Larry Alan Smith, Artistic and Executive Director
Larry Alan Smith
Following his New York debut concert, Larry Alan Smith was praised by The New York Times as “a young composer of great gifts.” Since that time, he has developed an international reputation as a composer, performer, educator and arts executive. Many of today’s outstanding soloists, chamber ensembles and orchestras have performed and commissioned works by Larry Alan Smith. Upon hearing the world premiere of his one-act opera, Aria da Capo, well-known Chicago-based critic Claudia Cassidy reported: “This is remarkable opera theatre . . . Smith has an ear for flaring brilliance . . . All this seems to me a true talent, primarily because I want to hear Aria da Capo again.”
He began his earliest musical training in Ohio, and pursued his studies in France with Nadia Boulanger and at the Juilliard School with Vincent Persichetti. While earning his B.M., M.M. and D.M.A. degrees at Juilliard, he was the recipient of several prizes, including the Joseph Machlis Prize for outstanding distinction in composition. During his final year of study, Dr. Smith was appointed to the faculty of the Juilliard School, where he taught from 1980-1986. Previously, he was on the composition faculty of the Boston Conservatory.
An award-winning and prolific composer, Larry Alan Smith is represented and published by the Theodore Presser Company. His works are also published by Bourne Music, E.B. Marks, Colla Voce Music and Tallow Tree Music Publishing, and his vocal works are distributed by Classical Vocal Reprints. Dr. Smith is a member of the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers (ASCAP), and he serves on a number of regional, national and international boards. He is currently the President of the Lotte Lehmann Foundation in New York City.
In addition to his primary life as a composer, Dr. Smith also maintains an active performing schedule. He has guest conducted numerous orchestras and chamber ensembles in England, Brazil, Italy, Poland, Croatia, Germany and the United States. Dr. Smith is also an experienced pianist who frequently performs his own works.
As an arts executive, he served as the President of the School of American Ballet from 1997-2000, Dean of the Hartt School at the University of Hartford from 1990-1997 and Dean of the School of Music at the North Carolina School of the Arts from 1986-1990. Dr.
Smith is currently Professor of Composition at the Hartt School and Artistic and Executive Director of Wintergreen Performing Arts in Wintergreen, Virginia where his responsibilities include the annual Wintergreen Summer Music Festival and Academy. He is the Artistic Director of the newly formed Associazione Musicale Peligna in Sulmona, Italy. Settimane Musicali in Abruzzo (Musical Weeks in Abruzzo), a program of the Associazione, is a music festival that takes place in August. Dr. Smith also serves as the Music Director for Bowen McCauley Dance in Washington, DC.
Larry Alan Smith is a Group XI Fellow of the Kellogg National Fellowship Program, a program of the W.K. Kellogg Foundation designed to expand the nation’s pool of capable leaders. He is also the President of Berg Associates, Inc., a Connecticut corporation providing a variety of arts-related services to individuals and organizations.
Dr. Smith is also a prolific poet who resides in Avon, Connecticut, with his wife, pianist Marguerita Oundjian Smith. They have four sons. For more information, visit www.larryalansmith.com.
