Peter Kramer

Peter is the featured composer and performer, alongside violinist Pala Garcia, on a forthcoming portrait album of violin and piano works projected for release on New Focus Recordings in 2023. Their project is the recipient of a 2021 recording grant from the Aaron Copland Fund for Music. His music was recently featured on the Northwestern University New Music Conference NUNC! (2023) where he performed his composition entitled Copse of Trees with bassoonist Ben Roidl-Ward. Peter was awarded the Kanter Prize (2020) by the Mivos Quartet for his work Three Fragments, and is also the recipient of the Walter E. Aschaffenburg Prize in Composition, the Earl L. Russel Award in Historical Performance, and the Shansi Prize from the Oberlin Conservatory. He was invited to join the Loretto Project as a composer fellow in its 2017 cohort, and has also spent time at the Banff Center as an artist in residence. 

Peter was born in Portland, Oregon where he studied composition, piano and violin with Dr. Marshall Tuttle at Mount Hood Community College. He graduated from the Oberlin Conservatory with a double major in Composition and Harpsichord Performance, and from the CUNY Graduate Center with a PhD in Music Composition. Peter has taught music courses at Baruch College, Born Star Training Program NYC, The Hoffman Center for The Arts, and at Circle Circle Arts. His principal teachers include Lewis Nielson, Jason Eckardt, Suzanne Farrin and Webb William Wiggins. Additionally, Peter has been mentored by composers Eric Wubbels, Josh Levine, and Daniel Tacke.

As a composer, Peter has attended the June In Buffalo, New Music on the Point, SICPP, and Nief-Norf festivals, and has participated in the Vancouver Early Music Festival, Baroque Performance Institute, Accademia d’Amore opera workshop as a harpsichordist. 

He has participated in composition master classes with Hans Abrahamsen, Chinary Ung, Rodger Reynolds, Jason Eckardt, Phillip Cashian, George Lewis, and Mark Barden, as well as harpsichord master classes with Mitzi Meyerson, Charles Metz, Ton Koopman, Jacques Ogg and Michael Sponseller. His compositions have been performed by ensembles and performing artists such as Longleash, TAK, Uusinta, Oberlin CME, Nouveau Classical Project, andPlay, Second Species, Wolftone, JACK Quartet, Mivos Quartet, the Emissary Quartet, Lucy Dhegrae, Pala Garcia, Issei Herr, Ben Roidl-Ward, William Overcash, Zachary Good, and Johnna Wu.