PluComp
PluComp Composition Summer Course: Exploring Non-Eurocentric Perspectives
The Du Vert à L'Infini Festival is thrilled to announce the call for participant composers for the upcoming 2026 PluComp Composition Summer Course. This unique opportunity is designed to revolutionize music composition by delving into non-Eurocentric perspectives, with a specific focus on Iran and Turkey for this year's edition.
About the Program:
PluComp, short for Pluralist Composition, stands as a pioneering composition summer course that takes a fresh approach to music composition, shifting the focus from Eurocentric norms. In the upcoming edition, we're honored to welcome distinguished resident composers Reza Vali and Shahab Paranj from Iran, Erberk Eryilmaz from Turkey. These eminent composers will lead participants through a transformative journey, exploring various facets of music composition, including melody, rhythm, polyphony, form, and instrumentation.
Program Highlights:
Participant composers will engage in daily one-on-one composition lessons with each resident composer in addition to the seminars and discussions. This year’s seminar schedule includes:
Reza Vali (Professor at Carnegie Mellon University)
Shahab Paranj (Professor at University of California, Los Angeles) UCLA
Erberk Eryilmaz (Professor at Ankara Music and Fine Arts University)
As the festival unfolds, resident musicians rehearse participant’s pieces leading to a live performance and recording during a concert as an integral part of the Du Vert À l'Infini Music Festival.
Du vert à L'infini collective:
Violin, Cello,, Clarinet, Persian Ney, Santoor, Tambour and Persian Percussion.
Application Deadline: January 31st
Fee: $1100
Room and Board Included
Lectures will be given in English.
Composeres
Reza Vali
was born in Ghazvin, Iran, in 1952. He began his music studies at the Conservatory of Music in Tehran. In 1972 he went to Austria and studied music education and composition at the Academy of Music in Vienna. After graduating from the Academy of Music, he moved to the United States and continued his studies at the University of Pittsburgh, receiving his Ph.D. in music theory and composition in 1985. Mr. Vali has been a faculty member of the School of Music at Carnegie Mellon University since 1988. He has received numerous honors and commissions, including the honor prize of the Austrian Ministry of Arts and Sciences, two Andrew W. Mellon Fellowships, commissions from the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra, the Boston Modern Orchestra Project, the Pittsburgh New Music Ensemble, Kronos Quartet, the Carpe Diem String Quartet, the Seattle Chamber Players and the Arizona Friends of Chamber Music, as well as grants from the Pennsylvania Council on the Arts, The Pittsburgh Foundation, and the Pittsburgh Board of Public Education. He was selected by the Pittsburgh Cultural
Trust as the Outstanding Emerging Artist for which he received the Creative Achievement Award. Vali's orchestral compositions have been performed in the United States by the Pittsburgh Symphony, the Seattle Symphony, the Boston Modern Orchestra Project, the Baltimore Symphony, the Memphis Symphony Orchestra, and Orchestra 2001. His chamber works have received performances by Cuarteto Latinoamericano, the Pittsburgh New Music Ensemble, the Carpe Diem String Quartet, Kronos Quartet, the Seattle Chamber Players, and the Da
Capo Chamber Players. His music has been performed in Europe, China, Chile, Mexico, Hong Kong, and Australia and is recorded on the Deutsche Grammophon, Naxos, New Albion, MMC, Ambassador, Albany, and ABC Classics labels.
Shahab Paranj
Winner of the 2024 Hoefer Prize, Composer, Conductor, Instrumentalist, and Educator Shahab Paranj, an Iranian-born composer, holds degrees in music composition from the San Francisco Conservatory of Music, Manhattan School of Music, and the University of California, Los Angeles. He is considered one of the pioneers among his generation of Iranian composers whose composition style integrates Persian and Western composition techniques. Known as a tombak virtuoso, he has performed, recorded, and collaborated with some of the most celebrated artists worldwide. Praised by the San Francisco Examiner as “extraordinary” and acclaimed by composer John Adams for his “unique voice,” Paranj’s compositions distinctly diverge from Eurocentric conventions, drawing inspiration primarily from the vibrant traditions of Persian music. Recent commissions include works for ensembles such as the Russian String Orchestra, Intersection Contemporary Music Ensemble, Long Beach Opera, Jâca Duo, Aleron Trio, San Francisco New Music Ensemble, One Great City Duo, MSM Symphony Orchestra, and international Low Brass Trio. Additionally, he has composed an original score for the movie “Dressage,” which won the 2018 feature film (generation category) at the Berlin Film Festival. As a scholar, his main research focus lies in the Iranian Avazi Style, and he has presented on this topic in various seminars, including the SEM, AMS, and SMT 2022 joint annual meeting. He has received formal recognition from the Mehr Humanitarian Society (2010) and the City and County of San Francisco (2011). Paranj is a founder and music director of The Iranshahr Orchestra and the artistic director of “du vert à l’infini,” a contemporary music festival in the Franche-Comte region of France. He currently serves as a faculty member at the UCLA Herb Alpert School of Music.
