Biography of Linda Robbins Coleman
Current, 2009 (821 words)
Linda Robbins Coleman is an internationally acclaimed composer especially in the areas of orchestra and chamber music. She served as the Composer-in-Residence with the Cedar Rapids Symphony Orchestra for the 1994-96 seasons, the first Iowa woman to hold this position with any orchestra. She was invited back for the orchestra’s 80th anniversary in 2001-02 and two of her works were performed during that season. During the 1995-97 seasons Coleman also became Composer-in-Residence with the Wartburg Community Symphony.
A native of Des Moines, she is a graduate of Drake University and has studied with the Greek National Theatre. From 1977-97 Coleman was Composer-in-Residence for Drake Theatre, scoring thirty-five plays ranging from the ancient Greeks to the moderns.
She has been recipient of more than 70 commissions for compositions ranging from chamber to symphonic music, and from jazz to theatre and film. To date her music has been performed and broadcast in twenty-seven states in the USA, as well as Great Britain, Europe, Canada, and Mexico. Her music has been performed by more than seventy-five organizations ranging from the Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra to regional and local professional, community, and university ensembles and individuals. Many orchestras have performed more than one of Coleman’s works, and new commissions have often followed as a result. She is currently working on commissions for orchestra, wind ensemble, and a chamber ensemble. Her music is listed in the fifth edition of “Orchestral Music, A Handbook” by David Daniels and published by Scarecrow Press.
On May 16, 2008, Coleman was awarded Drake University’s distinguished Alumni Achievement Award at the Drake National Awards Dinner. This honor is bestowed annually to one individual for outstanding achievement in a career or profession and reflects the pride of Drake University in those achievements.
In recent years she has been awarded grants and honors from the American Music Center, Meet the Composer, Inc., WORLDFEST - The Houston International Film Festival, the Iowa Library Association, the Iowa Arts Council, Minnesota Composers Forum, Minnesota Arts Council, Arts Midwest, and the National Endowment for the Arts. She is one of the few people to receive two commissions from the Iowa Music Teacher’s Association and the Music Teachers National Association, for Concertino Mediterraneo in 1994, and The Late Night Café in 1999. The latter was commissioned especially for the internationally acclaimed ensemble, The Ames Quartet.
In October, 1999 she was awarded a National Honorary Membership "for Professional National Reputation in the field of Music" by the international music fraternity, Sigma Alpha Iota. The latter is the highest award bestowed to any chapter or individual by this organization. In 2000 Coleman was the eighth person in its history to be inducted into the Hoover High School Hall of Fame in Des Moines, for "outstanding life achievements" by a graduate of that school.
In 1987, Coleman co-founded the Iowa Composers Forum where she served as its original Executive Secretary and chief administrator for ten years. In 1981 she founded the Friends of Drake Arts and worked with promotion and community outreach for fifteen years at the university.
As an educator, Coleman spent five years as a visiting artist teaching music composition at a magnet elementary school in Des Moines’s inner city. She was on the Iowa Arts Council's Artist in the Schools/Communities roster for fifteen years and provided residencies in many Iowa communities.
She has been performing since childhood, and has worked as a jazz and classical pianist and accompanist, including fifteen years on the Iowa Arts Council artist roster.
For twenty-nine years she served as research associate to Professor William S. E. Coleman, working on materials related to William F. (Buffalo Bill) Cody and the 19th century Lakotas; the escape of the Danish Jews from Nazi persecution in 1943; and modern productions of ancient Greek plays by the Greek National Theatre.
From 1988-2000 she served as research associate and copy editor for the book Voices of Wounded Knee that detailed the events and attitudes leading to the 1890 Massacre and the end of the Plains Indian Wars. Published by the University of Nebraska Press in 2000, it is considered the definitive book on this topic. It is currently available at bookstores and online.
For the past thirty-four years she has been owner and president of Coleman Creative Services, working in music, promotion, marketing and publicity, desktop publishing, research, and consultation. She is a published poet and writer and has served as copy editor, historian, grantwriter, composer, educator, and coordinator on various projects for numerous organizations and groups around the USA and abroad. Additionally, she has served as a caregiver to elderly relatives for the past three decades.
When she is not working on something musical or historical, Coleman can be found digging in her gardens, creating a new recipe in her kitchen, or doing repair and renovation (including drywall, brick laying, and floor refinishing) on the 1910 home she shares with her husband William and their three cats.
For more information, please go to
http://www.lindarobbinscoleman.com/