Bio
Elliott Lupp is a composer, visual artist, improviser, audio engineer, drummer, and educator. His research and musical interests range from works for solo musician and chamber ensembles to multimedia projects with lights and video. He is inspired by the way works of art can foster connection, purpose, and emotion through in-person, dramatic, sensory experiences. This has prompted an ongoing curiosity and consideration of audience perception, presence, and a desire for deeper engagement, as well as an awareness of how his work functions within a broader artistic ecosystem.
His creative process typically involves some amount of journaling and doodling, as well as improvising and experimenting with sound, tactile objects, light, Western tonality, digital technologies, and samples from a range of popular media. These materials are often subjected to a variety of harsh manipulative processes to produce gradual or sudden shifts between familiarity and the unknown, confusion and confidence, and stability and fragility. The result is a body of work that frequently showcases dramatic collisions of harsh noise and tonality, acoustic and electroacoustic sounds, and chaotic tension and release.
Elliott has received a number of awards and honors for his work, including a 1st-place internationally awarded MA/IN Award in 2023, a 2023 CIME PRIX Residency Award, a 2024 William T. Faricy Award, a 2019 international SEAMUS/ASCAP Commission, the 2019 Franklin G. Fisk Composition Award for Chamber Music, and both Departmental and All-University awards in Graduate Research and Creative Scholarship in 2019.
His music has been performed at a variety of national and international electroacoustic festivals and conferences including NUNC!, Milwaukee Sonic Arts Festival, SPLICE Fest, MA/IN Festival, SPLICE Institute, N_SEME, CHIMEfest, Electronic Music Midwest, MOXsonic, Fulcrumpoint New Music Project, SEAMUS, and Electroacoustic Barn Dance, and by such ensembles as the Varo String Quartet, Dutch/American trio Sonic Hedgehog, the Atar Piano Trio, Found Sound New Music Ensemble, Spektral Quartet, various members of MOCREP, The Chicago Composer's Orchestra, Fonema Consort, and Ensemble Dal Niente.
While at Northwestern University, Elliott worked as an A1 freelance sound engineer for the Bienen School of Music where he frequently ran live sound for prominent artists and ensembles including Third Coast Percussion, Jessie Montgomery, Dover Quartet, Soprano Chrestine Goerke, Bruce Hornsby, Christopher Cerrone, Donnacha Dennehy, Alan Pierson, the NU Contemporary Music Ensemble and Jazz Orchestra, and many others. During this time was also an instructor of record for courses in music composition, music technology, and aural skills.
Elliott is currently a Faculty Specialist Lecturer at Western Michigan University where he teaches courses in composition, electronic music techniques, computer music design, aural skills, and music theory.
He is currently the drummer for the experimental noise brass brand Disco Behemoth.
Education:
PhD: Northwestern University - Studied with: Alex Mincek, Jay Alan Yim, Stephan Moore
MM: Western Michigan University - Studied with: Christopher Biggs, Lisa R. Coons
BM: Columbia College Chicago - Studied with: Eliza Brown, Kenn Kumpf