MATA Festival

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We present, support, and commission the music of early-career composers, regardless of their stylistic views or aesthetic inclinations.

Music at the Anthology (MATA) is an incubator for adventurous emerging artists experimenting with composition, multimedia, collaborative performance art, and every imaginable sound in between. Founded by Philip Glass, Eleonor Sandresky, and Lisa Bielawa in 1996 as a way to address the lack of presentation opportunities for unaffiliated composers, MATA has since developed into the world’s most sought-after performance opportunity for young and emerging composers. MATA presents an internationally-recognized festival each spring in New York City of new music by early-career composers selected from a free global call for submissions; MATA Presents, commissioned projects presented at venues and non-conventional spaces throughout New York; and MATA Jr., an evening of music by pre-college composers, mentored by emerging composers, and performed by top performers in new music.

10/06/2026

MATA is Hiring: Executive Director

We are seeking a visionary leader to join MATA as our next Executive Director!

MATA commissions and presents the work of early-career composers and sound artists. If you are passionate about contemporary music and arts leadership, we’d love to hear from you.

📌 See below for details and how to apply:
Please visit our Jobs page at https://www.matafestival.org/jobs or send your application to [email protected].
(Applications will be accepted on a rolling basis until the position is filled.)

10/02/2026

📣 MATA Festival 2027 Call for Submissions is now open!

Heading into our 30th year of bringing new music to NYC, MATA is inviting early-career composers and sound artists from around the world to submit work for our May 2027 festival. Submissions will be curated by an external panel of guest artists.

We accept scores (notated, graphic, instruction-based), audio/video recordings, sound installations, and proposals for soloist performance.

Requirements:
🔹 Artist Bio / Resume
🔹 Artist Statement
🔹 Links to 2 work samples

📅 Deadline to submit is November 15, 2026.

Full details and application link at www.matafestival.org.
We look forward to listening to your work.

09/08/2026

✨We are thrilled to announce the expansion of our leadership team with the appointment of two outstanding new members to the Music at the Anthology Board of Directors: Composer/Performer and MATA Founder Eleonor Sandresky as well as Adjunct Professor/Associate Organist Jestin Pieper. Thank you for helping MATA present tomorrow's music today!

07/14/2026

SET RELEASE ✨ Thinking back to opening night at .pecos in May, exploring the intersection of club music and experimental electroacoustic music ♥️ huge gratitude to and MATA for getting behind this genre bending event! It was an honor to curate and moderate this memorable collaboration that aimed to bring together multiple communities under one roof. Unfortunately, I had some technical difficulties during my set, but I’m happy to share the practice recording, now up on SoundCloud, prepared specifically for MATA ♥️ hope you enjoy! Thanks to everyone who came out to support!

☁️: https://tinyurl.com/mtsrzdc9

NEXT UP
Hope you can join for our DEBUT this Thursday, July 16 ♥️

🎟️ https://ra.co/events/2459068

MATA THANKS 🫂
.pecos

05/26/2026

THANK YOU for a most thoughtful review of the opening night of MATA Festival 2026 for New York Classical Review ✨

"The great thing about the MATA Festival is that you never know what you're going to get, which in any kind of festival or concert can also be a drawback.

At MATA it isn't, because the point of the festival under executive director Pauline Kim Harris' tenure is to be as wide open as possible. That's not a slogan, but it came through in how she introduced the fundamental values of the festival at the opening concert Thursday night in the DiMenna Center. Harris pointed out that when MATA announces their call for scores, they get them from all over the world. Significantly, there is no application fee. This may seem minor, but it is a crucial consideration for composers, especially young ones with precarious careers and thriving imaginations.

