Joshua Marquez

Joshua Marquez is a North Carolina-based composer whose music explores the spectrum between tone and noise through the examination of timbral subtleties.

Hailed as “cutting-edge” (The Gazette) and “haunting” (Daily Iowan), the juxtaposition and fusion of his unique timbres represent the alienation and assimilation of being an Asian-American in the 21st Century.

Marquez’s music has been performed, internationally, by ensembles such as the JACK Quartet, Stony Brook Contemporary Chamber Players, University of Iowa Center for New Music, Akropolis Reed Quintet, Fresno State New Music Ensemble, Gate City Camerata, Quintet Sirocco, and the Cape Fear Wind Symphony.

Recent performances include the New York City Electroacoustic Music Festival, the National Student Electronic Music Event, Birmingham New Music Festival (AL), Brave New Works (CA), Indiana State University New Music Festival (IN), SCI Concerts, Stony Brook Premieres!
(NYC), Circuit Bridges (NYC), and the International Ferienkruse für Neue Musik Darmstadt in venues such as Symphony Space (NYC), Abron Arts Center (NYC), the Englert Theatre (IA), Georgia Southern University (GA), Weatherspoon Art Museum (NC), the Canada International Film Festival, and the Utopia Film Festival (MD), among others.

Marquez’s paper, “Deep Structures of Pitch Usage in Humpback Whale Song”, was accepted to the 2015 Humpback Whale World Congress in Sainte-Marie, Madagascar. Recordings of his music have been released by Sarton Records and E.M.P.i.R.E.S Records.

His work has been supported by the Ape Cognition and Conservation Initiative, Ocean Alliance, the Roger Payne Marine Sound Archive, and the Music Research Institute.

Marquez holds a PhD from the University of Iowa in addition to degrees from the University of North Carolina at Greensboro (MM ’13), and Campbell University (BA ’11). In 2015, Joshua and his partner, Dana O’Malley, founded the interdisciplinary collaborative nonprofit, GRIT Collaborative. Marquez serves as a Resident Composer for the Saint Mary’s Summer Composition Intensive in Notre Dame, IN (2014-present).

He has studied with Josh Levine, David Gompper, Mark Engebretson, and Alejandro Rutty in addition to private studies with Samuel Adler, Derek Bermel, Michael Harrison, Laura Kaminsky, David Lang, and Augusta Read Thomas.

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