American Composers Forum

Robert Ross was born February 3, 1955 in Philadelphia. He attended Radnor High School, where he participated in every facet of the music programs, singing bass-baritone and playing, at various times, French horn, valve trombone, tuba, guitar, electric bass, piano, and organ. He received his Bachelor's degree in music education from Temple University, where he studied voice with Phillip Cho and George McKinley, organ with Earl Ness, and conducting with Gail Poch. After a year of public school teaching and three years in the graphic arts industry, Mr. Ross returned to Temple to pursue Master's degrees in choral conducting under Alan Harler and composition under Maurice Wright; he completed both degrees in 1983. He was Retail Choral Music Specialist and acting Assistant Manager of The Music Store at Elkan-Vogel (Theodore Presser Company) in Bryn Mawr from 1984 through 1991. He continues to serve as Artistic and Music Director of the Philadelphia Festival Choruses, including Voces Novae et Antiquae and the Yavneh Ensemble. He is staff baritone at St. Peter's Episcopal Church, 3rd & Pine Streets, Philadelphia; and is professional bass chorister, choirmaster, and assistant to the cantor at Congregation Adath Jeshurun in Elkins Park, and served as Music Director of the Mak'helat Beth Sholom (Singers of Beth Sholom) at Temple Beth Sholom in Cherry Hill, NJ for ten years. He served as Interim Director of Choral Activities at Franklin & Marshall College in the spring of 1998, and has also taught at Temple University. He was appointed to the full time music faculty of Community College of Philadelphia in 2005 where he teaches music theory and history and is director of the CCP Vocal Ensemble.
Mr. Ross is extremely active in the Philadelphia area music scene. As a conductor, he has appeared with Pennsylvania Pro Musica, Philadelphia Chamber Chorus, Mount Saint Joseph Academy, Rosemont College, Temple University Concert Choir and Chamber Singers, Symphony Club Orchestra of Philadelphia, and chamber orchestras in the area. He has appeared at numerous area churches and synagogues as both chorister and soloist. He performed the title role in three performances of Benjamin Britten's *Noye's Fludde* at Trinity Lutheran Church in Lansdale, PA in May, 1999, and will be a featured soloist in faure's *Requiem* on October 6, 2007.
His compositional catalog numbers well over two hundred works, including many choral works, three cantatas, two symphonies, several instrumental chamber works, and experimental pieces; he has a growing number of original works, arrangements, and editions in print from Coronet Press, Theodore Presser Company, Thomas House, Psalm 150 Publications (both now represented by Hal Leonard), Laurendale Associates, Oxford University Press, and Bärenreiter-Verlag. His works have been recorded on the Premier label by the Gregg Smith Singers and the Arkay label by Voces Novae et Antiquae.
Mr. Ross' honors include composition prizes from the Stowe Institute (Stowe, VT), the Musical Fund Society of Philadelphia, Phi Mu Alpha Sinfonia/James Madison University, and the Pro-Arte Chorale of Wayne, PA. Mr. Ross was awarded a fellowship to study choral conducting at the 1984 Aspen Music Festival and Choral Institute, and was named Composer of the Year in the same year by the Norristown Octave Club. Mr. Ross has been a recipient of Meet the Composer grants between 1993 and 1997 at the Adirondack Festival of American Music, where he also served as General Manager of the Festival and performed with and conducted the Gregg Smith Singers. He also served as Production Editor and engraver for the Centennial Songbook of Phi Mu Alpha Sinfonia Fraternity, which includes three of Mr. Ross' original part-songs and eight arrangements for mens' voices, and he continues to serve as Production Editor and principal engraver and production editor for the Complete Works edition of the music of G.B. Pergolesi at City University of New York.
In the summer of 1998, he was awarded a commission by the Radnor Township Educational Association for a new work for chorus and orchestra for the dedication of their new theater and performing arts complex. The work, *Of Arts and Elements,* received its world premiere June 3, 1999 in performance by the Radnor High School Meistersingers and Orchestra under Mr. Ross' direction.
Mr. Ross was awarded a commission from Gloria Dei/Old Swede's Episcopal Church in Philadelphia for a suite of four anthems on original texts by Gene Sweeney in commemoration of the church's 300th Anniversary on May 21, 2000. He was also named one of two national grand prize winners in the 1999 Welcome Christmas! Carol Competition sponsored by the Plymouth Music Series of Minneapolis and the American Composers' Forum. The winning piece, *What Child is This?* received its world premiere on December 5, 11, and 12, 1999 in Minneapolis, and was subsequently broadcast nationwide over public radio. In 2000 he had a piece recorded in Europe for the first time: his early madrigal *My Mistress' Eyes* (on the famous sonnet of Shakespeare) was recorded by the Choir Cantinovum of the Jyvaskyla Polytechnic Institute of Jyvaskyla, Finland on a CD of new music by otherwise Finnish composers. Choir Cantinovum commissioned a setting of Psalm 51 in Hebrew for chorus and string orchestra, which was premiered March 29, 2002. He was awarded a commission at the same time from the Adath Jeshurun Choral Society (Congregation Adath Jeshurun, Elkins Park, PA) for *Hear, O Heavens,* a cantata on texts from Isaiah which was premiered by Voces Novae et Antiquae in June 19, 2002.
in 2003, a total of fifteen original hymns, arrangements and editions by Mr. Ross were included in *Voices Found*, a new Episcopal Hymnal Supplement by Church Publishing Incorporated. Most recently, he was commissioned by St. Peter's Episcopal Church to compose a new prelude for the 2006 Easter morning service. The new work, *Resurrexit sicut dixit* for brass quartet, timpani, & organ was premiered April 8, 2006 and is slated to be performed again March 23, 2008.