At its best, a MATA concert is full of wildcards and free of the type of academic consensus that produces exquisitely crafted and aesthetically empty music. Thursday night's concert, though not flawless, had music and performances that were either special events or utterly, even mind-bogglingly, surprising, the kind of thing one craves at new music concerts but infrequently finds." - George Grella

05/23/2026

BLACKBOX ENSEMBLE ✨

🎺 Leonard Bopp, Conductor/Trumpet
🗣️ Amber Evans, Soprano
🎹 Yifei Xu, Piano and Managing Director
🥁 J Clancy, Percussion
🪈 Annie Nikunen, Flute/Alto/Piccolo and Director of Artistic Planning
🎶 Gabriel Henkin, Clarinet/Bass Clarinet
🎻 Lauren Conroy, Violin
🎵 Jordan Bartow, Cello

* GILLIAN RAE PERRY
* FLORIANA PROVENZANO
* LAILA ARAFAH
MORTON FELDMAN
* KRISTUPAS BUBNELIS
* JESSICA SHAND
* ERICH BARGANIER

NIGHT THREE: Local Musoc [SATURDAY, May 23] ✨7PM

BlackBox Ensemble is a NYC–based contemporary music ensemble redefining how contemporary music is heard, seen, and experienced. They have presented work nationwide at institutions including Smithsonian National Museum of Asian Art, Whitney Museum of American Art, Clark Art Institute, National Sawdust, and Roulette Intermedium. Recent highlights include Speculative Listening: The Sonic World of Julius Eastman and the site-specific music-and-dance program The Sound of Space Between Us. Inspired by the theatrical and scientific “black box”, the ensemble inhabits the charged space where artistic expression and human experience meet, transforming concerts into immersive environments for interdisciplinary dialogue and new ways of listening.

https://www.blackboxensemble.org/

05/23/2026

GILLIAN RAE PERRY ✨ Composer

A PLACE IN-BETWEEN (2024) New York Premiere

NIGHT THREE: Local Music [SATURDAY, May 23] ✨7PM

Biography, Gillian Rae Perry Gillian Rae Perry is a composer and songwriter whose work is dedicated to themes of mental health, vulnerability, and interconnectedness. She grew up on a bird farm in rural Texas and her first compositions were written for the birds.

Perry was the Vanguard Emerging Opera Composer with Chicago Opera Theater for the 2022-2024 seasons and is a 2025-2026 recipient of New Music USA's Creator Fund Grant. Her grant with New Music USA provided funding for her latest album, gilly's garden, set to release April 3, 2026. Her work has been performed by the Chicago Philharmonic, Chicago Opera Theater, Atlanta Opera, and Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra, among others. Perry's work has been described as "sweet and sensitive" (Parterre Box) as well as "gentle, introspective, caring, important, and beautiful" (Music City Review).

With degrees in both film and music composition, as well as growing up a theater kid, Perry actively integrates art forms outside of music into her artistic practice. Perry is also influenced by text and poetry and she released her first collection of poetry, What Will I Wish for Now?, in 2024. Perry holds an MFA in music composition from The California Institute of the Arts and is currently a DMA candidate at the Peabody
Institute.

05/23/2026

LAILA ARAFAH ✨ Composer

LOCAL PATHS (2023) New York Premiere

NIGHT THREE: Local Music [SATURDAY, May 23] ✨7PM

Laila Arafah is a London-based composer whose work explores fragile systems, sonic processes, and forms emerging from interruption, interaction and temporal instability. At nineteen, she received a commission from the London Symphony Orchestra through the Panufnik Composers Scheme, and has since been commissioned by BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra, Tonkünstler Orchestra, London Contemporary Music Festival, the London Mozart Players, and Explore Ensemble.
Her music has been performed internationally by Ensemble MusikFabrik, Talea Ensemble, London Sinfonietta, and Quatuor Bozzini, and venues including Aldeburgh Festival, King’s Place, Bold Tendencies, Westminster Abbey, St John’s Smith Square, Bowdoin Music Festival, and KM28 Berlin.
She has held fellowships at Aspen Music Festival (2024, 2025), Internationales Musikinstitut Darmstadt, and IMPULS Festival. Her work has been recognized with awards including the Frank Abell Composer's Award, Leverhulme Grant, Faber Music Grant, International Guitar Foundation, and CoMA Composer-in-Residence (2024). Through these opportunities, she has engaged with composers such as George Lewis, Judith Weir, Hans Abrahamsen, Olga Neuwirth, Chaya Czernowin, and Nico Muhly. Laila is pursuing a Bachelor of Music at the Royal Academy of Music.
Upcoming projects include a chamber work premiering at the Frick Museum in New York, a string quartet for the Britten Pears Summer Academy, premiere at REDNOTE festival with Trio Diorama, a new work for Ensemble Intercontemporain at IYCA, and participation in the composer-conductor fellowship at Grafenegg Music Festival’s Ink Still Wet programme.

