User:Contempment

Clark Suprynowicz is a composer living in Berkeley, California. He is the author of operas and music theater works, including Chrysalis (2006) for the Berkeley Opera; also chamber works, orchestral works, and pop songs. His jazz background is audible in his music, but that influence manifests in unexpected ways. Moral Hazard, for example, written for the Berkeley Symphony's 2008 Under Construction series, has some resemblance to Gershwin, but employs extended techniques, an adventurous structure, and generally seems more a product of our time than of the 1940's. Similarly, his recordings with singer / writer / performer Rinde Eckert, and with singer / ECM recording artist Aina Kemanis are closer to jazz or popular music than to the classical world, but the lines are blurred. San Francisco Chronicle critic Johua Kosman has been ebullient about the results: "When Suprynowicz goes all out with lyrical, melodic writing, the effect is ravishing."

Upcoming works include a musical (in development) with NYC-based playwright Tanya Barfield, about the black revolutionary movement of the 1960's, and a new chamber opera for the Crucible in Oakland, California, to premiere January 2011.