Peter Child

Peter Child is an American composer. He is Professor of Music and MacVicar Faculty Fellow at MIT, where he chaired the department of Music and Theater Arts from 1996 to 1999. He joined Reed College in 1973 through an exchange scholarship from Keele University in England and received his B.A. in music from Reed in 1975. After studying Karnatic music in Madras for a year through a Thomas J. Watson Fellowship (1975-76), he entered the graduate program at Brandeis University and earned his Ph.D. in musical composition in 1981. His composition teachers include William Albright, Bernard Barrell, Arthur Berger, Martin Boykan, Jacob Druckman (Tanglewood) and Seymour Shifrin.

Peter Child has written music in many different genres, including music for orchestra, chorus, computer synthesis, voice, and a wide variety of chamber groups. Ensembles that have performed his music include the John Oliver Chorale, the Pro Arte Orchestra, the Lydian String Quartet, Collage, Parnassus, New York New Music, the Pittsburgh New Music Ensemble, Lontano (Great Britain), Interensemble (Italy), Speak Percussion (Australia), Emory University Wind Ensemble and Percussion Ensemble, and many others.