Settlement Staff

Chris Auerbach-Brown - Theory, Composition

"This is a composer to watch; he might just shake things up with a musical trainwreck." - New Music Connoisseur

Mr. Auerbach-Brown received his BM in Composition from Ithaca College where his
major teachers were Dana Wilson and Gregory Woodward. He went on to complete his MM
in Composition at the Cleveland Institute of Music, studying with Donald Erb.

Mr. Auerbach-Brown was awarded an ASCAP Young Composers' Award in 1996 for his
Trio for Violin, Cello and Piano. The piece also received its New York premiere in September of
1999 in Weill Recital Hall as part of the Vector 5 contemporary music series.  In addition, Mr.
Auerbach-Brown received a grant from Meet the Composer for his participation in this concert.
His String Quartet was also premiered by the Cavani Quartet at Weill Hall in December of
1997. In 1998 Mr. Auerbach-Brown was the recipient of a Charles Ives Scholarship given by the
American Academy of Arts and Letters to "composition students of great promise."

Mr. Auerbach-Brown is active as an educator, teaching music theory and composition at
the Music Settlement, electronic music courses at Lakeland Community College, and classes in
the Liberal Arts department at the Cleveland Institute of Art. His classes at CIA focus on the
connections between contemporary music and sound art with the visual arts. In addition, he is
the New Media Education Manager at the Museum of Contemporary Art Cleveland, where he
programs innovative music concerts and edits video and audio content for the museum.

Mr. Auerbach-Brown was commissioned by the Finger Lakes Music Educators'
Association to compose a work for orchestra, which premiered in January 2008. His
arrangements of Hasu Patel's works for sitar and orchestra were performed by the Doctors'
Orchestra of Houston (Texas), and by the Plymouth Canton Symphony (Michigan) in
Februrary and March of 2008. His sound installation Boundaries, using found objects and
handmade electronics, was unveiled at SPACES Gallery in Cleveland, Ohio in November of
2011. Other projects have included commissions by the No Exit Ensemble, Parade the Circle, the
Cleveland Institute of Art, and percussionist Donald Miller. Mr. Auerbach-Brown is a member
of the Cleveland Composers' Guild and the American Composers' Alliance. His works have
been performed regularly on ACA's yearly Festival of American Music. He also plays alto
saxophone, musical saw, and melodica in the chamber collective The Trepanning Trio.

Discipline

E-Mail
cauerbach-brown@thecmss.org

Direct Phone
(216) 421-5806 ext. 701

Courses