Composer, conductor, electronic musician and performer Anthony Holland attended the Baldwin-Wallace
Conservatory of Music in Berea, Ohio and received the Bachelor of
Music degree in 1978 with concentrations in composition and vocal performance.
From 1978-82 Holland was a scholarship student at The Cleveland Institute of
Music and Case-Western Reserve University in Cleveland, Ohio, graduating with
a Master of Music degree in composition, another Master of Music degree in
music theory and a Doctor of Musical Arts Degree in composition. Holland's
composition teachers have included Walter Winzenburger, Loris Chobanian,
Donald Erb, and Eugene O'Brien as well as masterclasses with Olivier Messiaen,
Joseph Schwantner, John Cage, Karel Husa, Robert Hall Lewis, Hale Smith, and
Leslie Bassett. His conducting teachers have included Arthur Saarinen, Walter Winzenburg,
Richard Stamp (London Sinfonietta) Dwight Oltman (Cleveland Ballet, Ohio Chamber Orchestra & the Baldwin-Wallace International Bach Festival), and Kenneth Jean (Cleveland and Chicago Symphony Orchestras).
During his college career, Holland worked as conductor and performer
for The Cleveland Civic Light Opera Company in Cleveland, Ohio.
During this same period he garnered much experience as a guest
conductor for such groups as the Baldwin-Wallace Annual International
Bach Festival and "Reconnaissance", a chamber group specializing in
contemporary music. In addition to his work in conducting, he has
appeared in many vocal performances in both choral and solo capacity.
He has performed as counter-tenor soloist for the Bethesda Schola Cantorum
and has given numerous performances with "Opera Excelsior", an opera troupe centered in the up-state New York region
of the U.S.. Holland made his international singing debut in Darmstad,
Germany in the summer of 1990 and most recently was a featured
soloist with the Czech Republic's "Praha Musica Antiqua" in Telc, Czech
Republic (1996).
Since 1982 Holland has been an Associate Professor of Music at
Skidmore College in Saratoga Springs, New York. Director of the
Electronic Music facilities at Skidmore College, Holland also serves
as Skidmore's orchestral conductor. In 1988, Holland was Visiting Composer at Stanford University's Center for Computer Research in Music and Acoustics (CCRMA). Holland's works have been performed live and
broadcast on radio across the United States, South America, western
and eastern europe and in China. His works are published by Zalo,
Southern Music and Cimarron Music. In 1991, Albany Records
released a Compact Disc of his work "Three Poems Without Words"
which has received international critical acclaim. In 1997, Albany Records released an entire CD devoted to the compositions of Anthony Holland. This CD included his critically successful concertos for piccolo and violin. Holland has won
numerous awards and grants including several from Meet The
Composer, the New England Foundation for the Arts, the
Massachusetts Cultural Council, the W. M. Keck Foundation
and the National Endowment for the Arts.
Professor Holland has written numerous well known works for flute,
piccolo and flute ensemble, many of which have been performed at past
National Flute Association Conventions including: The Global Village
Samba [1994 NFA convention in Kansas City: National High School Flute
Choir], Three Poems Without Words [1993 NFA convention in Boston] ,
Angstrom [flute ensemble][1994 NFA convention] , The Visions of
Timberlaine [flute ensemble][1994 NFA convention] , Four New England
Poems [1993 NFA convention], Concerto for Piccolo and Chamber
Orchestra, Nostradamus [solo flute], Fanfare [solo flute], Saloon
Music No. 2 [flute, clarinet & percussion] and Epitaxy [solo flute
and computer generated tape]; and in 1990 made his Carnegie hall
conducting debut in the World Premiere Performance of his work Sun
Flight [flute ensemble and orchestra], which was commissioned by the
El Camino Symphony of Palo Alto, California.