Ramona Luengen

Biography

Sample Works

Born in Vancouver in 1960, Ramona Luengen received both her B.Mus and M.Mus from the University of British Columbia where she studied composition with Cortland Hultberg and piano with Jane Coop. In 1996 she completed her Doctor of Music in Composition from the University of Toronto with Derek Holman and Harry Freedman.

Luengen has composed extensively in the choral genre and has been commissioned and recorded by Canada's finest choirs as well as the CBC. Her works have been performed in North America, Europe, Australia, New Zealand and Japan by artists and ensembles such as Judith Forst, Jane Coop, CBC Radio Orchestra, Chanticleer, Phoenix Chamber Choir, musica intima, Vancouver Cantata Singers, the 1992,1994 and 2000 National Youth Choirs of Canada, Elektra Women's Choir, Chor Leoni, Ariose Women's Choir (Edmonton), Winnipeg Singers, Elora Festival Singers, Amabile Youth Choir (Ontario), University of Toronto Women's Chorus, Toronto Children's Choir, Aeolian Singers (Nova Scotia),San Francisco Girls' Chorus, Peninsula Women's Chorus (California), Voci Women's Choral Ensemble (California), Washington State University Concert Choir, Mount Holyoke Glee Club (Massachusetts) and the Bitterfelder Kantorei (Germany).

Her works are published by Cypress Publishing, Gordon V. Thompson and Rhythmic Trident Publishing and have been broadcast on CBC, BBC, WDR (Germany) and the national radio stations of Denmark, Norway and Hungary.

Luengen has recently been commissioned by the CBC to write a piano concerto for Jane Coop and the CBC Radio Orchestra for the 2005-2006 season. She has also been commissioned by Vancouver Opera to compose a work for young audiences based on Joy Kogawa's novel, Naomi's Road. The 45-minute opera is scheduled for completion in 2005 and will then tour BC schools.

In May 1996 her large-scale Stabat Mater, premiered by Judith Forst, Elektra Women's Choir and the CBC Radio Orchestra under Mario Bernardi, was awarded Outstanding Choral Work and Choral Event of the Year by the Association of Canadian Choral Conductors. A lengthy movement of the work, A Mother to her Dead Child, was released in 2000 on the CBC label, again with Judith Forst and the CBC Radio Orchestra.

The Association of Canadian Choral Conductors awarded Luengen's composition Mésange the first ACCC Associated Publishers Award for Choral Composition (Mixed Choir) in May 2000.

A sessional lecturer at the University of British Columbia's School of Music for the past eight years, Luengen has taught theory, composition, counterpoint and 20th century music appreciation. Until 2002 she was also director of the UBC Collegium Musicum Vocal Ensemble, a choir which specializes in early music. She was also an instructor of 20th century music at Simon Fraser University from 1995-2000.

Luengen has been Artistic Director of the award-winning, highly respected Phoenix Chamber Choir since 1995.

2003

Back to Top