General admission for children 17 years and under is always free

Ken Frazelle

Artist-in-Residence

Ken Frazelle is a composer with an ear for poetry and an eye for art. Frazelle makes quick sketches that capture flashes of sound and color, later translating these "gestures" into music. As part of his 1998 residency, Ken Frazelle conceived and composed a new, full-evening orchestral work with chorus titled The Motion of Stone, which had its world premiere at the Gardner Museum on September 27 that same year. The piece took inspiration from spaces at the Gardner and A.R. Ammons’ poetry collection, Sumerian Vistas.

Additionally, Frazelle presented an Eye of the Beholder program discussing a wide range of painters from Raphael to Cezanne to Willem de Kooning, interspersing his words with live piano playing. As part of the School Partnership Program, Frazelle created music with students from the Farragut School.

Ken Frazelle’s compositions include commissions from Yo-Yo Ma, Dawn Upshaw, Paula Robison, and members of the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center. In recent years, Frazelle's music has drawn on folk tunes from the Appalachian Mountains. He was a student of Roger Sessions at the Juilliard School, and attended high school at the North Carolina School of the Arts, where he now teaches.