Composer Andrew May is best known for his pioneering instrumental works with live interactive computer systems, and has created numerous tools for statistical tracking and modeling of musical behaviors. Most of his works, however, are purely acoustic, exploring parallel issues of performance, communication, notation, and interaction. May’s music has been performed in Canada, Brazil, England, Northern Ireland, France, Germany, Switzerland, Poland, Greece, Denmark, China, Korea, Japan, Thailand, Singapore, and throughout the United States. May is Associate Professor of composition at the University of North Texas College of Music, where he served as the Director of UNT’s Center for Experimental Music and Intermedia (CEMI) from 2005-2016.
Festivals and conferences that have presented May’s music include SEAMUS National Conferences, International Computer Music Conferences, Third Practice Festival, New York City Electroacoustic Music Festival, Spark Festival, Kansas City Electronic Music & Arts Alliance, IMEB Synthèse Festival, Sound Festival, Bowling Green New Music Festival, Electronic Music Midwest, Florida Electroacoustic Music Festival, Sonorities Festival, Scarborough Electro Acoustic, June in Buffalo, National Flute Association Convention, International Clarinet Association ClarinetFest, Festival de Nohant, Darmstadt Summer Courses, LA Philharmonic Green Umbrella Series, New Music Circle of St. Louis, Southeastern Composers’ League, Birmingham Art Music Alliance, and the Summer Institute for Contemporary Performance Practice. May’s music has also been presented at major schools and conservatories (Peabody, Juillard, New England Conservatory, Curtis, Brown, Hartt, Dartmouth, University of Iowa, New York University, etc.) and museums (Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth, Boulder Museum of Contemporary Art, Dairy Center for the Arts, Ellarslie City Museum of Trenton, CU Art Museum).
May has written pieces for the Calliope Duo, the EAR Unit, the SONOR Ensemble, the Tornado Project, Canto Battuto, Clarion Synthesis, clarinetist F. Gerard Errante, percussionists Vanessa Tomlinson, Terry Longshore, David Shively, Brett Reed, and Robert Damm, flutist Elizabeth McNutt, violinists Päivikki Nykter, János Négyesy, Jonathan Dubay and Persephone Gibbs, the Third Unitarian Church Ensemble of Chicago, and the Yale Bach Society Orchestra. His projects have been supported by grants from Center for Research and Creative Work at CU Boulder, the Boulder County Arts Alliance, the American Music Center, and the Foundation for Contemporary Arts, as well as residencies at Yaddo, MacDowell Colony, and the Brush Creek Foundation for the Arts. May’s music can be heard on Music from SEAMUS Volumes 9 and 15, Elizabeth McNutt’s solo CD pipe wrench, the Tornado Project CD, Jeremy Baguyos‘s CD Uncoiled Oscillations, the Négyesy-Nykter Duo’s Dedications 2, Christian Verspay‘s Blood Moon, CDCM Computer Music Series Volume 39: Music from CEMI, and Imaginary Friends, a solo CD of May’s music for instruments and computer.
Also a violinist, improviser, and conductor specializing in adventurous new music and avant-garde improvisation, May has performed in Germany, Denmark, and Switzerland and across the United States, and has been recorded on CRI. He was a founding director of Pendulum New Music from 2001-2005; from 2004-7 he co-directed the contemporary music series Atomic Clock Music Events; and he currently assists in organizing the Sounds Modern series.
Born and raised in Chicago, May studied violin from the age of 5, taking lessons with Barbara Breckman at the Chicago Musical College. He received a PhD in 2000 from University of California at San Diego, where he studied composition with Roger Reynolds, computer music with Miller Puckette and improvisation with George Lewis. He has also studied composition with Mel Powell, violin with Laura Kuennen-Poper, and conducting with Lucky Mosko at the California Institute of the Arts, where he received a MFA in composition and violin performance in 1994; and with Jonathan Berger, John Sichel, and Deniz Hughes at Yale University, where he received a BA in music (summa cum laude) in 1990. He studied computer music at the Stage d’Informatique Musicale at IRCAM in 1998.