About

About SICPP

Welcome to SICPP: 8 days and nights of explosive new music!

We are thrilled to announce the return of SICPP in its new, exciting location!

In collaboration with University of Colorado, Colorado Springs’ Music Program and Ent Center for the Arts, and with the Green Box Arts Festival in Green Mountain Falls, CO, SICPP will take place June 24th to 30th at UCCS’s Ent Center for the Arts.

With the expanding landscape of the contemporary music world, SICPP 2023 builds upon its traditional Performance, Composition, and Electronic Music programs to include more integrated activities and interdisciplinary explorations.

With select UCCS Music Faculty joining forces with SICPP Faculty, our goal is to help develop new creative artists across the breadth of SICPP programs by integrating emerging areas such as outdoor concert and installation settings, immersive listening, environmental sound, the performer/composer relationship, and improvisation. SICPP especially welcomes students dedicated to addressing issues of our time in their music and from diverse backgrounds and perspectives.

New to SICPP, the 2023 institute will include creative activities in beautiful mountain landscapes offered by Colorado Springs and Green Box Arts. All SICPP Fellows will be able to participate together in activities such as environmental sound walks, as well as more traditional concert performances, private lessons, coachings and seminars.

All SICPP students can get UCCS course credit either undergraduate or graduate level for minimal cost.

Find out more about our hosts:

https://vapa.uccs.edu/index/music

https://entcenterforthearts.org/

https://greenboxarts.org/about-green-box/

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Here’s what some past “Sick Puppies” have to say:

Thank you for building this community of like-minded people! I can't wait to come back.

The performances by Callithumpian were among the most exciting I’ve seen in general, and the performances by fellows as well were amazing. Overall, I’m very grateful to have attended and learned a lot from meeting and watching many talented people doing some really interesting things.

It was by far my favorite event I've attended as a composer so far and I hope I can make it back in future years!

This was one of the most welcoming and kind musical environments that I have ever been in. I have made so many new friends and finally feel like I found a home in classical music!

Nick [Vines] is a truly great composer, an outstanding, candid, generous and professional mentor, and has made my time [at SICPP] more than worth it! I cannot say enough glowing things about him.

I wanted again to write you and express how fascinating and special the last week at NEC was. Thank you for the rare opportunity to listen to this interesting combination of "older" and "newer" New Music during the evening concerts and experience it through such extraordinary performances.

It really was the best musical experience of my life! Being able to meet so many people that share an equal if not more exuberant love for contemporary music was invaluable to my growth as a musician and a person. The intensity of the week really helped me rise to a new level.

Hearing composers and musicians talk about new music formally (in the masterclasses and colloquia), and informally was so educational. All of the performances on the series at Jordan Hall, at the Gardner, and at the Iditarod were fantastic. There were such good vibes and an intense excitement about new music in the air!

This summer program was really motivating, and I'm going to try to find people here to start a new music ensemble at my school.

So many like-minded people creating this great artistic community, playing fantastic music all the time. I met so many interesting performers and composers with really enlightening perspectives and thoughts, and I can't wait to come back to SICPP next time... I've been raving about it nonstop to my family and friends. Thanks again for a truly inspiring week of masterclasses and colloquia and concerts.

The entire faculty was phenomenal; superb teachers all. I don't think I've ever learned so much in so little time. The master classes were the best I've ever experienced, both as a participant and as an audience member. The faculty recitals were all extraordinary. The whole experience has a wonderfully enthusiastic and positive spirit – very energizing.

For me SICPP had the aura of an being in a parallel universe, where almost everything is identical to this one, except that when you walk down the halls of a music conservatory, from room after room you hear one contemporary composition after another, and when, occasionally you come across someone practicing a Chopin Etude, you stop and say, 'What the heck is that guy doing?!

Past Guest Artists and Composers-in-Residence

2021
- Composer-in-Residence: Ann Cleare and Chaya Czernowin
- Guest Artists: Tony Arnold
- Electronics Workshop Guests: John Paul Beattie, Katarina Miljkovic, Amber Vistein, Harry Chaubey, Ted Moore
2019
- Composer-in-Residence: Michael Finnissy
- Guest Artists: Mark Dresser and Joseph Kubera
- Electronics Workshop Guests: Andrea Pensado and Elainie Lillios
2018
- Composer-in-Residence: Julian Anderson
- Guest Artists: Allen Otte and Mark Menzies
- Electronics Workshop Guests: Susanna Bolle, Davide Ianni, and Brian Riordan
2017
- Composer-in-Residence: Georg Friedrich Haas
- Guest Artists: Kim Kashkashian and William Winant
- Electronics Workshop Guests: Judy Dunaway and Christopher Bailey
2016
- Composer-in-Residence: Vinko Globokar
- Guest Artist: Marilyn Nonken
- Electronics Workshop Guests: Elainie Lillios and Katarina Miljkovic
2015
- Composer-in-Residence: Rand Steiger
- Guest Artist: Mark Menzies
- Electronics Workshop Guests: Sasha de Koninck and Rand Steiger
2014
- Composer-in-Residence: Roger Reynolds
- Guest Artists: John Tilbury and Nino Jvania
- Electronics Workshop Guests: Jed Speare and Roger Reynolds
2013
- Composer-in-Residence: Rand Steiger
- Guest Artists: Winston Choi
2012
- Composer-in-Residence: Christian Wolff
- Guest Artists: Steffen Schleiermacher, Joseph Kubera, and Louis Goldstein
2011
- Composer-in-Residence: Tristan Murail
- Guest Artists: Ursula Oppens
2010
- Composer-in-Residence: Chaya Czernowin
- Guest Artists: Steffen Schleiermacher and Mathias Reumert
2009
- Composer-in-Residence: Jonathan Harvey
- Guest Artists: Francesco Dillon, Emanuele Torquati, and Aki Takahashi
2008
- Composer-in-Residence: Jo Kondo
- Guest Artists: Aki Takahashi
2007
- Composer-in-Residence: Water Zimmermann
- Guest Artists: Heather O’Donnell
2006 Composer-in-Residence: Michael Finnissy
2005 Composer-in-Residence: Frederic Rzewski
2004 Composer-in-Residence: Christian Wolff
2003 Composer-in-Residence: Lee Hyla
2002 Composer-in-Residence: Linda Dusman
2001 Composer-in-Residence: Paul Elwood