Who’s Who?

The Young Composers Challenge is the brainchild of Stephen Goldman, an Orlando philanthropist who is also a trained composer. With assistance from the Orlando Philharmonic Orchestra and other local composers, Mr. Goldman was able to realize his vision in 2004 when the first annual Young Composers Challenge was held.

The Orlando Philharmonic Orchestra is Central Florida's resident orchestra, appearing in more than 115 performances each season. The Orlando Philharmonic is Central Florida's resident professional orchestra, serving the community as a resource for culture, education and economic development. As an educational resource, the Orlando Philharmonic annually performs 28 Young People's Concerts for over 56,000 Orange, Seminole, and Volusia County public and private schools and home school students at the Bob Carr Performing Arts Centre.

The Marin Symphony is one of the oldest, most prestigious, cultural organizations in Marin County, located just across the Golden Gate Bridge from San Francisco. The Marin Symphony's first official concert was held on December 14, 1952. In 1971, the Symphony moved to its permanent home in the newly opened, 2,000-seat Marin Veterans' Memorial Auditorium where it still resides today. In 2001, Alasdair Neale was appointed to the position of Music Director and Conductor. Today, the orchestra has grown to include approximately 85 musicians. The Marin Symphony supports a variety of youth programs including the Marin Symphony Youth Orchestra, Crescendo Workshops, the Symphony@Schools program, and the National Young Composers Challenge.

Christopher Wilkins: Christopher Wilkins was appointed Music Director of the Orlando Philharmonic in the fall of 2005. In addition to the Orlando Philharmonic, Mr. Wilkins serves as Music Director of the Akron Symphony and the Boston Landmarks Orchestra. As a guest conductor, Mr. Wilkins has appeared with many of the leading orchestras of the United States, including those of Boston, Buffalo, Chicago, Cincinnati, Detroit, Houston, Indianapolis, Los Angeles, Pittsburgh, and San Francisco. He has also appeared regularly with orchestras in Latin America, New Zealand, and Spain. He has served as Music Director of the San Antonio Symphony and the Colorado Springs Symphony, and is currently Artistic Advisor to the Opera Theatre of the Rockies in Colorado Springs. During his tenure with San Antonio, the orchestra received six programming awards from ASCAP, including the first-ever Morton Gould Award for creative programming. Mr. Wilkins also served as Resident Conductor of the Youth Orchestra of the Americas, assisting in its formation and subsequently leading the orchestra on tours throughout the Americas. Mr. Wilkins was winner of the Seaver/NEA Award in 1992. He served as the associate conductor of the Utah Symphony, assisting his former teacher Joseph Silverstein; assistant conductor of the Cleveland Orchestra, as assistant to Music Director Christoph von Dohnányi; conducting assistant with the Oregon Symphony under Music Director James DePreist; and was a conducting fellow at the Tanglewood Music Center. Born in Boston in 1957, Mr. Wilkins earned his bachelor's degree from Harvard College. He received his master of music degree from Yale University, where he studied with Otto-Werner Mueller. As an oboist, he performed with many ensembles in the Boston area, including the Tanglewood Music Center Orchestra, and the Boston Philharmonic under Benjamin Zander.

Challenge Judges

Dan Crozier - Rollins College: Dan Crozier's compositions have been performed in New York, Philadelphia, Baltimore, Pittsburgh, Boston, Toronto, Syracuse, at Washington's Kennedy Center, the Aspen Music Festival, the Oregon Bach Festival Composers' Symposium, and by the Bach Festival Society of Winter Park, and have been recorded by MARK Records as well as for broadcast by the Belgian Radio and Television Network. He has received ASCAP Special Awards awards annually since 1996, an ASCAP Foundation Young Composer's Grant, and first prize in the National Opera Association Chamber Opera Competition. Daniel Crozier has worked with Eliot Newsome, Jean Eichelberger Ivey, and John Harbison. He holds the Doctor of Musical Arts degree from the Peabody Conservatory of the Johns Hopkins University and has served on the faculty at the Peabody Preparatory, Radford University, and is currently Assistant Professor of Theory and Composition at Rollins College.

Keith Lay - Full Sail University: By the end of High School, Keith Lay had written works for symphonic band, piano, chorus and jazz orchestra. After earning a Master of Music Composition degree from the University of Akron he began a successful commercial composition career scoring jingles and commercials for broadcast, documentaries and short film. After joining the staff at Full Sail University in 1990 to teach digital production, Lay directed the Music History courses for 18 years and currently teaches in Full Sail’s new Composition degree program. In 2004, his work "Children On the Playground" for Violin and String Orchestra was selected from over 7 years of Riverside International Competition winners for the competition's Grand Prize and a performance at Lincoln Center. "Earth Caoine", which was recorded by renowned clarinetist Richard Stoltzman and the Warsaw National Philharmonic Orchestra was described as “unapologetically emotional” by a Gramophone magazine review in 2005. Lay is the recipient of a Florida Artist Fellowship, two United Arts of Central Florida Professional Development Grants, and a grant from the Margaret Fairbanks Jory Copy Assistance Program.

Jeff Rupert - University of Central Florida: Jeff Rupert is the Director of Jazz Studies at the University of Central Florida. He earned his BM, and MM degrees in Jazz Performance at Mason Gross School of the Arts, Rutgers University. Rupert is the founder of Flying Horse Records, the university record label. Rupert directs the UCF Jazz Ensemble I, the Jazz Workshop, and teaches the Evolution of Jazz. In addition to teaching at UCF, Rupert gives master classes and clinics throughout the Middle East, South America, Europe, Australia, and Japan. Jeff also enjoys an active career as a freelance tenor saxophonist, composer, and arranger. Jeff is a long time member of Sam Rivers' band, with performance and recording at Lincoln Center, for Ed Bradley's Jazz from Lincoln Center, broadcast on NPR. Rupert was featured at the Kennedy Center with Kevin Mahogany, and tours with Judy Carmichael, and Harry Allen and the Four Others. He has been a featured soloist at the Chicago Blues festival, the Monterrey Jazz Festival, the Montreux Jazz festival, Montreux, Switzerland, the Montreux festival/Japan, the Lucerne Jazz festival, the Jamaica Jazz festival, The Aruba Jazz festival, Bishopstock, The Pori Jazz Festival, Finland, The Jubileums Blues festival, Hamar, Norway, as well as numerous other festivals throughout the world. Jeff has toured twice with the Jaguar International Jazz Series, New Zealand, with Joe La Barbera, Larry Koonse, John Fedchock, Tom Warrington, and with Maynard Ferguson.

Stephen Goldman studied music composition at Interlochen Center for the Arts, and in 1974 received a BS in Physics from the University of Florida. Mr. Goldman has composed many pieces in both popular and classical styles. In 1997 he received the Composers Guild’s 1st place award for orchestral composition for Quicksilver’s Salvitude. Mr. Goldman's compositions have been performed by the Orlando Philharmonic Orchestra, the Güyr Philharmonic Orchestra, and the Hungarian Symphony Orchestra. Goldman was CEO and founder of Distributed Processing Technology, a developer and manufacturer of intelligent storage controllers for the computer industry. In 2000, Mr. Goldman retired from DPT to pursue philanthropic interests. He has served on the boards of the Orlando Museum of Art, the Orlando Science Center, the Orlando Philharmonic Orchestra, The Marin Symphony, the Festival of Orchestras, and as a Trustee of United Arts of Central Florida. Mr. Goldman also serves on the Dean's Advisory Councils for the University of Central Florida College of Arts and Humanities, and the College of Sciences.