SHORT BIOGRAPHY
View Standard BiographyComposer David Smooke currently resides in Baltimore, Maryland, where he teaches music theory, rock music history, and composition at the Peabody Conservatory of Johns Hopkins University. His honors include those from the Maryland State Arts Council, BMI, the National Association of Composers USA, the MacDowell Colony, and the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts. He has composed commissions for groups and individuals including the International Contemporary Ensemble (ICE), CUBE, and pianist Amy Briggs. He received an M.M. degree from the Peabody Conservatory, a B.A. magna cum laude from the University of Pennsylvania, and a Ph.D. from the University of Chicago, where he received the Century Fellowship, the highest fellowship offered by the Humanities Division. His composition teachers have included Shulamit Ran, David Rakowski, Robert Hall Lewis, and Richard Wernick. In addition to his composition activities, David performs improvisations on toy piano with the support of Schoenhut toy pianos and also blogs on New Music Box, the online magazine of the American Music Center.