Testimonials
(Open invitation, alums! Feel free to send us your comments!)
CitW has been the best experience of my life. The Alaskan landscape is stunning and the composers I met are now some of my closest friends. This was the most connected to nature, other composers, and myself I have ever felt. This trip was rejuvenating artistically and emotionally, and I would do it again in a heartbeat. If you have any interest in exploring nature and writing music, it does not get better than CitW.
Leah Mullen (Pennsylvania and Ireland)
Composing in the Wilderness gave me the courage to fully reconnect with a part of myself—an inquisitive, adventurous, and almost mystical part, that experiences the world around me with a ceaselessly childlike wonder. Once that part of you has been reclaimed, you will never dare to abandon it again.
Nicholas Denton Protsack (Canada and New Zealand)
"There is nothing quite like sitting atop a mountain and listening to the sound of the wind and the beating of your own heart. Composing in the Wilderness for me was a combination of deep personal reflections and growth as well as making lifelong friendships with other creatives and composers in the beautiful haven of Denali National Park."
Christine Pan (Sydney, Australia)
"Composing in the Wilderness was an entirely unique and indescribable experience. I will be drawing inspiration from it for years to come."
Kohen Hammond (Ontario, Canada)
"Composing In The Wilderness is a life changing event no matter who you are. For some, it’s a springboard to a nature-inspired course in their career. To others, it’s a welcomed disturbance in their regular artistic process. All in all, the inconceivable beauty of the Alaskan backcountry is only rivaled by the genuine kindness of the people you meet there."
Brent Lawrence (Oregon, USA)
"Composing in the Wilderness took me out of myself and opened me up to listen – really listen – to the world around me in whole new way. One year on and I'm still full of inspiration from the experience!"
David John Lang (Adelaide, South Australia)
“I envy the people who are applying for the first time! Go with your eyes and your heart wide open and tropical strength DEET distributed evenly over your skin. It’s going to change your life. I loved every moment of Composing in the Wilderness. I loved the great group of composers and performers involved, the unearthly beauty of Denali, being taught to understand the extraordinary magic of lichen, the weird half light at midnight, and a glimpse of the poetry of the place. Steve and the NPS scientists are wonderful teachers and humans and you will probably see bears and a moose or two.”
Gemma Peacocke (New Zealand & Brooklyn)
"The experience has been one of profound impact that has formulated a single path for me that had been two different worlds throughout my life. I’ve always been a naturalist and an environmentalist, and I’ve always been a composer and musician. The course combined those in a very present, dramatic, exponential way."
Stephen Wood (Washington, USA)
"There’s no doubt that Composing in the Wilderness is one of the best damn things I ever did. It proved to me in a big way that art, like a truly-lived life, is not for sissies; it might just wrench your soul right out of you to make it, but the hole it leaves will fill right up with wonder if you let it."
Jennifer Wright (Oregon, USA)
"At Composing in the Wilderness, I am my truest self, both as a composer and as a person"
Christina Rusnak (Oregon, USA)
“For me, participating in Composing in the Wilderness was life changing. As a full time film and tv composer it’s often difficult to dig deeper into concert music and having the time in Denali followed by intense composing time made me re-examine my process and sensibility altogether. I had always wanted to visit Alaska and this couldn’t have been a more amazing experience.”
Cody Westheimer (California, USA)
"Composing in the Wilderness simultaneously developed my self-confidence and humility. I learned what I was capable of achieving creatively and physically while Alaska and an introduction to some of the most brilliant and creative people I've ever met, reminded me of my place in this very big world in which we live. It was also just plain fun!"
Jeanette Wong (California, USA)
Recent Articles
Mercer Professor Composes New Music While Camping in the Alaskan Wilderness (The Den)
Denali: Artists Respond to Music Inspired by Wilderness Opens at the Rozsa Gallery (Daily Mining Gazette)
Creating and Listening in Alaska: My Experience with Composing in the Wilderness (NewMusicUSA)
MSU music technology student participates in 2019 Composing in the Wilderness summer program (Montana State University)
Composers Go Into the Wild and Come Home Transformed (Sharps and Flatirons, Colorado)
Murray Bridge Musician Jesse Budel Flies Into Alaskan Wilderness (Murray Valley Standard, Australia)
Composing in the Wilderness 1: Tundra Tapestry (Oregon Arts Watch)
Composing in the Wilderness 2: On Distant Hills (Oregon Arts Watch)
Composing in the Wilderness 3: Song of Beginnings (Oregon Arts Watch)
Denali Park Wilderness Inspires Composers (Golden Valley Electric Magazine)
From the Murray to the Yukon (Resonate Magazine from the Australian Music Centre)