White, Frances

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White, Frances

White, Frances, American composer; b. Philadelphia, Aug. 30, 1960. She studied at the Univ. of Md. (B.Mus., 1981), Brooklyn Coll. (M.A., 1982), and Princeton Univ. (M.A., 1990), where she subsequently began a Ph.D. program in composition. In 1980-81 she was a member of the Univ. of Md.’s 20th -Century Music Ensemble; in 1993 she was composer-in-residence at the Univ. of Mo. in Kansas City. From 1985 to 1987 she served as technical assistant to John Cage in the creation of his works for computer- generated tape, Essay, Stratified Essay, and Voiceless Essay. In 1990 she won first prize in the program music category and 2nd prize in the mixed category in the 18th Bourges International Electro-Acoustic Music Competition; she also received ASCAP awards (1990, 1993, 1994). White’s compositions, often of exquisite beauty, have been almost exclusively for instruments and tape, with particular emphasis on the creation of interactive sonic landscapes; her Winter Aconites (a species of flowering bulb, Eranthis hyemalis) for 6 Instruments and Tape (1993), a commission from ASCAP in memory of John Cage, was created at the Winham Laboratory at Princeton Univ. on a NeXT workstation using Cmix and Csound software. White currently lives in Princeton, N.J., with her husband, the writer James Pritchett, 2 cats, and an ever-expanding collection of species and hybrid orchids.

Works

Ogni pensiero vola for Tape (1985); Chiaroscura for Percussion and Tape (1986); Design for an Invisible City for Tape (1987); Valdrada for Tape (1988); Still Life With Piano for Piano and Tape (1989); Resonant Landscape, interactive computer-music installation (1990); Trees for 2 Violins, Viola, and Tape (1992); Nocturne for Tape (1992); Walks Through Resonant Landscape 1-5 for Tape (1992; derived from the interactive computer-music installation Resonant Landscape, 1990); Winter Aconites for Clarinet, Electric Guitar, Cello, Double Bass, Piano, Vibraphone, and Tape (1993).

—Nicolas Slonimsky/Laura Kuhn/Dennis McIntire