Composer, clarinetist, Burton Beerman’s music spans many media, including, solo, chamber, and orchestral music, interactive real-time electronics, interactive video art, theatre, dance, and musical score for documentary films. His works have been the subject of international, national and public television and radio broadcasts, including ABC, NBC, CBS, Fox News, NPR and PBS. Beerman’s works have been recognized by over thirty professional journals and publications, and his activities have received national and public television networks broadcasts. LIVE! with Regis & Kelly Television Show (ABC), The Eastern European Talk Show “RTL-Klub Reggeli”, HEAR Radio, ( Hungarian-Austrian Radio), and the week-long Pepsi Sziget International Festival (broadcast at Margit Island in Budapest, Hungary, which annually attracts over 500,000 people).
CNN and CNN International, FutureWatch, and The World Today, broadcast Beerman’s Virtual Video Opera, Jesus’ Daughter to a viewing audience of 50 million plus, showcasing the music, dance, video and interactive technology utilized in the opera. The opera addressed a critical social issue of Violence against Women~Children-at-Risk and was chosen as a Video Installation ArtWork exhibited in Switzerland and Italy, endorsed by UNESCO-CIRET, sponsored by the United Nations, at the New York Metropolitan Museum of Art (MOMA), Lincoln Center Gallery, and Dance on Camera Festival. CNN maintains a webpage as a source of information on the story and the opera: http://www.cnn.com/TECH/9602/performance_art/index.html.
Beerman continues to be a major creative force in the American music arena. Milton Babbitt, a Pulitzer Prize honoree, William Shubael Conant Professor of Music Emeritus at Princeton University, and a member of the composition faculty of the Julliard School states of Beerman. “He is a virtuoso performer and a knowing sophisticated composer and musical thinker.”...
Most recently his 90 minute multimedia chamber oratorio TIKVAH (“Hope”) was featured on PBS. TIKVAH, scored for saxophone quartet, soprano voice, digital video/film and dance ensemble based on the memoirs of living Holocaust survivor Philip Markowicz has received over twenty performances to critical acclaim. “Beerman’s “Tikvah” breathes a stunning honesty musically and sets an ardent mood of inspiration” (Atlanta Journal Constitution).
Beerman’s music, characterized as “spicy, captivating, and filled with exotic sounds and lush textures” (Los Angeles Times), has been presented at prominent venues and festivals worldwide, such as the Edinburgh International Art Festival in Scotland, New York’s Carnegie Concert Hall, The Chicago Sinai, Martin Luther King International Center in Atlanta, Rudolfinum Performing Center, Prague, the Haag, Amsterdam, OrfRadioFunkhaus, Vienna, Chopin Hall, Mexico City as well as throughout Australia, Canada , Europe and Asia.
The Warsaw National Philharmonic performed and recorded Beerman’s Morning Calls for B-flat clarinet and orchestra featuring Richard Stoltzman as clarinetist under the baton of George Manahan, present music director of the New York City Opera. Morning Calls received a performance by the Memphis Symphony Orchestra with Beerman as soloist. Beerman has been hailed by audiences as one of the leading clarinetists of contemporary and avant-garde music whose virtuosity and technical control of the instrument establish him as a remarkable and compelling performer.
Amongst some of his prestigious international awards and honors is the 2005 Barlow Endowment Commission for Music Composition, “The Barlow Award encourages and financially supports individuals who demonstrate technical skills and natural gifts for the composition of great music.” the 2008 Governor’s Award for the Arts in Ohio, selected as one who is recognized as a “distinguished artist sustaining extraordinary artistic talents and achievements throughout his career”, a 2008 CINE Special Jury Award, the 2007 CINE Golden Eagle Award as composer for the film documentary 203 Days produced by bbarash productions, LLC. (others who share the CINE award are Steven Spielberg, Ron Howard, Marvin Hemlisch, and Ken Burns).
First Place Winner International Society of Bassists for Voices, for soprano voice and contrabass (1989), a Lipscomb prize for Romance, piano and tape (1986), the Arthur Honegger Prize, Fondation De France (1979), the Martha K. Cooper Prize for orchestra (1984), Meet the Composer and Meet the Composer/Global Connection grants, and the 1999 Olscamp Research Award for outstanding scholarly and creative accomplishments.
Recent projects include eight week summer residencies for four years serving as Music Director for The Hungarian Dance Theatre, Budapest. During the residency, Beerman developed original compositions for their concert programs and served as principal clarinetist. Beerman was invited as guest composer for a five week residency at STEIM Research Center in Amsterdam where he presented concerts and masterclasses both in Amsterdam and at IRCAM, France.
Beerman has over ten recordings to his credit, which have garnered excellent reviews, the most recent CD release Beerman Unplugged…. almost (CPS-8757), 2005, can be found on the Capstone Label, “Living Voices in Contemporary Music” His ground-breaking recording The Electric Clarinet on the Capstone Label sold out and is in its second pressing.
Beerman received his Master of Music and his Doctor of Musical Arts degree in composition with a cognate in clarinet performance from the University of Michigan (1971). His composition teachers were Ross Lee Finney, Leslie Bassett, George B. Wilson, and Eugene Kurtz. He is the founder of the internationally acclaimed New Music & Art Festival at Bowling Green State University, now in its 30th year and served as the Director of the MidAmerican Center for Contemporary Music from 1998-2008. The New Music & Art Festival has been a springboard for bringing a diverse group of artists and composers together and serves as a prestigious venue to showcase their music. Amongst some of the composers who have been hosted are John Adams, Milton Babbit, William Bolcom, Anthony Braxton, John Cage, Chen Yi, John Corigliano, George Crumb, Mario Davidovsky, Anthony Davis, Philip Glass, Lou Harrison, Karel Husa, Paul Lansky, Pauline Oliveros, Bernard Rands, Terry Riley, Christopher Rouse, John Harbison,Frederic Rzewski, Gunther Schuller, Bright Sheng, Joan Tower and more than 200 other guests and artists.