Bio

I am Dr. Timothy Gibbons, a composer, teacher, researcher, recording artist, sound engineer, and programmer. I earned my doctorate in composition from the University of Alabama in May 2015. My compositions have won the Frederic Goossen composition prize (Composition for flute, Bb clarinet, and cello, in 2010) the Huxford Symphony Orchestra concerto, aria, and composition competition (Eclipse, in 2012) and have recently been published by the International Journal of Contemporary Composition (Dome Songs in volume 25 [May 2015], and Trio for flute, Bb clarinet, and cello in volume 27 [September 2015].

As a composer, I write music in a number of different compositional streams, including complex atonal works, experimental electronic music, video game music, and accessible tonal pieces. I have posted several full scores, recordings, and program notes here; I hope you enjoy my work! For information on commissions or to perform my pieces, please email me at info@tgibbons.com or visit the contact page.

I have been teaching for seven years, including graduate and undergraduate music theory, music history, musicianship, composition lessons, and electronic music training in Csound and Logic. I am currently an adjuct professor of music theory and history at the University of Alabama.

I have recorded, mixed, and mastered two full-length studio albums (with a third nearly complete). The first (Refuge and Ruin: Break Free) I recorded with my rock band between 2006 and 2009, but it was never publicly released. I intend to clean up the tracks a bit more and release it in the near future. The second (Declamation) is an album of my compositions, performed by students at the University of Alabama in Spring 2015. The third is an ongiong project: a thematically unified art rock album featuring a wide array of instrumental ensembles and musical styles. This album is nearly complete, but requires the use of an orchestra and chorus to finish the last few tracks.

I've included some information about my research and coding projects below.

Current Projects

I am currently working on a number of projects in addition to new compositions (see here for more information about my compositional endeavors). These include my Synaesthesia Visualization program (more info on this here) as well as a few promising academic pursuits, discussed below.

Beethoven's Sketches for the Presto in C minor, WoO 52

In my in-progress article, written under the expert guidance of Dr. Joanna Cobb Biermann, I examine the autograph manuscript of Beethoven's Presto in C-minor, WoO 52, and propose a possible solution to the problem of how the manuscript came to be in its current state (torn apart and rearranged as it has been). Following the work on this manuscript done by Douglas Porter-Johnson, I demonstrate that Beethoven's original version must have contained an additional bifolium which has since been lost and that the first page of the extant score is actually a later reconstruction after several layers of revision. My findings have significant editorial implications for future editions of the piece.

Vivaldi's Concerti con Molti Istromenti, RV 555-558

Vivaldi's Concerti con Molti Istrumenti, R. 555-558, are unusual and infrequently discussed pieces. In this paper, I discuss problems of instrumentation in these works (each one is a concerto for a strange combination of soloists, some having a larger solo group than the ripieno). I particularly focus on the curious instrument pair that Vivaldi calls violini in tromba marina, and what significance the identity of these unusual instruments holds for modern performances of this repertory.

Hugo Wolf analysis

I am working on a new research project seeking to examine Hugo Wolf's Lieder from a novel analytical perspective and expand upon the idea of circular formal structures in the music of the late 19th century. I will address the dichotomy of circular form and goal-directedness, using reductive analysis to demonstrate large-scale musical elements.