James Dashow


James Dashow is an American composer of electro-acoustic music, instrumental music and opera.

Life and career

Dashow was born in 1944, outside of Chicago. His musical studies began in high school with Horace Reisberg; his principal teachers at the university level were J. K. Randall, Arthur Berger and Seymour Shifrin. In 1969, Dashow went to Italy on a Fulbright Fellowship to complete his studies with Goffredo Petrassi. For many years, he studied the music of Luigi Dallapiccola independently.
One of the first to compose music for digital audio synthesis, Dashow was invited by Graziano Tisato to work at the computer center of the University of Padova, where he created the first computer music compositions in Italy. He was the first vice president of the International Computer Music Association, has taught at MIT and Princeton University, and continues to actively hold master classes, lectures and concerts in Europe and North America. In 2003 he was composer-in-residence at the in Gainesville, Florida.
For several years he and Riccardo Bianchini coproduced a weekly contemporary music program for RAI. He is the author of the MUSIC30 language for digital sound synthesis, and invented the Dyad System, a method that both integrates pitch structure based on dyads into electronic sounds as well as develops the pitch structure itself in terms of dyadic elaborations.
Following on his extensive use of audio spatialization as an integral part of the compositional process, Dashow composed the first opera designed to be performed in a Planetarium, taking advantage of the depth projection capabilities of the digital planetarium projectors and the multichannel audio systems that together provide a full immersion theatrical experience. He continues to develop the idea of a double approach to spatialization, through the complementary concepts of Movement IN Space, and Movement OF Space.
His most important recognitions include the Prix Magistere at Bourges in 2000, Guggenheim and Koussevitzky Foundation grants, and in 2011 the Fondazione CEMAT distinguished career award “Il CEMAT per la Musica” in recognition of his outstanding contributions to electro-acoustic music.

Principal compositions