05/23/2026

KRISTUPAS BUBNELIS ✨ Composer
ELIAS BROWN ✨ Electronics

PLEASE LEAVE A MESSAGE AFTER THE TONE (2021) New York Premiere ✨

NIGHT THREE: Local Music [SATURDAY, May 23] ✨7PM

Kristupas Bubnelis is a Lithuanian composer based in New York. His work explores microtonality, timbre, and temporal processes, often combining acoustic instruments with electronics. His music frequently draws on architectural thinking about sound, shaping slowly evolving textures and resonant harmonic structures.

His works have been performed internationally by ensembles including Ensemble Modern, Wet Ink Ensemble, Caput Ensemble, and Quasar Saxophone Quartet, and presented at festivals such as the ISCM World New Music Days and the Lucerne Festival Academy. His work has also been featured at the International Rostrum of Composers and the International Young Composers Academy Ticino.
Bubnelis is currently pursuing a DMA in composition at Columbia University, where he studies with Georg Friedrich Haas, Marcos Balter, and Zosha Di Castri. He previously studied at the Royal Academy of Music, graduating with distinction and receiving the DipRAM Award for an outstanding portfolio.
He is a nominee of the Prince Pierre Foundation Musical Springboard Award (2025) and a prize winner of the Eduardas Balsys Young Composers’ Competition (2021). Recent projects include collaborations with the International Contemporary Ensemble and performances at the Lithuanian National Philharmonic Hall.

Conducting leading orchestras and curating imaginative collaborations across artforms, Elias Peter Brown is a quintessentially modern conductor – curious, versatile and future-focused. His projects include CAVE, a site-specific performance for the Brunel Museum, and less than a grain of dust, inspired by Thomas Wilfred’s Light Art. He collaborates with leading contemporary ensembles such as Ensemble Modern and MusikFabrik, and has conducted orchestras including Deutsche Radio Philharmonie and Flanders Symphony, with upcoming appearances at Rundfunk-Sinfonieorchester Berlin and Danish Chamber Orchestra. A graduate of Yale and the Royal Academy of Music, Brown was mentored by Esa-Pekka Salonen as Salonen Fellow (2023–24), working closely with him at major international orchestras and festivals.

05/23/2026

FLORIANA PROVENZANO ✨ Composer

“I am Never Anywhere / Anywhere I Go” (2024) New York Premiere

NIGHT THREE: Local Music [SATURDAY, May 23] ✨7PM

Floriana Provenzano (1998) is an Italian composer from South Italy. Her music often originates from sound images and visual or physical sensations linked to her places of origin, unfolding into explorations of texture, brightness, and timbre. She frequently employs instrumental preparations, metallic objects, electronics and unconventional materials, aiming to expand the expressive potential of sound.

Her works have been performed by ensembles and soloists such as zone expérimentale, Blaurenz Duo, Ensemble Sillages, Ensemble Suono Giallo, Duo Dubois, mdi ensemble, Manuel Teles and Giulia Zaniboni, and presented at international festivals including impuls (AT), IntAct (TH), Mixtur (ES), Bludenzer Tage zeitgemäßer Musik (AT), Trame Sonore (Mantua, IT), Sound of Wander (Milan, IT), Musikàmera (Venice, IT), Ramificazioni (Lugano, CH), among others. She is currently pursuing a Master’s degree in composition at the Conservatory of Mantua, under the guidance of Zeno Baldi, taking also courses with Maurizio Azzan.

Among her latest collaborations there will be a new piece for ensemble Suono Giallo, presented at the Festival delle Nazioni (Città di Castello, PR) on August 2026, and a new project with ensemble Proxima Centauri, premiered at the MAD Festival in Bordeaux (FR) on November 2026.

Address

New York, NY
10013

Website

http://www.matafestival.org/

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