Michael Coyle (composer)
Michael Patrick Coyle is an American composer.
Coyle was born in Easton, Pennsylvania. He studied at the Eastman School of Music, the New England Conservatory of Music, and the University of Minnesota.[1]
Michael Coyle is a composer/arranger in Minneapolis, and also the senior producer for an independent, multi-media production company based in Manhattan. He is the former composer-in-residence for the Manhattan Performance Group and the Cottage Theater in New York, and was the editor of Stagebill Magazine at Lincoln Center and Carnegie Hall. Michael's works have been featured on television, film, and stage, and in art installations in New York, Boston, and Minneapolis, and Madison, WI.
He works in a wide variety of styles, but primarily enjoys writing for instrumental chamber ensembles and orchestra. Most evident in Michael's music is a rich use of both traditional and extended harmony balanced with sections of harmonic ambiguity and atonality. He believes that the combination of tonality and atonality is critical to the appreciation of both. By his own admission, he is obsessed with novel variation in both tone color and texture. He has been recognized as an adept and imaginative orchestrator. He works with both acoustic and electronic instruments in order to have access to as wide a palette of raw sound as possible.
One of Michael's recent works, Tänzchen für vier, was a winner of the annual Zeitgeist/American Composers Forum competition and was premiered by Zeitgeist in March 2011.
In addition to music, Michael has an avid interest in science and material experimentation and in the mid-1980s accepted a position as Production Manager for McHugh-Rollins Associates, a properties and special effects design firm in New York City. While in that position he oversaw the special effects production of such large Broadway shows as The Phantom of the Opera and Les Misérables and implemented the effects for Ingmar Bergman's production of Hamlet at the Brooklyn Academy of Music, as well as many other stage productions and films.[1]
Michael did his undergraduate studies at the Eastman School of Music, graduate work at the New England Conservatory of Music, the Institute of Audio Research, and the University of Minnesota. Michael plays the piano, trombone, and a wide variety of electronic instruments. His greatest musical influences and mentors have been: Robert Bailey, James Hepokoski, Daniel Pinkham, Jan Gorbaty, Dominic Argento, William Curnow, and Henry Schmidt.[1]
Coyle currently resides in Minneapolis, where, in addition to his work as a composer and arranger, he occasionally performs on the piano and trombone.[1]
Michael is an active member of the American Composers Forum.
Recent Works
- DX - for viola, clarinet, trombone, string bass, and percussion [1]
- Intervals I - for small wind ensemble, piano, and percussion [2]
- Intervals II - for piano, violin, and viola [3]
- Small Village Large Tree - for chamber orchestra [4]
- Bruckneurosis - for large orchestra [5]
- The Barking Wizards of Middleview - for chamber orchestra [6]
- Trio for violin, viola, and piano [7]
- Four Divas and one Climax, for cello quartet
- Tänzchen für Vier" - for violin, clarinet, piano, marimba and vibes - winner of the annual Zeitgeist/American Composers Forum competition, premiered by Zeitgeist, St. Paul, MN, March 22, 2011.[8]
Contact and More Information
- Official website with musical samples
- American Composers Forum Bio Page
- Facebook Page
- List of Eastman School of Music people - List of Eastman School of Music Alumni
