Samuel Beebe is a composer and sound designer exploring the dramatic possibilities of music and sound through collaborations that produce interdisciplinary works.
He recently received a Live Arts Boston award of $30,000 from the Boston Foundation to create a new operatic work created with Lex Brown to be performed by operatic tenor / drag performer Jordan Weatherston Pitts (Creatine Price). The work will be presented at a Boston venue in the summer of 2026.
He collaborated with artist Lex Brown on Carnelian, a project that originated as a 3-channel film installation at the List Center for Visual Arts at MIT in Cambridge from April 2 to July 18, 2023, which was a New York Times Critic’s Pick. The film The film made its theatrical debut at Tulsa’s Circle Cinema on Thursday, April 4 on the first night of Sovereign Futures, a four-day arts and culture symposium organized by curator Allison Glenn, and was reviewed by Maya Pontone for Hyperallergic. The film was adapted for the stage, with support from residencies and workshop performances at 8th House, Big Town Gallery, and Deli Gallery. As music director, Beebe joined Brown, the cast, musical ensemble, and crew for a week-long residency at the Celebration Barn in South Paris, Maine, culminating in performances in August 2023. Carnelian was then presented at Icebox Project Space as part of the Philadelphia Fringe Festival in September 2023.
POW POW POWER UP: Someday is Now is an on-going collaboration with interdisciplinary artist Liss Lafleur. The inspiration for this project is the life, work, and philosophy of Corita Kent, and specifically her series of screen prints entitled heroes and sheroes (1969). The first public showing of this project was the processional opera for chorus and sound system, greenfingers, 1969, presented at the 2022 Arts Summit at the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington DC, premiered by the chamber chorus Artifice.
Biophilia, a 75-minute chamber opera in two acts with a libretto by Sara Costantino, was workshopped by Stony Brook Opera Workshop, culminating in a video premiere in June 2021 of the complete work, captured remotely during the Covid-19 lockdown. It is currently being revised for a tentative staged performance in the Boston area.
Pretty Saro Orbital was composed for Ensemble Decipher, and was performed over video conferencing software on multiple occasions during the Covid-19 pandemic, including the 2020 Network Music Festival and the 2020 New York City Electronic Music Festival.
Beebe has collaborated extensively with directors, filmmakers, and theater companies, including Mallory Catlett (Current Location, 2018), Kelly Creedon (In This World, 2015), as well as the Boston-based movement theater company Imaginary Beasts. His work on the David Valdes Greenwood play Bully Dance (2014) earned him the 2014 ArtsImpulse award for best music/sound design. In addition, his concert work has been performed or workshopped by Juventas New Music Ensemble, Chelsea Symphony, Castle of Our Skins, Boston Choral Ensemble, Sound Icon, WordSong, Texas Flute Society, and Calliope's Call.
Beebe was commissioned by Strange Trace with librettist Susan Bywaters to create a brief video-opera production of a new work as part of their 2024 Stencils Festival. He was also commissioned by Opera On Tap NYC for their TikTok Aria competition in 2023, and he premiered art songs at Sparks and Wiry Cries’ SongSLAM NYC in 2020 and 2023. He was a resident at the 2019 Source Song Festival, where he participated in workshops with composer Libby Larsen. He was also a resident at the 2019 Collaborative Composition Initiative, organized by Unheard-of Ensemble and New Music for Strings, where he presented the new work The Glade (2019), for clarinet, violin, cello, piano, and electronics. In addition, Yarn/Wire recorded the two piano, two percussion score Three Quartets (2019). His song cycles Rocking Chair Child (2017) and The Woods (2018) were finalists for the American Prize.
He holds a Ph.D in Music Composition from Stony Brook University, where he worked with Matthew Barnson, Daria Semegen, and Sheila Silver. He also holds a M.M. in Composition from Boston University and a B.S. in Music Technology from Northeastern University. He has participated in masterclasses with Gunther Schuller, David T. Little, Salvatore Sciarrino, and Matthew Aucoin.
Beebe is a Visiting Lecturer at Salem State University and teaches music classes for incarcerated students in Massachusetts via the Jail Education Project at Merrimack College. He lives in Boston.
Contact
For inquiries, scores, or more information, please reach out at: beebe.sa@gmail.com
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