Collection: McManus, Andrew

Andrew McManus’ (b. 1985) orchestral work Strobe, premiered in 2014 by the New York Philharmonic, was called “riveting” and “breathless…surging…hazy…sometimes all at once” by the New York Times. In 2014 he began Neurosonics, a long-term collaboration with University of Chicago neuroscientist, that creates electronic soundscapes using data from experiments used in the study of epilepsy. New Music USA funded the project’s second work, pathways, bursting, which places the Spektral Quartet amidst a sea of occasionally violent artificial sounds. Embers, fused to ash, for Alarm Will Sound, amalgamates Wagner’s “Magic Fire Music” with other fire-based imagery and timbres.

He is a 2018 recipient of an Aaron Copland House Residency Award, as well as a residency with the Brush Creek Foundation for the Arts. Other ensembles and festivals that have featured his work include SEAMUS, eighth blackbird, the Pacifica Quartet, Fort Worth Opera, the SPLICE Institute, the Aspen Music Festival, and the Minnesota Orchestra.

In 2020 he was Limited Term Assistant Professor of Composition at the University of Georgia Hugh Hodgson School of Music. He holds degrees from the University of Chicago, the Eastman School of Music, and Yale University.