Norbert Palej

Originally from Cracow, Poland, Norbert Palej has been increasingly recognized for his “first-rate and genuinely original work” (American Composers Orchestra), and a musical language that generates “visceral excitement” (The Boston Globe).

Norbert Palej is Associate Professor of Composition and the Theory and Composition Department Coordinator at the University of Toronto. He also serves as the director of the University of Toronto gamUT chamber orchestra, and as the artistic director of the annual New Music Festival. He holds composition degrees from Cornell University (D.M.A.), The Juilliard School (M.M.), and the New England Conservatory (B.M.). He is also an active concert pianist and conductor.

Recent commissions include operas for the Tapestry New Opera and the Canadian Children’s Opera Company, a string quartet for the Penderecki String Quartet, a percussion concerto for Evelyn Glennie, a song cycle for the Canadian Art Song Project, a work for NEXUS and 2X10, and a choral work for Soundstreams Canada, featuring the Elmer Iseler Singers, the Polish Chamber Choir, and the Toronto Children’s Chorus. His music has been heard in Canada, USA, Poland, Norway, Germany, Italy, Austria, Hungary, Great Britain, and Costa Rica.

A guest composer at the 2012 Beijing Modern Music Festival and the 2013 Thailand International Composition Festival, he is a recipient of the Toru Takemitsu Award from the Japan Society in Boston, the ASCAP Morton Gould Young Composer Award, the Robbins Family Prize in Music Composition, the Benjamin Britten Memorial Fellowship, the Susan and Ford Schumann Fellowship and Ontario Arts Council Recording and Commissioning grants. He participated in the Tapestry New Opera’s Composer-Librettist Laboratory, the Minnesota Orchestra Composers Institute, the American Composers Orchestra Underwood New Music Readings, the Academy for New Music and Audio-Art in Tyrol, Austria, the International Workshops for Contemporary Music Krakow/Stuttgart, as well as the Tanglewood, Aspen, Caramoor, and Budapest music festivals.