Carl Witt, pianist and composer

....

"Witt is the real thing. He's worth going out of your way to hear."

—Randall Beard, St. Paul Pioneer Press

GRANTS & FELLOWSHIPS

The American Composers Forum
The Dayton-Hudson Foundation
The Target Foundation
The Twin Cities Metropolitan Arts Council
The Brannon-Cooper Fund
The Fisher Scientific Trust
The Upper Midwest Flute Association
Composers Commissioning Project Fellowship
McKnight Composer Fellowship

EDUCATION

Eastman School of Music: DMA in Composition and Applied Piano
Southern Methodist University: Master of Music
Western Michigan University: Bachelor of Music
Sophia Rosoff, New York: studied the pedagogical and performing methods of Abby Whiteside.

OTHER COOL STUFF

Director of Music, Saint Andrew's Sewanee School: Under his watch, the school received the largest gift in its history--$1.6 million dollars for a new performing arts building.

Assistant Musical Director and Accompanist, Minnesota Opera: Collaborated with Maurice Sendak and Oliver Knussen on Where the Wild Things Are and three world premiers.

Co-Artistic Director, Zeitgeist: Presented world premiers of works by John Cage, Terry Riley, Paul Dresher, Jerome Kitzke, Warren Kreuger, Martin Bresnick, Yoko Ono, Pauline Oliveros, and many more.

Instructor, Augsburg College, the University of Saint Thomas, Hamline University, the University of the South, The University of Tennessee at Chattanooga, the University of Wisconsin at River Falls, Western Michigan University

Music Director and Organist, Unity Church-Unitarian, Saint Paul, Minnesota
Music Director and Organist, First Presbyterian Church, Three Rivers, Michigan

Concert improvisations with choreographers Chris Aiken and Peter Bingham, Flying Sisters Theatre, Borrowed Bones Dance Theatre, Zeitgeist, and the James Sewell Ballet.

ABOUT CARL WITT

Educated at the Eastman School of Music, where he earned the top composition prize, Carl Witt has poured his love of music and the arts into chamber music, opera and music theater, contemporary art music, dance, and of course through his unique work as a solo performing artist.

Before devoting himself full time to solo performing, he won the McKnight Performance Award, with Minnesota Orchestra Co-Principal flute Barbara Leibundguth, the McKnight Composer Fellowship, the Quinto Maganini Award, ASCAP awards, and grants and commissions from the Walker Art Center, the Jerome Foundation, the American Composers Forum, the Dayton-Hudson foundation, the Target Foundation, the Twin Cities Metropolitan Arts Council, the Brannon-Cooper Fund, the Fisher Scientific Trust, the Upper Midwest Flute Association, the Faith Partners Residency, and Nautilus Music Theater, Zeitgeist, Opus 21, and individual patrons.

His discography includes releases on the Innova, CRI, Troy-Albany, and Heon labels.

AWARDS

McKnight Performance Award
McKnight Composer Fellowship
Howard Hanson Prize, (Eastman School)
Nautilus Music Theater Composer-Librettist residency
The Alieanor Prize
The Quinto Maganini Award
Faith Partners Residency Award
ASCAP awards

COMMISSIONS

Kalamazoo Philharmonia, Piano Concerto
First Presbyterian Church of Three Rivers-Centerville, Carry the Stones
Western Michigan University, Koan
Opus 21, Karuna
Flutist Barbara Leibundguth, Duo, Blessing
Flutist Wissam Boustany, This Invisible World
Bagpiper Dick Hensold, Greeting Song
Minneapolis Chamber Symphony, After Sketches in Spain
Zeitgeist, Noeanoeane
Corn Palace Productions, Rings Ringing
The Lyra Concert, Cello Concerto
Flying Sisters Theatre, Improvisations for Dance
Borrowed Bones Dance Theatre, Corridors of Sleep, Two Fridas, Hungry Ghost
Cellist Kirsten Whitson, Liberty
Walker Art Center, Figures in Tension
Bet Shalom, Hassidic Song, Psalm 103, Building of the Tabernacle
United Theological Seminary, Hymns
Nautilus Music Theater, Ophelia at the Bates Hotel
Blacklock Nature Sanctuary
Minnesota Dance Theatre
Jerome Foundation Minnesota Ballet Theatre
Unity Church-Unitarian