Erberk Eryılmaz
Turkish-American composer and performer Erberk Eryılmaz is recognized for bringing the energy of the traditional music of his homeland to the concert stage with a creative and dramatic approach. His recent album of chamber works, "Dances of the Yogurt Maker" won a Grammy Award with producer Judith Sherman and received two gold medals at Global Music Awards in 2022. His compositions have been performed at some of the world’s most important concert venues such as Carnegie Hall, Sydney Opera House, the National Museum of Fine Arts in Havana, Cuba, and the Kennedy Center in Washington D.C. Eryılmaz was selected to participate in the Moon Arts Project which sent his work, "Was her face the moon or sunlight?", to space in 2024. The work received its premiere at NASA, next to Saturn V, history’s largest rocket.
His compositions and performances have been featured multiple times on Turkish State Radio and American Public Media's Performance Today and have received praise by Fanfare Magazine, Andante, CNN Turk, Cumhuriyet, Hürriyet, Sanattan Yansımalar, as well as the Washington Post, which describes his music as a “dervish-like explosion.” He has been featured on records released by MSR Classics, Naxos, Albany Records, Innova Recordings, Wirripang, and Parma Recordings.
As a composer, pianist, conductor, and folk percussionist, he has collaborated with many important ensembles including the Presidential Symphony Orchestra of Turkey, Houston Symphony, European Union Chamber Orchestra, Turkish State Choir, River Oaks Chamber Orchestra, Gedik Philharmonic, Fairfax Symphony, Fargo-Moorhead Symphony, Austin Camerata, Apollo Chamber Players, Klasik Keyifler, Carpe Diem, Tesla Del Sol, and Semplice String Quartets, Windsync, Anatolian Wind Quintet, ZOFO Duet, as well as the Bowen McCauley Dance Company.
Eryılmaz has received numerous awards including BNY Mellon Award for Outstanding Artistic Achievement, Sallie Shepherd Perkins Prize for Best Achievement at Rice University, the Diemente Prize at the Hartt School and top prizes at the Van Rooy Competition for Musical Excellence, Silberman Chamber Music Competition, Carnegie Mellon University's Harry G. Archer Orchestra Composition Competition and String Quartet Composition Competition.
In 2015, Erberk Eryılmaz and his wife Laura Krentzman established Hoppa Project with aims to promote music from Eastern Europe and the Middle East by performing the music of the region with a wide range of styles from folk to newly commissioned contemporary music. Hoppa Project has collaborated with varied artists such as Ismail Lumanovski, Mehmet Ali Sanlıkol, Shawn Conley, Beth Bahia Cohen, Ayşe Göknur Şanal, Önder Özkoç, Yiğit Kolat, Özkan Manav, and Kamran İnce.
Eryılmaz is a composer/performer in Devingen, a dynamic transcultural band that draws inspiration from the rich musical traditions of Anatolia, as well as the cultures of the Balkans, the Middle East, and beyond. Devingen consists of Sinan Ayyıldız on electric saz; Erberk Eryılmaz on synthesizer and davul; Buğra Kutbay on kaval, zurna, balaban, and sipsi; and Ali Can Öztan on drum set. The band gave their debut performance in 2024 at the historic State Art and Sculpture Museum in Ankara.
Eryılmaz received his education at Samsun Municipality Conservatory, Ankara State Conservatory, the Hartt School (Bachelor of Music), Carnegie Mellon University (Master of Music and Artist Diploma), and Rice University (Doctor of Musical Arts). He is currently a faculty member at Ankara Music and Fine Arts University where he teaches composition and directs the new music ensemble (MGÜ Yeni Müzik Topluluğu)