Sean Friar, composer

December, 2011

Awake, featuring my piece, Velvet Hammer, is showing up on “Best Albums of 2011″ lists all over the place, including: All Music, The Awl, Silent Ballet, CBC Radio Canada, Citta del Capo Radio Metropolitana, Ted Gioia, Music in the Bubble, and this one. It was featured on NPR’s All Things Considered earlier this year, and reached the Top 10 in iTunes Classical and #2 in Amazon Classical.

If you haven’t checked it out yet, you can find it on iTunes, Amazon, and most anywhere else. Lot’s of great reviews are posted on the PRESS page.

October, 2011

Interviewed for Yale University’s Oral History of American Music: Major Figures in American Music, an ambitious project that seeks to interview all those who have had an influence in American music, as well as younger up-and-comers.
A 3-hour (!!) interview (both audio and written transcription) between myself and Libby van Cleve is now available. HERE is the full list of musicians who have contributed to the project.

July, 2011

Slate Magazine has published an article about me and my piece Clunker Concerto, which was premiered earlier this year at Carnegie Hall with the American Composers Orchestra and Line C3 Percussion. Click HERE to read.

Sean is thrilled to be writing a new work for the Berlin Philharmonic Scharoun Ensemble.

May, 2011

Sean has won the 2012-2013 Renee B. Fisher Composer Award.  This commissions him to write a short piano work that a slew of talented young performers will learn and perform as part of the Renee B. Fisher Piano Competition.

NOW Ensemble’s Awake (featuring my piece, Velvet Hammer) is #1 in the Classical Chamber Music category in Amazon.com sales and #2 in all Classical (we can’t be expected to compete with the Royal Wedding Soundtrack, can we?)  We’re also #6 for all Classical albums on iTunes!  If you’ve been thinking about checking out the album, but haven’t yet, go for it!

We also got a great plug on NPR’s All Things Considered this weekend.  You can listen to it HERE.

April, 2011

Sean wins the 2011-2012 Rome Prize!

Here’s a feature on me from UCLA.  Here’s an article from NewMusicBox.

Sean wins his 4th ASCAP Morton Gould Young Composer Award for Velvet Hammer. VIEW PRESS RELEASE

NOW Ensemble’s Awake is out on iTunes, featuring a fantastic recording of my piece, Velvet Hammer!
Download it here!

Great press just keeps pouring in!

It’s New York’s Classical music radio station WQXR’s Album of the Week. They describe the album as “… a Whitman’s sampler of new music. And, lucky for us, everything in the box is a caramel.”  The call Velvet Hammer a “haunting whirlwind.”
Classical Review calls it, “scintillating”, “fresh and vibrant” and “rewarded by repeated listening”.
Silent Ballet says “Awake is truly a delightful experience from beginning to end.”
The Bangkok Post says of my Velvet Hammer, “… there is much to marvel at in the variety of timbres and moods [Sean Friar] gets from [repeated notes and chords], from woodpeckerish tappings to ringing peals to pounding attacks, all in six or so kaleidoscopic minutes.”  As for the album, they “recommend it strongly even to people who usually keep their distance from contemporary classical music.”

March, 2011

Here’s the episode of Andrew Andrew Sound Sound I was featured on March 2nd on East Village Radio!  I am 3/4 of the way through the episode (the last half-hour).

Sean was awarded Honorable Mention in the 2011 Harvey Gaul Composition Competition.

February, 2011

Here’s video #2 of 3 documenting my creation of Clunker Concerto!
Here’s video #3 of 3 documenting my creation of Clunker Concerto!
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Sean will be featured at the GAUDEAMUS New Music Week this September in Utrecht, Netherlands, where his piece, Velvet Hammer, is nominated for the Gaudeamus Prize.  Watch a video about it HERE (which features Velvet Hammer quite prominently!)

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Sean is a FINALIST for the Darmstadt Composition Prize “Soli fan tutti”!  His wind quintet, Lick Machine, will be recorded by Staatsorchester Darmstadt at Darling Records in Cologne, Germany, and performed at the Staatstheater in Darmstadt, Germany this May.  At the concert, the audience will vote the winners.

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Sean received Honorable Mention in the Finale/Eighth Blackbird National Composition Contest. VIEW PRESS RELEASE

December, 2010

The American Composers Orchestra just released the first in a series of documentary videos on the process of making Clunker Concerto, my percussion quartet concerto for junk car and orchestra. Watch it here!

And the concert’s March 4, 2011 at Zankel Hall, Carnegie Hall.