Among our graduate degree recipients before 2004 are the
composers Eric Sawyer, Martha Horst, and Anne Guzzo; and
musicologists Donna M. DiGrazia, Carol Hess, Don Meyer, John
Palmer, Matthew Daines, Suzanne Jubenville, Mark Brill, and Paul
Christiansen.
Ph.D. music (UC Davis), 2025M.A. musicology (University of Oregon), 2018M.A., trumpet performance in jazz studies (University of Oregon), 2016B.A., music (UC Davis), 2014
Ryan Nason’s dissertation is on music and nostalgia in
Disneyland. When not in Disneyland or writing about music,
Nason is a competitive water-skier and coach.
Trey Makler (b. 1994) is a musical
storyteller. His music creates dramatic, poignant narratives
that take the listener on unexpected journeys through memories of
hope, play, struggle, and triumph. Aside from composing,
he enjoys writing poetry, doodling, and organizing concerts.
He is a doctoral candidate in composition and theory at the
University of California, Davis, and holds degrees from the
Juilliard School and the University of Missouri. His
primary teachers have included Mika Pelo, Melinda Wagner, Stefan
Freund, and W. Thomas McKenney.
Leanny Muñoz is a PhD candidate in
Musicology. She received her Master of Music from Louisiana State
University; there she completed her master’s thesis, “Homenajes:
Finding Spanish Identity in Falla’s Orchestral Suite.” She
completed a Bachelor of Arts in Liberal Arts with a concentration
in Fine and Performing Arts and a minor in Music Performance at
the Louisiana Scholars’ College at Northwestern State University
of Louisiana.
Joseph Vasinda is a composer and music educator based in the
Sacramento area and is attending school to earn a PhD in
music composition and theory. As a composer, he is deeply
interested in creating works that resonate with performers.
Whether through performer input on the musical material,
performer feedback on the experience of playing through the
piece, or by using improvisational elements, Joseph writes pieces
that he hopes performers will find enjoyable or rewarding.
Elizabeth Campbell is a musicology Ph.D. student at the
University of California, Davis. She graduated from Indiana
University in 2017 with master’s degrees in musicology and
library science after completing a bachelor’s degree in music at
Luther College in 2014. Her research interests include
Renaissance vocal polyphony and amateur music making in the
United States, in particular the music of the early
twentieth-century women’s suffrage movement.
Esther Luna DeLozier is a Ph.D. candidate in
Ethnomusicology. Currently, she is conducting ethnographic
research examining the value of the live music experience. During
her time at UC Davis, she has cultivated her desire to promote
access to and community in the arts by spearheading community
outreach programs in the music department. As a Mellon Public
Scholar, she collaborated with the California Arts Council
reviewing their public arts grant-making programs. She previously
worked as a recording editor and an assistant producer with
Telarc Records and managed the Audio Department for TNT Latin
America, a division of Time Warner. Ecomusicology, social
anthropology, and public policy concerning the promotion of the
arts through community engagement are among her main interests.
Addie Camsuzou is a composer and violinist from
the central coast of California. She holds a Bachelor of Music
degree in music theory/composition from Sacramento State
University, where she studied composition with Dr. Stephen
Blumberg, and violin with Ian Swensen and Anna Presler. She is
currently pursuing a Ph.D. in music composition.
Michael Accinno received his Ph.D. in 2016 with research
interests in nineteenth-century American music and disability
studies. He has held academic appointments at Duke University and
UC Riverside.
2020: Thomas Hampson Award for Research and Publication on
Classic Song, American Musicological Society
2019: Short-Term Fellowship, Library Company of Philadelphia and
Historical Society of Pennsylvania
2018: NEH Summer Institute Scholar, “Global Histories of
Disability” Gallaudet University, Washington, D.C.
