Laura Elise Schwendinger

This information is accurate as of the fellowship year indicated for each fellow.

Laura Elise Schwendinger is a composer and assistant professor of composition at the University of Illinois at Chicago. Her recent works include commissions from the Koussevitzky Foundation for the Spectrum Concert Series at the Berlin Philharmonic Recital Hall and The Fromm Music Foundation for Nonet, which will be premiered by The Chicago Chamber Musicians. While a Radcliffe fellow, she will compose an orchestral work in one movement.

Schwendinger’s other honors include commissions from the Harvard Musical Association, the American Academy in Berlin Prize fellowship (the first composer recipient), First Prize of the ALEA III International Composition Competition, and the Charles Ives Scholarship from the American Academy of Arts and Letters. Her works have been performed internationally by world-renowned artists, including Dawn Upshaw and Gilbert Kalish who have performed her setting of in Just-spring on tour. Her works Songs of Heaven and Earth and Magic Carpet Music, for the Theater Chamber Players, were premiered at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts. Upcoming performances include the premieres of her String Quartet by the Arditti Quartet and Celestial City for the Spectrum Concerts Series in Berlin.

Schwendinger has been a fellow at the Rockefeller Foundation’s center in Bellagio, Italy; the Bogliasco Foundation’s center; the MacDowell, Yaddo, and Millay arts colonies; as well as the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts. She holds a PhD from the University of California at Berkeley.