Mark Dancigers named next director of New Music New College

Assistant Professor of Digital Media and Music Mark Dancigers has been named the director of New Music New College, starting with the 2020-21 season. He succeeds Professor of Music Stephen Miles, who is retiring from the New College of Florida faculty at the end of the current academic year. Miles has served as director of New Music New College since founding the annual concert series in 1998 with Ron Silver, who will continue in his role as producer.

“Mark Dancigers promises to be a great director of New Music New College,” Miles said. “He’s a brilliant musician, known internationally as a composer and a co-founding member of the acclaimed NOW Ensemble. His musical vision is broad and inclusive, which means that we can expect wide-ranging and innovative programming, and he’s already established a strong connection to the New College community — especially students — and to New Music New College’s loyal supporters in the Sarasota/Bradenton area. I couldn’t be happier about his appointment.”
Dancigers first came to New College in 2009 as an artist performing in New Music New College, with NOW Ensemble, his critically acclaimed modern chamber music group. Dancigers’ work as a composer explores imaginative collaborations between music, dance, and film, as well as the role of the electric guitar and technology in musical environments. His recent compositions for electronic and acoustic instruments include Skyline, Everything Happens for the First Time, Jehanne, and When It Rains, It Rains. At New College, Dancigers teaches Electronic Music and creates music performance experiences with his students.
“A New Music New College concert is an experience that is created by everyone in the room, together,” Dancigers said. “These events celebrate the creative potential of musicians and audiences, and often break down walls between the two. Building community and knowledge through music is a mission that resonates with the broader mission of the College, and the series couldn’t have grown from any other environment. I am honored to direct what has become both a New College and nationally known institution, and look forward to bringing new music into conversation with art, dance, research, and the interests of our students.”
Dancigers’ eclectic musical compositions span film scores, orchestral performances, ballet productions, and electronic music concerts. As an album producer, his credits include pianist Michael Mizrahi’s “Currents” (2016) and “The Bright Motion” (2012), which made the Top Ten Best Classical Releases of 2012 in both Time Out New York and Time Out Chicago. He received his B.A. from Yale University, an M.M. from the Yale School of Music, and a Ph.D. from Princeton University. Before joining New College as an assistant professor in 2018, he taught at Yale University, the University of Redlands, and as a visiting professor at New College.
Since its founding in 1998, New Music New College has presented almost a hundred performances featuring nearly 400 works of music, seventy of them world premieres. These performances have involved more than 200 visiting artists and have offered almost 450 opportunities for New College students to perform and/or compose.
The next New Music New College concert, Jen Shyu: Nine Doors, will be held on Saturday, January 18 at 8 p.m. at the Sudakoff Conference Center.
— Ann Comer-Woods is director of the Office of Communications and Marketing.