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Photo by Joel Chadabe Octo Mixes

Larry Austin Larry Austin is composer of more than seventy works incorporating electroacoustic and computer music media: combinations of tape, instruments, voices, orchestra, live-electronics and real-time computer processing, as well as solo audio and video tape compositions. He composed his first electronic music compositions in 1964 at the American Academy in Rome electronic music studio, on Paul Ketoff's prototype synthesizer, the Synket. Highly successful as a composer for traditional as well as experimental music genres, Austin's works have been performed and recorded by the New York Philharmonic, Boston Symphony, the Cincinnati Philharmonia, the National Symphony orchestra, the National Philharmonic of Warsaw, the Ensemble Neue Musik and the Academy of Music, Cologne, as well as many other major ensembles in North America and Europe. He has enjoyed extended associations with composers John Cage, Karlheinz Stockhausen, and David Tudor. He has also worked with the San Francisco Tape Music Center, and the Artificial Intelligence Center at Stanford University. From 1958 to 1972 Austin was a member of the music faculty of the University of California, Davis, active there as a conductor, performer, electronic music practitioner, and composer. There, in 1966, he co-founded, edited, and published the seminal new music journal, SOURCE: Music of the Avant Garde. Subsequently, he served on the faculties of the University of South Florida, and the University of North Texas, founding and directing extensive computer music studios at both universities. In 1986 he founded and served as president of CDCM: Consortium to Distribute Computer Music, producer of the CDCM Computer Music Series on Centaur Records, with thirty-one compact disc volumes released since 1988. Elected twice to the Board of Directors of the International Computer Music Association, Austin also served as its president. Austin has received numerous commissions, grants, and awards. In 1996, Austin was the first US composer to be awarded the prestigious Magistère de Bourges prize/title in the 23rd International Electroacoustic Music Competition, Bourges, France, for his work BluesAx (1995-96), for saxophonist and computer music/electronics, and for his work and influential leadership in electroacoustic music genres through the past four decades. In the summer of 1997, Austin was Magistère de Bourges composer-in-residence at the Electroacoustic Music Studios at the University of Birmingham, UK, working on two commissions: Djuro's Tree (1997), solo octophonic computer music, commissioned by Borik Press and a sound-play for baritone Thomas Buckner, Singing!...the music of my own time (1996-98), for baritone voice and octophonic computer music. In the summer of 1998, Austin was awarded a month-long composer residency at the Rockefeller Center at Bellagio, Italy, completing his commission from tárogató player Esther Lamneck, Tárogató! (1998), for tárogató and octophonic computer music. In February 2000, Austin was a guest research fellow in the Electroacoustic Music Studios, University of York, UK, working on a commission for the London-based Smith Quartet, completing ambisonic recordings for his recently completed Ottuplo! (1998-2000), four inter-episodes for real and virtual string quartet. In September 2000, Austin enjoyed a month-long composer residency at the International Institute for Electroacoustic Music, Bourges, France, which commissioned his newest work, Williams [re]Mix[ed] (1997-2001), for octophonic computer music system. He was educated in Texas and California, studying with Canadian composer Violet Archer (University of North Texas), French composer Darius Milhaud (Mills College), and American composer Andrew Imbrie (University of California-Berkeley). Retiring from his 38-year academic career in 1996, Austin resides with his wife Edna at their home in Denton, Texas. Working in and out of his Denton studio, gaLarry, Austin continues his active composing career with commissions, tours, performances, writing, recordings, and lecturing, anticipating future extended composer residencies in North America, Asia, and Europe.

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