Roger Joseph Zare was born in 1985 in Sarasota, Florida. He is a Chinese-American composer and pianist who lives and works in Boone, North Carolina. He is known for writing music for large groups of musicians and groups of wind musicians. Several of his works have received recognition in the modern music field.

Life

Zare was born in Sarasota, Florida, and began playing piano at age 5, violin at age 11, and composing at age 14. He earned his BM from the USC Thornton School of Music in 2007, his MM from the Peabody Conservatory in 2009, and his DMA from the University of Michigan in 2012. Zare’s teachers have included Bright Sheng, Kristin Kuster, Paul Schoenfield, Michael Daugherty, Derek Bermel, David Smooke, Christopher Theofanidis, Tamar Diesendruck, Donald Crockett, Morten Lauridsen, Frederick Lesemann, Betty Hines, and Rex Willis. Before attending college, Zare studied at Pine View School in Osprey, Florida.

In 2005, while studying with Tamar Diesendruck at USC, Zare won the New York Youth Symphony’s 65th annual First Music commission. This made him the youngest composer in the foundation’s history to receive that honor, starting his professional career. For the group, Zare wrote The Other Rainbow, which was first performed in Carnegie Hall in 2006. Later that year, his 2004 orchestral piece Fog was performed by the Sarasota Orchestra, conducted by Leif Bjaland.

In 2007, Zare’s career-establishing work Green Flash was first performed at USC, conducted by Donald Crockett. Green Flash was performed at the 2008 American Composers Orchestra Underwood Readings, conducted by Anne Manson, and Zare won the 2008 Underwood Commission. The piece also received ASCAP’s 2009 Rudolf Nissim Prize, BMI’s student composer award in 2007, and the Symphony in C composition competition in 2011. Green Flash has been published by The Theodore Presser Company.

After the Underwood Readings, Juilliard faculty member and Pulitzer Prize-winning composer Christopher Rouse wrote in 2009:

Also in 2007, Zare was invited to perform with the USC Thornton Wind Ensemble’s Lift-Off, conducted by H. Robert Reynolds. Lift-Off later won first prize in the 3rd Frank Ticheli Competition, category 2, for works graded 3–4. It was later performed at the Midwest Clinic by the Mason High School Wind Symphony, directed by Micah Ewing, and published by Manhattan Beach Music in 2016.

Zare’s 2008 Underwood Commission from the American Composers Orchestra was a fifteen-minute single-movement work titled Time Lapse, first performed by the ACO in Carnegie Hall, conducted by Anne Manson. This piece uses magnetic tape tied to piano and harp strings to create an ethereal bowed effect. This technique was first developed by David Smooke, and a demonstration is available on YouTube. Other works by Zare that use magnetic tape include Oneironaut’s Journey, premiered by the Aspen Contemporary Ensemble in 2010, and Alarum Bells, commissioned and premiered by Jeannette Fang

Discography

• Collider by the Donald Sinta Quartet, featuring LHC and Z(4430).
• Confluences (Mark Records) by the Drake University Wind Symphony, directed by Robert Muenier, featuring Mare Tranquillitatis.
• Unraveled by the Akropolis Reed Quintet, featuring Variations on Reverse Entropy.
• Voicings (GIA Publications) by the University of North Texas Wind Symphony, directed by Eugene Corporon, featuring Lift-Off.
• Teaching Music Through Performance in Band, Volume 10 (GIA Publications) by the University of North Texas Wind Symphony, directed by Eugene Corporon, featuring Mare Tranquillitatis.
• My Song (NAMI Records Japan) by Kayako Matsunaga, featuring Dark and Stormy Night.