This weekend, I finally released the recordings of my collection of songs, Waiting for Niko. The four tracks were composed, arranged, rehearsed, performed, and recorded for my senior project at Grand Valley State. The works are particularly meaningful to me because of the countless hours that my very musical friends Ryan, Liz, Nic, and Gabe put into the project. The album touches on themes ranging from friendship to self-improvement.
I was also just able to release a recording from the Grand Valley State New Music Ensemble’s second National Parks Tour of my piece, Canvas the Bear. You can find the recording HERE, which was taken in the Map Room at the Mammoth Springs Lodge in Yellowstone National Park.
Because of a couple of awards that I won from the university this year, particularly the Niemeyer Award for academic and extracurricular excellence and the Seykora Award for contributions to student life, I landed a story on the front page of our student newspaper, the Lanthorn. You can read all about my compositional process and how my brother feels about me HERE.
In other news, I won second prize in the GVSU Music and Dance Writing Competition, being edged out of first by the inimitable Gabriel Ellis, whose paper on robots beat my paper on Homer. What is this, middle school?! Gabe couldn’t beat me to GVSU Composer of the Year, however, because his magnum opus, “Happy’s Pizza,” somehow didn’t qualify him for the award.
Niko D. Schroeder 