Marjorie
Rusche

Marjorie Rusche
Marjorie M. Rusche is an internationally performed award winning composer who combines romantic, modernist, and vernacular influences.  Dr. Rusche composes for opera, music theater, dance, orchestra, chorus, and a variety of soloists and chamber ensembles.  She has taught music composition, orchestration, music theory and piano at the University of Notre Dame, Saint Mary’s College, IU South Bend and Colombia College Chicago.  She earned her D.M. in Music Composition from the Jacobs School of Music IU-Bloomington, and her M.A. in Music from UM-Minneapolis.  

www.marjorierusche.com 

http://marjoriemrusche.bandcamp.com 

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Biography

Marjorie Rusche

Marjorie M. Rusche is an internationally performed award winning contemporary classical composer who combines romantic, modernist, and vernacular influences in her music. Dr. Rusche composes for opera, music theater, orchestra, chorus, a variety of vocal and instrumental chamber ensembles, soloists, dance, and theatre. 


The Gamboling Girl, a South Bend Symphony Orchestra commission, premiered 1/9/2022. Commissioned by oboist Jennet Ingle, Dreams and Visions (Searching the Shadows) for oboe, viola, and piano, premiered 1/26/2020 with subsequent performances throughout northwestern IN and southwestern MI in Feb. and March 2020. Songs of Love and Death for soprano and piano premiered 3/6/2020 on the Fourth Annual International Music by Women Festival, Mississippi University for Women, Columbus, MS.; song cycle excerpts were premiered 3/7/2014 on a New York City Underworld Productions Opera CrossCURRENT concert. She was a guest composer 3/2/2013 with Musica Reginae Productions, New York City and was honored as a guest composer at the 13th London New Music for Winds Festival, 11/19/2010, in London, England. Her compositions have been performed live and on radio in Amsterdam, Chicago, London, Los Angeles, Minneapolis, New York City, San Francisco, Vienna, Denmark, Kenya, Spain, Indiana, Maryland, Michigan, and Wisconsin, her birth state. 

Awards and commissions include: 2021-2022 South Bend Symphony Orchestra commission; 2019-2020 chamber work commission (with partial funding support from the Indiana Arts Commission); 2018 & 2017 Indiana Arts Commission grant for Creativity Workshops through the Arts in the Parks and Historic Sites program; 2016-2017 University of Notre Dame Children’s Choir Commission; 2016 Calliopes’ Call International Composition Competition Honorable Mention; 2015-2016 Indiana Arts Commission Individual Artist Fellowship – Music Composition; 2015 University of Notre Dame Chorale; 2015-2016 Masterworks Chorale, Muncie, IN; 2014 South Bend Chamber Singers; 2013-2014 and 2012-2013 Music Composition Professional Development Faculty Grants, Indiana University South Bend; 2012 Music Composition Commission from USA Projects, Artists2Artists Fund, USA Open Matching Fund, Cheswatyr Music Commissioning Fund (American Composers Forum) and 30 individual donors; 2012 Associate Faculty Merit Status, Indiana University South Bend; 2011 Stickley Foundation Grant for Music Composition; 2011 Curriculum Development Grant, Indiana University; 2010 Associate Faculty Travel Grant, Indiana University South Bend; 2010-2011 IU South Bend Center for a Sustainable Future Sustainability Fellow; Columbia College Chicago Follett Fellowship; Saint Mary’s College Women’s Choir commission; Portland, OR Regional Arts Commission grant; Indiana Music Teachers Association Convention Commission; South Bend Symphony Orchestra; the American Music Center’s Margaret Fairbank Jory Copying Assistance Program, New York City; DuPage Chorale/American Composers Forum-Chicago Chapter; Stickley Foundation Opera Commission Award, South Bend, IN; Indiana State Arts Board Individual Composer Fellowship; Meet The Composer-Midwest; the Jerome Foundation, St. Paul, MN; the American Chamber Opera Company, New York City; Gotham Ensemble, New York City; Meet The Composer-New York Composer Performance Fund Award; Indianapolis Symphonic Choir, IN; McKnight Foundation Fellowship in Music Composition, St. Paul, MN; Minnesota State Arts Board Individual Artist Fellowship in Music Composition; Minnesota Composers Forum Demo Tape Grant; the Schubert Club, St. Paul, MN; Minnesota Composers Forum/Jerome Foundation Composers Commissioning Program Award; Skylight Comic Opera Theater, Milwaukee, WI; DANCECIRCUS, Milwaukee, WI and yearly ASCAP Standard Awards. 

Dr. Rusche is affiliated with ASCAP, New Music USA, Opera America, College Music Society, and is a charter member of the American Composers Forum (aka Minnesota Composers Forum).

She currently teaches or has taught music composition, orchestration, opera history, music theory, form & analysis, music history, and piano at Indiana University South Bend, the University of Notre Dame, Saint Mary’s College, Colombia College Chicago and Southwestern Michigan College. She also taught in Kenya while serving in the U.S. Peace Corps. She earned her D.M. in Music Composition from the Jacobs School of Music Indiana University-Bloomington, and her M.A. in Music Composition & Theory from the University of Minnesota-Minneapolis. 

Please view http://marjoriemrusche.bandcamp.com for audio files of her music compositions.

 

 

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Contemporary Classical Music

Contemporary Opera

Music by women

Musical Theater