Bekah Simms (born 1990) is a Canadian composer of

contemporary classical music Contemporary classical music is classical music composed close to the present day. At the beginning of the 21st century, it commonly referred to the post-1945 modern forms of post-tonal music after the death of Anton Webern, and included seria ...

Education

Simms was born and raised in

Mount Pearl Mount Pearl is the third-largest settlement and second-largest city in Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada. The city is located southwest of St. John's, on the eastern tip of the Avalon Peninsula on the island of Newfoundland. Mount Pearl is the fo ...

Newfoundland and Labrador Newfoundland and Labrador (; french: Terre-Neuve-et-Labrador; frequently abbreviated as NL) is the easternmost province of Canada, in the country's Atlantic region. The province comprises the island of Newfoundland and the continental region ...

, where she studied at the nearby

Memorial University of Newfoundland Memorial University of Newfoundland, also known as Memorial University or MUN (), is a public university in the province of Newfoundland and Labrador, based in St. John's, with satellite campuses in Corner Brook, elsewhere in Newfoundland and ...

with composer

Andrew Staniland Andrew Staniland (born 1977) is a Canadian composer and guitarist. He is currently a professor of Composition and Electronic Music at the Memorial University of Newfoundland. Biography Andrew Staniland was born in Red Deer, Alberta, in 1977. H ...

. At Memorial University, she received a B.Mus. in music theory and composition in addition to a B.Mus.Ed in music education. She also holds M.Mus. and D.M.A. degrees from the

University of Toronto The University of Toronto (UToronto or U of T) is a public research university in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, located on the grounds that surround Queen's Park. It was founded by royal charter in 1827 as King's College, the first institution ...

where her teachers included

Gary Kulesha Gary Kulesha (born 22 August 1954) is a Canadian composer, pianist, conductor, and educator. Since 1995, he has been Composer Advisor to the Toronto Symphony Orchestra. He has been Composer-in-Residence with the Kitchener-Waterloo Symphony (1988� ...

Christos Hatzis Christos Hatzis ( el, Χρήστος Χατζής; born 1953) is a Juno Award-winning Greek-Canadian composer. Many of his compositions are performed internationally, and he is a professor at the Faculty of Music, University of Toronto. Early ...

, and

Norbert Palej Norbert is a Germanic given name, from ''nord'' "north" and ''berht'' "bright". Norbert is also occasionally found as a surname. People with the given name Academia * Norbert Angermann (born 1936), German historian * Norbert A’Campo (born 1941 ...

. Her thesis work, ''Foreverdark'', was subsequently performed by

Esprit Orchestra The Esprit Orchestra is an orchestra based in Toronto, Ontario, Canada that is dedicated to the performance of new orchestral works. It was established in 1983 by music director and conductor Alex Pauk, and is Canada's only full-sized orchestra d ...

. Additional studies with

acousmatic Acousmatic sound is sound that is heard without an originating cause being seen. The word ''acousmatic'', from the French ''acousmatique'', is derived from the Greek word ''akousmatikoi'' (ἀκουσματικοί), which referred to probationary p ...

composer Martin Bédard in Montreal were facilitated through the PIVOT mentorship program, jointly run by the

Canadian Music Centre The Canadian Music Centre was founded in 1959 by a group of Canadian composers who saw a need to create a repository for Canadian music. It now holds Canada's largest collection of Canadian concert music, and works to promote the music of its As ...

Canadian League of Composers The Canadian League of Composers is an organization formed in 1951 of Canadian composers primarily interested in raising awareness and acceptance of Canadian music. Its activities are overseen and directed by an executive, and by a National Council ...

, and Continuum Contemporary Music.

Career

Simms has received over 30 composition awards, prizes, and competitive selections. This includes the 2019 Barlow Prize, the 2017 Toronto Emerging Composer Award, the 2018 Karen Kieser Prize in Canadian Music, and the inclusion of her work in the official Canadian Section of the

International Society for Contemporary Music The International Society for Contemporary Music (ISCM) is a music organization that promotes contemporary classical music. The organization was established in Salzburg in 1922 as Internationale Gesellschaft für Neue Musik (IGNM) following the ...

's World Music Days in 2016, 2019, and 2021. She was a nominee for the 2022 Gaudeamus Award. Simms released her debut album, ''impurity chains'', in September 2018 to positive reviews. The composition ''Granitic'' was subsequently nominated for a 2019

JUNO Award The Juno Awards, more popularly known as the JUNOS, are awards presented annually to Canadian musical artists and bands to acknowledge their artistic and technical achievements in all aspects of music. New members of the Canadian Music Hall of ...

for Classical Composition of the Year, and her composition ''Everything Is... Distorted'' was nominated for a 2020

for Classical Composition of the year.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Simms, Bekah 1990 births Living people Memorial University of Newfoundland alumni University of Toronto alumni 21st-century Canadian composers People from Mount Pearl Canadian women composers 21st-century Canadian women musicians