Bernstein Artists, Inc. 282 Flatbush Avenue, Suite 101; Brooklyn, NY 11217 ph 718.623.1214 - fx 718.638.6110 - www.bernsarts.com

PHIL KLINE BIO

Phil Kline makes music in many genres and contexts, from experimental electronics and sound installations to songs, choral, theater, chamber and orchestral music.

Raised in Akron, Ohio, he came to New York to study English Literature and music at Columbia. After graduation, he joined the downtown New York arts scene: founding the rock band The Del-Byzanteens with and James Nares, collaborating with on the soundtrack to The Ballad of Sexual Dependency, and playing guitar in the notorious Ensemble.

His early compositions grew out of his solo performance art and often used boombox tape players as a medium, most notably in the Christmas piece , which debuted in the streets of in 1992 and is now performed annually in dozens of cities around the world.

Other notable compositions include Zippo Songs , a song cycle based on poems Vietnam vets inscribed on their Zippo lighters, The Blue Room and Other Stories , written for , and Exquisite Corpses, commissioned by the All-Stars.

More recent works include the choral Mass John the Revelator, written for vocal group Lionheart; a piano sonata, The Long Winter , written for ; and scores for three evening-length dance pieces by Wally Cardona: Everywhere , Site and Really Real . The sound installation World on a String opened the season at the Krannert Center in Champaign-Urbana, Illinois, in September 2007 and SPACE for string quartet and electronics was performed by Ethel at the gala reopening of Alice Tully Hall in 2009.

2011 saw the premieres of A Dream and its Opposite , written for the La Jolla Symphony Orchestra, Canzona a due Cuori , commissioned by the St. Luke’s Chamber Ensemble, and a book of organ pieces commissioned for the gigantic Kotschmar Organ of Portland, Maine. The recently completed Partita for Solo will be premiered by Jennifer Koh in the 2013 season. Kline is currently working on an opera, Tesla in New York , in collaboration with writer-director Jim Jarmusch, as well as a song cycle for Theo Bleckmann, Out Cold, to be presented at the BAM Next Wave Festival. He has also been commissioned to write a new work celebrating the 100 th birthday of John Cage for the Out of Doors Festival. His music is available on the Cantaloupe, CRI and labels.

Recording s – John The Revelator (2009) Cantaloupe; Around the World in a Daze (2009) Surround DVD, Starkland; Zippo Songs (2004) Cantaloupe; Unsilent Night (2001) Cantaloupe; Glow in the Dark (1998) CRI.

Awards : Meet the Composer Commissioning USA (2000, 2003, 2006, 2010); Rockefeller Foundation MAP Fund (2010); Rockefeller NY State Music Fund (2007); Aaron Copland Fund (2005); NYSCA (2002, 2005, 2008); Mary Flagler Cary Trust (1999, 2002); Jerome Foundation (2000)

January 2012