Composer, producer, engraver. This account contains a small sample of my work but is no longer actively maintained. Refer to my bandcamp links for a more complete showing of both my classical and electronic works.

Miguel Espinel is a Venezuelan composer, performer, and improviser based in Denton, TX.

Also involved in Monte Espina, Oil Spill, The Watermelon is not Orange, Nahr Alhumam, Tangential Meandering.

Du Yun, born and raised in Shanghai, China, based in New York, is a composer, multi-instrumentalists and performance artist, working at the intersection of orchestral, opera, chamber music, theatre, cabaret, pop music, oral tradition, visual arts, electronics and noise.

Sam Melnick believes that music is greater than the sum of our parts, and we must work together to create it. He focuses on collaborating with performers to write music that fits their unique abilities. Melnick also uses their feedback to further push his music to all that it can be. With inspirations from John Mackey to Caroline Shaw and Igor Stravinsky to Philip Glass, Melnick pulls from whatever influence he needs to achieve his musical goals. This synthesis created his style that uses development through repetition and lays melodies on top of textures, sometimes in layers.

	While not known as a performer, Sam Melnick has been an active member of various ensembles. They include concert bands, marching band, brass quintet, jazz band, choir, a cappella group, steel drums, and gamelan. These experiences have shaped his ideas of how different ensembles achieve different textures and how melodies can be layered or woven together. Melnick's music may layer interlocking parts to create an aggregate musical line like gamelan or assign roles to specific voices like in steel drums or jazz band. The experience of creating music with other musicians drives his creative output through process and style.

	Musicians have performed Sam Melnick's music at events such as the North American Saxophone Alliance Biennial Conference, the International Horn Society Symposium, the Austin Symphony Orchestra's Young Composers Competition and Concert, the TUTTI Festival at Denison University, and the Third Coast Trombone Retreat. Notable ensembles that have performed his music include the NOW Ensemble, the Austin Symphony Orchestra, the Anthony P. Hopkins Memorial Trombone Choir, and AVIDduo. Melnick's piece Painted Brick will be included on an upcoming recording project of music for piccolo and piano by Dr. Mary-Karen Clardy and Dr. Pamela Paul. 

	Sam Melnick graduated magna cum laude with a Bachelor's of Music in Composition from the University of North Texas. There he studied composition with Dr. Panayiotis Kokoras, Dr. Kristen Soriano Broberg, and Dr. Joseph Klein. In 2015 he received the Outstanding Undergrad in Music Theory at UNT and the Province Senior Achievement Award for the South Central Province of Mu Phi Epsilon. While active in the Phi Tau chapter of Mu Phi Epsilon, Melnick programmed 14 free public performances as chair of the programming committee and Music Director. He is now an active member of the Mu Phi Epsilon Dallas Alumni Chapter and training to be a District Director. Melnick is also working with the Verdigris Ensemble as their Programs Administrator and the Dallas Chamber Symphony as their librarian.

Regarded as “one of the most prominent ensembles in the United States practicing truly experimental music” (I Care If You Listen), TAK delivers energetic performances "that combine crystalline clarity with the disorienting turbulence of a sonic vortex.” (WIRE Magazine). The ambitious ensemble “impresses with the organicity of their sound, their dynamism and virtuosity” (New Sounds, WQXR). Dedicated to the commissioning of new works and direct collaboration with artists working in a variety of disciplines, TAK promotes ambitious programming at the highest level. 
 The quintet has released four albums to critical acclaim, including Oor (2019), which launched their in-house media label TAK editions. This label creates broadly accessible platforms for audience engagement with a host of new music media with a focus on original TAK content. The ensemble's Youtube videos have been viewed 15,000 times, and the TAK Editions Podcast has received over 5,000 listens from across the globe.

'Love, Crystal and Stone' by Ashkan Behzadi out on TAK editions 5/10/22

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TAK’s operations occur on Lenape lands—Lenapehoking; we acknowledge the Lenpae as the original people of this land and their continuing relationship with their territory.

Katherine Ayres is following