Thomas Cabaniss: Visionary Teaching Artist and Composer

Conversations with Musicians, with Leah Roseman

Thomas Cabaniss is a wonderful American composer of works for opera, theater, dance, film and the concert stage. He’s been a member of the faculty of the Julliard School since 1998, and leads the Lullaby Project at Carnegie Hall, serving young parents in shelters, hospitals and prisons with collaboratively created songs for their children. We talk about all this and much more, inluding his work creating Carnegie Hall’s Link Up. I was curious about these many facets to Thomas’ life as both a composer and educator, and you’ll find this episode has gorgeous, inspiring music of his, as well as great stories from his diverse career as a Teaching Artist, working with music educators, students of all ages, and meaningful outreach in the community. You’ll hear performances from pianists Michael Shinn and Jessica Chow Shinn, singer Joyce DiDonato, and towards the beginning of the episode you’ll hear some of Thomas’ great music for string quartet, performed by the Charleston symphony String quartet.

Like all my episodes, you can watch this on my YouTube channel or listen to the podcast on all the platforms, and I’ve also linked the transcript to my website https://www.leahroseman.com/episodes/thomas-cabaniss

Thomas Cabaniss website: http://thomascabaniss.com/about.html

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Timestamps

(00:00) Intro

(02:24) Thomas Cabaniss string quartets

(07:57) excerpt from Water from Four Elements with the Charleston Symphony String Quartet

(09:28) Charleston Symphony

(12:10) Fire, Four Elements string quartet

(16:07) Link Up program and Cabaniss’ work with music education and orchestras

(23:39) the Lullaby Project

(30:53) Peace sung by Joyce DiDonato written by Tamilles Fernandez with Dierdre Struck

(34:19) Tiny Bits of Outrageous Love, Michael Shinn and Jessica Chow Shinn

(39:53) Lovesong no. 3 Tiny Bits of Outrageous Love, Michael Shinn and Jessica Chow Shinn

(41:58) Thomas’ wife, and musical themes in families

(43:54) Two no. 7 Tiny Bits of Outrageous Love, Michael Shinn and Jessica Chow Shinn

(47:09) different musical styles and influences, writing for theatre at Yale

(51:27) Thomas’ youth and musical education

(55:50) Thomas’ approach to teaching music theory, teaching music appreciation to dancers

(58:50) please support this series!

(59:27) the work of Teaching Artists, working with students and educators

(01:07:16) operas for toddlers

(01:13:38) how to bring new audiences into orchestra concerts

(01:17:57) how and when to talk to audiences

(01:23:15) Thomas’ creative process