Composing Earth
cohort II
(2022-2023)

Adeliia Faizullina

Adeliia (Adele) Faizullina (b.1988) is a Tatar composer, vocalist, multi-instrumentalist and quray player. As a composer, she explores cutting-edge vocal colors and paints delicate and vibrant atmospheres inspired by the music and poetry of Tatar folklore. The Washington Post has praised her compositions as "vast and varied, encompassing memory and imagination." Her recent commissions include works for Jennifer Koh, the Tesla Quartet, Johnny Gandelsman, and the Metropolis Ensemble. Her works have also been performed by the Seattle Symphony, cellist Ashley Bathgate, the Del Sol Quartet, and Duo Cortona. She won the Seattle Symphony Celebrate Asia Competition in 2019, she won first prize in the Radio Orpheus Young Composers Competition in Moscow in 2018. Adeliia received her BM in Voice in Kazan, Russia, and BM in Music Composition in Gnessins Russian Academy of Music. She has an MM in Music Composition from the University of Texas at Austin, and in 2021 will be pursuing her PhD in Music & Multimedia Composition at Brown University.
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Gilbert Galindo

Gilbert Galindo is an award-winning internationally performed composer of classical music, an active DJ-producer, and experienced music engraver. He is also the Executive and Curatorial Director of NYsoundCircuit — a multi-media event series — and has produced concerts and events in New York City for over 10 years.
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Dawn Norfleet

Described by Dr. Robin D.G. Kelley as "a renaissance woman," Dr. Norfleet is a flutist, vocalist, composer and educator. Her music is steeped in traditional jazz, but without boundaries of genre. She is influenced by artists from Chick Corea and Herbie Hancock to Stevie Wonder and Steely Dan. Her passion for music reaches into the realm of education and she is an advocate for quality arts programs for youth, particularly in underserved communities of color. Before heading off to ivy-covered colleges of the East Coast, she was a proud product of Los Angeles public schools, where music had still been a strong part of the educational system. Music in the schools profoundly shaped the direction of her life, supplementing the interest planted in me by her musical family. Her hope is for the return of arts instruction for all communities. When implemented wisely, the arts can help to make a bigger, better world with more creative, empathetic people.
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Aeryn Santillan

Aeryn Jade Santillan (she/her) is a composer, guitarist, and bassist whose work is heavily influenced by the DIY punk scene and actively aims to blur the lines between band/ensemble and song/composition. Aeryn performs bass in the New Jersey based, internationally touring screamo quartet, Massa Nera. Along with composer/guitarist Andrew Noseworthy, she co-founded this place is actually the worst, an experimental mathcore duo, and post-genre DIY label, people | places | records.
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Aida Shirazi

Born and raised in Tehran, Iran, Aida Shirazi is a composer of acoustic and electroacoustic music. Shirazi’s music is described as”unfolding with deliberation” by The New York Times, “well-made” and “affecting” by The New Yorker, and “unusually creative” by San Francisco Classical Voice. In her works for solo instruments, voice, ensemble, orchestra, and electronics she mainly focuses on timbre for organizing structures that are often inspired by Persian or English languages and literature, as well as Iranian classical music.
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Ben Shirley

Drawing inspiration from a life lived on the edge, Ben Shirley is a Los Angeles based composer-orchestrator who is known for succeeding against most odds.  After spending more than two years as a resident of the Midnight Mission, a homeless shelter on Los Angeles’ notorious Skid Row, Benjamin has emerged a respected composer, orchestrator, and arranger who brings a distinctive perspective, and relentless work ethic to film composition and concert music.  

Today, Ben’s classical concert works are commissioned by prominent ensembles with multiple premieres on the horizon which COVID put on hold this past year. He has also scored documentaries and works as an orchestrator for television and film. Orchestration credits include CBS Television: S.W.A.T., Fast and the Furious: Hobbs and Shaw, and Umbrella, an award winning and Oscar® qualified CGI animated short film.
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Nicky Sohn

From ballet to opera to Korean traditional-orchestra, the wide-ranging talent of composer Nicky Sohn is sought after across the United States, Europe, and Asia. Characterized by her jazz-inspired, rhythmically driven themes, Sohn’s work has received praise from international press for being “dynamic and full of vitality” (The Korea Defense Daily), having “colorful orchestration” (NewsBrite), and for its “elegant wonder” (Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung), among many others. As a result, Sohn has enjoyed commissions and performances from the world’s preeminent performing arts institutions, including Stuttgart Ballet, National Orchestra of Korea, Minnesota Orchestra, Sarasota Orchestra, Aspen Philharmonic, and New York City Ballet.
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Rajna Swaminathan

Rajna Swaminathan is an acclaimed mrudangam (a barrel-shaped South Indian drum) artist, composer, and scholar. Rajna has been described as “a vital new voice” (Pop Matters), creating “music of gravity and rigor… yet its overall effect is accessible and uplifting” (Wall Street Journal). In her music and research, she explores the undercurrents of rhythmic experience and emergent textures in collective improvisation.
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Akshaya Avril Tucker

Akshaya Avril Tucker is a composer who draws inspiration from the music and dance traditions of South Asia, having trained as a cellist and Odissi dancer from a young age. Recent commissions and projects include works for Johnny Gandelsman (Brooklyn Rider), WindSync, Marianne Gedigian, Hindustani vocalist Saili Oak, Duo Cortona, Englewinds, invoke string quartet, Thalea String Quartet and Density512. In 2019, she won an ASCAP Morton Gould Young Composer Award. She also received an honorable mention from ASCAP in 2018, was a finalist for the award again in 2020, and received an honorable mention from National Sawdust’s Hildegard Competition in 2018.
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