PAS Recent News

Nov 23, 2020, 16:18 PM by Percussive Arts Society

PAS is proud to announce the winner and honorable mentions of the 2020 PAS Composition Contest, hosted by the Composition Committee.

The purpose of the PAS Composition Contest is to encourage and reward composers who write music for percussion instruments, and to increase the number of quality compositions written for percussion. The 2020 Composition Contest focused on a duet for two performers with at least one percussion part. “The Percussive Arts Society annual composition contest has taken place 46 times as of 2020. Many of the winning works have gone on to become staples of the repertoire. It has been great working with both the PAS Staff and PAS Composition Committee each year in preparation for this event which helps to promote the creation of new works. We as a committee take this contest very seriously and want to see it continue well into the future.” – Nicholaus Meyers, Composition Committee Chair, PAS  

2020 Winner

Kyle Rieger, The Grigori

Kyle Rieger, born 1996, is an American composer, conductor, and educator currently based out of St. Louis, Missouri. Rieger attended Truman State University, and graduated magna cum laude with his Bachelor of Music in Composition in 2018, where he studied with Dr. Charles Gran and Dr. Victor Marquez-Barrios. He later earned his Master of Arts in Music in 2020 from the same institution with perfect marks, studying conducting under Dr. Curran Prendergast and aiding in directing and administrating TSU’s concert and athletic bands as a graduate teaching assistant. Today, Rieger is pursuing his Master of Arts in Education in Music while student teaching with the Lindbergh School District. Previously, he co-founded and conducted The Woodwind Choir at Truman State University, served as drum major at the collegiate level for three years, and performed with multiple ensembles at conferences hosted by the Missouri Music Educators Association, the Missouri Bandmasters Association, and the International Clarinet Association.

As a composer, Rieger has been an avid collaborator, taking on commissions from wind musicians, percussionists, strings players, and conductors. His marimba duet “Pluviality”, commissioned by the CHannel2 percussion duo, was selected for performance at the 2019 Society of Composers, Inc. Division VI conference in Commerce, Texas, and was where the commissioners gave the piece its premiere. Other accolades include being named the winner of the 2019 Uncommon Practice composition contest, and runner-up in the 2020 Sinta Quartet composition competition. Rieger’s catalog includes several chamber pieces, works for large ensembles of winds and percussion, and an hour-and-a-half long musical theater production. His original compositions have been performed in Missouri, Texas, Nebraska, London (UK), and Melbourne (Australia).

Rieger is an alumnus of the Upsilon Phi chapter of Phi Mu Alpha Sinfonia, and is a member of the National Association for Music Education, the Society of Composers Inc., and the National Education Association.

2020 Honorable Mentions

David Reeves, As Bright As The Skies Are Blue

David Reeves (b. 1973) has written extensively for percussion and has also composed music for orchestra, wind band, chamber ensemble, choir and solo instruments. His works draw from jazz, funk, world music, minimalism and electronics resulting in music that is stimulating and engaging to both performer and listener. David has also collaborated with contemporary choreographers as composer and percussionist. 

His works for percussion are frequently performed throughout the U.S. and have also been performed in: Australia, Italy, Japan, Russia Singapore, Spain and Thailand. His works are published through Tapspace or are self-published, available at DavidReevesMusic.com 

Recent awards and achievements include: 2019 WPG Composer-in Residence runner-up, 2018 Aries Composer Festival for Send & Receive, 2018 Solo & Chamber Timpani Showcase for Spiritual in five verses, 2018 Great Plains International Marimba Festival and the 2018 International Percussion Institute for Slowly, Agitated. 

David has worked for nearly thirty years as an arranger for several WGI, BOA, DCI and University marching ensembles. 

David received a Bachelors of Music in percussion performance from the University of Washington. His teachers included Tom Collier and Mike Crusoe. Prior to his time at UW, David studied composition and percussion performance at Indiana University. His teachers included: Don Freund, Claude Baker, David Dzubay, Gerald Carlyss and Wilbur England. 

David is a Pearl/Adams and Innovative Percussion artist. He resides in Seattle, Washington with his wife and their three sons.

Kevin Madison, my technology

Kevin Madison is a pianist, composer, and educator residing in Boston. He currently works as a teaching artist for non-profit Rehearsal for Life, which seeks to create social change through theater and arts practices. As a composer, his music has been featured at Spectrum, Le Poisson Rouge, Carnegie Hall, the MFA in Boston, the Brevard Music Center, the Bang on a Can music festival, and broadcasted on WQXR. His interests have recently shifted from being solely in classical music to writing in more commercial styles as well, with plans to release an album of self and co-produced music in 2021. 

2020 Judge's Picks

In Tandem by John Yeates
Roots by Matt Ridge
Viper Snake by Panayiotis Kokoras
The Construction of Disorder by Christopher Tomlinson