Nathan Currier

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Nathan Currier (born 1960, Huntingdon, Pennsylvania) is an American composer.

Biography

Coming from a musical family, Currier is son of composer Marilyn Currier (1931) and brother of composer Sebastian Currier (1959).

His principal teachers were David Diamond, Joseph Schwantner, Bernard Rands, Stephen Albert and Frederic Rzewski. He studied at the Juilliard School, where he received the Doctorate in 1989, and also served on their Evening Division faculty over a ten-year period. Starting in 2007 he served for two years as a visiting faculty member at the McIntire Department of Music at the University of Virginia.[1][failed verification] In 2016 he initiated a concert series called Orchard Circle, with concerts in New York City and Philadelphia.

Awards

Gaian Variations interrupted premiere

Currier's largest work is an oratorio called

Lincoln Center, on April 21, 2004, but was interrupted mid-concert, shortly after the beginning of the third act. The work is about Gaia, a scientific hypothesis developed by James Lovelock to explain the role of living systems in the regulation of Earth's climate and biogeochemical cycles. The composer described his work as both a description of the theory and a contextualization of it within the history of science, and he spent years writing the large work for chorus, orchestra and soloists. During the premiere the Brooklyn Philharmonic
suddenly stopped, claiming that it was headed into overtime, ultimately triggering a lawsuit.

Leading American composer

New York Times, however, published a highly critical review by Allan Kozinn
that began by claiming the work's texts (featuring writings by Lovelock himself, describing his Gaia theory) were “mostly pseudoscientific.”

Currier, who has since given talks on climate change for Al Gore's

Supreme Court of the State of New York Kings County in 2009.[3][4] Currier was quoted shortly thereafter in the New York Post
as saying that he only wanted the orchestra to play the work again.

Currier later became actively involved with Gaia science itself. With NASA scientist Paul D. Lowman he coauthored a chapter of the book Chimeras and Consciousness, published by MIT Press in 2011. Their paper, Life’s Tectonics, concerns Gaia and the role of life and water on plate tectonics, and when NASA recently celebrated the 50th anniversary of its exobiology program (Seeking Signs of Life, October 2010), a passage from their paper was condensed and read as part of the opening keynote speech given by Lynn Margulis.

References

  1. ^ "Academic Faculty — McIntire Department of Music, U.Va". Artsandsciences.virginia.edu. Retrieved 2010-07-21.
  2. ^ "Brooklyn Philharmonic Cancels Concerts", DANIEL J. WAKIN, New York Times Arts Beat Blog, April 17, 2009
  3. ^ "Losing his composure!", The Brooklyn Paper, Mike McLaughlin, April 14, 2009
  4. ^ "Composer’s Lawsuit Looms Over Cash-Strapped Brooklyn Philharmonic", The Brooklyn Eagle, Samuel Newhouse, 04-27-2009

External links

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