Nancy Van de Vateaus modern

Nancy Van de Vate (* 30 December 1930 in Plainfield, New Jersey, United States; † 29 July 2023 in Vienna, Austria) was an American-Austrian composer.

Life

Nancy Van de Vate studied piano performance at the Eastman School of Music and received her Bachelor of Arts in music theory from Wellesley College. After completing her master’s degree in composition at the University of Mississippi, she received her doctorate in the same subject from Florida State University. This was followed by further studies in electronic music at Dartmouth College and the University of New Hampshire.

She founded the International League of Women Composers in 1975 and served as its president until 1982.

De Vate became particularly well known for her compositions for large orchestra. She was a faculty member at eleven universities and colleges in the United States and also at the Jakarta Conservatory (Yayasan Pendidikan Musik) in Indonesia. In 1985, she moved to Vienna and taught composition at the Institute for European Studies.

The premiere of her opera Im Westen nichts Neues (All Quiet on the Western Front) took place in Osnabrück in 2003. The work was included in the New York City Opera’s programme in May 2003. In January 2005, her new chamber opera Where the Cross Is Made, based on a play by Eugene O’Neill, was awarded a prize by the National Opera Association (USA) as part of its international, biennial competition for new chamber operas. An abridged version was presented in New York City. The complete opera was also performed in January 2006 at the 51st annual convention of the National Opera Association in Ann Arbor, Michigan.

Chernobyl is one of her orchestral works that has been performed in Vienna, Hamburg, the Czech Republic, Bulgaria, in the USA (Chautauqua Festival) and in Maine (Portland Symphony Orchestra). As part of a special concert, the Portland Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Toshiyuki Shimada, performed it on 25 February 2006, the 20th anniversary of the Chernobyl disaster. Since its release on CD in 1987, her work Chernobyl has been played on radio stations.

Van de Vate has composed solos and chamber works for various instruments and ensembles, including String Quartet No. 2, commissioned by the Vienna Mozart Year 2006, and Brass Quintet No. 2: Variations on the ‘Streets of Laredo’, commissioned by the University of Mississippi for their 2005 music festival.

She participated as a speaker at the World Music Council meeting in Los Angeles in October 2005. She has also served as a nominator for the Kyoto Prize for Music. Together with her husband, Clyde Smith, she founded the CD company Vienna Modern Masters in 1990, of which she was president and artistic director.

Source Wiki: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nancy_Van_de_Vate