Corey Sevett is a successful Twin Cities composer who writes chamber, choral, and electronic music, as well as music for dance and sound installations. Collaboration and improvisation are two strong aspects of his work.
During the 2001-2002 school year, he wrote music for two ensembles at a Minneapolis public middle school, the Chamber Strings orchestra and the Eighth Grade Jazz Combo. Both pieces were performed at multiple venues in the Twin Cities of MInneapolis and St. Paul.
In partnership with a choreographer, a visual artist, and five artists from Israel, he created a dance/music/visual art performance piece that celebrated water and the many ways that water affects our lives. Mayim – A Celebration of Water was commissioned by two Twin Cities’ Jewish agencies and was performed at Lake Hiawatha in south Minneapolis in August 2000.
The American Composers Forum and the Shubert Club sponsored a concert of his music in 1995 at the Landmark Center in St. Paul. The concert featured five works which utilize improvisation in performance in various ways.
His Four Songs for clarinet and soprano has had multiple performances in Cincinnati, Ohio; New York City; and Ann Arbor, Mich. A newly revised version for soprano and piano was premiered in Syracuse, N.Y. Another vocal work, Loud Birds and Venetian Blinds for unaccompanied SATB chorus, was premiered in 1989 by the Macalester College Choir, Kathy Romey, director, and performed by the Minneapolis Vocal Consort in 1993.
In 1990, the Uptown Business Association in Minneapolis commissioned him to create music for an outdoor sound and light installation. That work, Newfound Street Sound, has also been installed in art galleries in Minneapolis and Kansas City, Missouri. Several other sound installations were installed at the Anderson and Anderson Gallery in downtown Minneapolis during 1991-93.
Choreographer Madeline Dean choreographed “November Elegy” to his music for guitar, and performed the work in 1986 and 1988. Also in 1988, Sevett and Dean collaborated on Rendition, a new work for dance ensemble which premiered at the Ordway Music Theater in St. Paul. Another collaboration, with composer Sarah Aderholdt, produced Hammers and Bows for electronic tape and live instruments, which was premiered in 1991 in San Francisco by the new music group EARPLAY.
Sevett has collaborated with Twin Cities musicians on a series of pieces for tape or tape and live instruments. These works explore the personality of one performer improvising on one single instrument. Improvisations are recorded, then edited and re-mixed to create the final work. The series currently consists of Sevett on hammer dulcimer, Philip Gonzales performing on flute, Gary Schulte’s improvisational violin, and Eric Strom on Marimba.
Born and raised in St. Louis, Missouri, Sevett holds degrees in music composition from the University of Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music, where he studied with Norman Dinerstein, Scott Huston, and Jonathan D. Kramer. He lives in Minneapolis with his wife and two daughters.