Mosko, Lucky (actually, Stephen L.)

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Mosko, Lucky (actually, Stephen L.)

Mosko, Lucky (actually, Stephen L.), American composer and conductor; b. Denver, Dec. 7, 1947. He studied conducting and piano with Antonia Brico (1959–65), then entered Yale Univ. as a composition student of Donald Martino and a conducting student of Gustav Meier (B.A., 1969); also studied composition at the Calif. Inst. of the Arts with Powell, Subotnick, and Stein (M.F.A., 1972). He traveled on a Fulbright grant to Iceland to research folk and contemporary music (1974, 1978). He taught at the Calif. Inst. of the Arts (1970 –90); was director of its conducting program (1976 –82), conductor of its orch. (1980 –82), and founderdirector of its Twentieth Century Players (1974 –87). He was composer-in-residence at the Aspen (Colo.) Music Festival (1986, 1987). He joined the faculty at Harvard Univ. in 1990. Mosko was principal conductor of the San Francisco Contemporary Music Players (from 1987) and the Griffen Ensemble of Boston (from 1990); also was a guest conductor with the San Francisco Sym. (from 1983) and the Los Angeles Phil, (from 1985); was director of the Ojai Music Festival in 1990. Mosko is an important conductor of new music, giving first performances of works by Cage, Scelsi, Stockhausen, Xenakis, and others. His own compositions are peculiar, somewhat abstruse, and characterized by wide-ranging fragments of sound in delicately controlled timbral contexts. He is married to the flutist Dorothy Stone, a long-time member of the Calif. E.A.R. Unit.

Works

Lovely Mansions for Chamber Ensemble (1971); Night of the Long Knives for Soprano and Chamber Ensemble (1974); 3 Clerks in Niches for Chamber Ensemble (1975); Darling for Contrabass (1976); Rais Murad for Cello and Piano (1978); Cosmology of Easy Listening for Percussion Trio (1979); Indigenous Music I for Chorus (1981) and 77 for Solo Instruments and Chamber Ensemble (1984); Superluminal Connections I for Chamber Orch. (1985) and 77: The Atu of Tahiti for Voices and Orch. (1986); The Road to Tiphareth for Chamber Ensemble (1986); for Morton Feldman for Flute, Cello, and Piano (1987); Schweres Loos for Alto, Piccolo, Bass Clarinet, and Violin (1988); A Garden of Time for Orch. (1989).