Phil Acimovic is a composer and gamelan musician in Easthampton,
MA. He writes quiet, austere music for solo and chamber
ensembles. In 2018 he served as Artist-In-Residence at the Cold
Hollow Sculpture Park in VT. Acimovic’s music taps into abstract
emotional states, the quiet corners of the mind that are
obstructed in our hyperactive world. His most recent project is a
set of solo instrumental works inspired by abstract visual
artists and complementing the disquietude of the Covid pandemic.
His works have been performed by the Left Coast Chamber Ensemble,
the Empyrean Ensemble, the St.
Hendel Almétus received a Ph.D. in composition from UC Davis in
2012. He was born in Haiti where he began his musical training at
the age of 12. He earned a bachelor’s in music composition from
the Houston Baptist University and a master’s in composition
from the Eastman School of Music.
Ph.D. in composition and theory from UC Davis Bachelor's in Music from the Juilliard School
Chris Castro is a composer and double bassist from Brooklyn, New
York. His music has been described as “on par with Varèse,”
giving him the nickname “The New Colossus of Sound.” He is a
recipient of Chamber Music America’s 2021 Classical Commissioning
Award. His new work, Canções dos Desassossego (Songs of
Disquiet), will be written for the Lyris Quartet and soprano
Sharon Harms and premiered in 2023. His music has been performed
by Sharon Harms and the Composers Conference Ensemble under James
Baker (Two Songs from Brooklyn Narcissus), the St. Louis Symphony
under David Robertson (Choruses III), pianists Sarah Cahill and
Eric Zivian (IV-I), piano duo HereNowHear (Beethausenstro -
Castockhoven) and the Lydian String Quartet (Choruses IV). He is
the 2022 Guest Composer for the James Tenney Memorial Symposium,
composing and collaborating with the New Mexico Contemporary
Ensemble. He has lectured at UC Davis and Sacramento State
University and is currently faculty at Chapman University in
California. He has a Ph.D. in composition and theory from UC
Davis and a bachelor’s in music from the Juilliard School in both
double bass and composition.
Josiah Tayag Catalan (he/him) is a
Filipino-American composer born in New York City and raised in
the San Francisco Bay Area. Recently, his compositional interests
have become centered around discovering the intersects of
musics influenced by traditional, avant-garde, popular, and
indigenous Philippine musics.
Music Annex, Room 1108, 233 Cushing Way, Davis, CA 95616
Born in Taiwan, composer-performer Yu-Hsin CHANG earned her Ph.D.
in Composition and Music Theory from the University of
California, Davis. Since August 2024, she has served as a
full-time Assistant Professor at the Academy of Music at Macau
University of Science and Technology, where she teaches courses
such as Music Technology and Electronic Music Production. Prior
to her current position, Dr.
Gabriel José Bolaños (b. 1984 Bogotá, Colombia)
is a Nicaraguan-American composer of solo, chamber, orchestral
and electronic music. He holds a PhD in composition from UC Davis
and a BA from Columbia University. He is currently an Assistant
Professor at the Herberger Institute for Design and the
Arts, School of Music, Dance and Theater at Arizona State.
Luis Chavez graduated with a Ph.D. in Ethnomusicology in 2018
from UC Davis. He holds the bachelor’s and master’s degrees
in music from California State University, East Bay.
He currently lectures at Sacramento State University.
An alumnus of the Juilliard School, William David Cooper has
enjoyed a diverse career as composer, conductor, and
keyboardist.His music has been championed by Augustin Hadelich,
the Juilliard Orchestra, Trio 180, the JACK Quartet, and the
Lysander Trio, and has been performed at the Radio France
Festival and the Wellesley Composers Conference. He has
recently been commissioned by Soli Deo Gloria, and is currently
writing Hagar and Ishmael, a two-act opera, that will
premiere with members of the Indianapolis Symphony
Orchestra. In addition to positions on faculty at Purdue
David Dennen received a PhD in ethnomusicology from the
University of California, Davis and a BA from Evergreen State
College. He currently teaches at Chihlee University of Technology
in Taiwan. His dissertation research was on the music and poetry
of Odisha, India. His current research is on the history and
ideas of American pragmatism and behaviorism.
