ANDRÉ CORMIER

André Cormier was born in Moncton, New Brunswick. He began making music with a guitar. In 1995, he gave up the guitar for good, left his native Acadie and began a BMus. in music composition at the University of Victoria, British Columbia. His teachers at UVic included John Celona, Christopher Butterfield and Michael Longton. After graduating from UVic in 1999, André attended the California Institute of the Arts where he received an MFA in composition. At Calarts he worked with James Tenney, Michael Pisaro and Morton Subotnick. He has also collaborated with visual artists, animators, writers, and choreographers.

In 2002, Cormier was a featured composer at Okiro’s New and Improvised Music series in Hollywood, CA. In May 2003, harpist Susan Allen premiered his Piling Sand – Piling Stone, a 90-minute work for solo harp and 6-minute delay loop, at the Roy O. Disney Hall. André co-founded the artist collective OXO in Brooklyn, NY in 2003 and founded Ensemble Ordinature in Vancouver in 2004 and has since served as its artistic director. His work has been presented by performers and ensembles in Canada and the US including Motion Ensemble, New Brunswick; Lost Dog New Musik Ensemble, New York; OXO Ensemble, Brooklyn; New Century Players, Valencia; cellist Jessica Catron and harpist Susan Allen, among others. Recently, one movement (60 minutes) of his 12 hour ‘Horaires: volume 1’ was premiered at Kenyon College in Ohio by members of the OXO ensemble, followed by a broadcast of the performance on Wandelweiser Web Radio. In April, André worked with Quatuor Bozzini on string quartets ‘Tammy Powder’ and ‘Forme uniche de continutia nello spazio’ after being selected to attend the Composer’s Kitchen in Montréal.

He is currently working on several commissions including an opera with librettist Louise Brissette, chamber music for ensembles in Canada, Germany and the US, as well as an upcoming release by Ensemble Ordinature. His compositions treat time as rubber bands. He lives in Vancouver.