Masterclass: Marie Bennett, flute; Stephen Lias & Stephanie Ann Boyd, composers

Marie Bennett is a Chicago-based flutist, explorer, and climate advocate. She performs with orchestras and chamber ensembles across the United States and internationally, and has been heard on both studio recordings and radio. She is the founder of Extinction Lullabies, a performance and commissioning initiative that honors vanishing species, coral reefs, glaciers, and endangered languages through music, poetry, and environmental sound. She also founded Blue Shift Collective, a community of performers, composers, artists, and scientists dedicated to climate-focused performance and interdisciplinary collaboration. An active commissioner of new works, Bennett collaborates with composers to expand climate-themed repertoire and design concerts that weave together music, science, and environmental storytelling. A passionate scuba diver for more than 20 years, she records underwater soundscapes with her hydrophone, drawing inspiration from both firsthand encounters and archival sound in the natural world.

Stephen Lias’s passion for wilderness and outdoor pursuits has led to a growing series of compositions about the national parks of the US. He has served as Artist-in-Residence at Glacier, Rocky Mountain, Denali, Glacier Bay, and Gates of the Arctic National Parks, and has written over a dozen park-related pieces that have been premiered in concerts and recitals in such places as Colorado, Texas, Alaska, Sydney, and Taiwan. In 2014 his piece Glacier Bay was premiered by the East Texas Symphony, and Gates of the Arctic by the Boulder Philharmonic. Upcoming performances include the Shreveport Symphony, the Fairbanks Symphony, and the SHIFT Festival of American Orchestras at the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts. He is the founder and leader of Alaska Geographic’s annual “Composing in the Wilderness” field seminar. 

Michigan-born, Manhattan-based American composer Stephanie Ann Boyd (b. 1990) writes melodic music about women’s memoirs and the natural world for symphonic and chamber ensembles. Her work has been performed in nearly all 50 states and has been commissioned by musicians and organizations in 37 countries. Boyd’s five ballets include works choreographed by New York City Ballet principal dancers Lauren Lovette and Ashley Bouder and include a ballet commissioned for the grand opening of the TWA Hotel at JFK Airport. Stephanie’s music has been praised as “a racing, brassy score” (New York Times), “attractive lyricism” (Gramophone), “[with] ethereal dissonances” (Boston Globe), “[music that] didn’t let itself be eclipsed” (Texas Classical Review), and “arrestingly poetic” (BMOP).