Michael Djupstrom is MTNA-Shepherd Distinguished Composer of the Year.(National Association News)

Michael Djupstrom has been selected as the 2005 MTNA-Shepherd Distinguished Composer of the Year.

Djupstrom was born in St. Paul, Minnesota, in 1980, and began piano studies at age 8. He continued his training at the University of Michigan with Lynne Bartholomew, Sergio de los Cobos and Katherine Collier, and began formal composition study with composers Bright Sheng, Susan Botti, William Bolcom and Karen Tanaka. As a composition fellow at the Tanglewood Music Center in 2002 and 2003, Djupstrom worked with composers Michael Gandolfi, Augusta Read Thomas, Osvaldo Golijov and George Benjamin, as well as conductors John Oliver and Stefan Asbury, among others. At the 2005 Aspen Music Festival and School, Djupstrom's teachers were Robert Beaser and Christopher Rouse. Djupstrom received his B.M. and M.A. degrees in music composition from the University of Michigan. He currently teaches piano and theory at Settlement Music School in Philadelphia, and is active as a freelance composer and pianist.

Djupstrom's compositions and piano performances have been recognized through awards and scholarships from institutions such as the American Academy of Arts and Letters, the ASCAP Foundation, the BMI Foundation, the Lotte Lehmann Foundation, and the Sigurd and Jarmila Rislov Foundation, among others. In 2002, his first work for wind ensemble, Homages, was awarded the Walter Beeler Memorial Composition Prize from Ithaca College and the first Frederick Fennell Prize from ASCAP and the College Band Directors National Association. His works have been commissioned by the Tanglewood Music Center in ...