chamber music series. Before turning to composing Festinger led his own groups as a jazz performer. He received M.A. and Ph.D. degrees in composition from the University of California, Berkeley, and in the mid 1980’s co-founded the acclaimed San Francisco based modern music ensemble Earplay.
Festinger’s music is published by C.F. Peters Corporation and Wildcat Canyon Music Press, and his works have been recorded for the Naxos, Bridge, CRI, Centaur, and CRS labels. He has received major awards and commissions from the Jerome Foundation, the Fromm Foundation at Harvard University, the Koussevitzky Foundation in the Library of Congress, the National Endowment for the Arts, the Aaron Copland Fund for Music, the Argosy Foundation, the Barlow Foundation, the Mary Flagler Cary Trust, the Pew Charitable Trust, the Philadelphia Music Project, Meet the Composer, the American Music Center, and the American Composers Forum. He is a recipient of the Gerorge Ladd Grand Prix de Paris, and has received both the Walter Hinrichsen Award and an Academy Recording Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters.
