New Music Ensemble Welcomes 3 Composer-Performer Fellows

Corie Rose Soumah is a Canadian composer (QC) currently based in New York. She is interested in shaping fractured and reconstructed sound components through hypercollages and visceral physical gestures. Her approach is characterized by a keen interest in the interweaving of multiple aesthetic and sonic elements from the perspective of Afro-diasporic geologies. She explores these textures through the overlay of different acoustic mediums as well as electronic and analog technologies. Recent and upcoming collaborations include ensembles such as the International Contemporary Ensemble, Longleash, Instruments of Happiness, Hypercube, Ekmeles, Paramirabo, pinknoise, Sixtrum, Contemporary Insight, New Music Concerts, Le Nouvel Ensemble Moderne (NEM) and Wet Ink. She is currently pursuing a Doctoral degree in composition at Columbia University (US). She completed a BMus degree in composition from the Conservatoire de musique de Montréal (CAD). Her mentors include Zosha Di Castri, George Lewis, Marcos Balter, Georg Frederich Haas, Annie Gosfield, Michel Tétreault, Nicolas Gilbert and Jimmie Leblanc."

The music of American composer-pianist Matthew Schultheis (b. 1997) is driven by a love of visual art and literature, a preference for dramatic, rich, sometimes opulent textures, a reverence for present-day musicians’ inheritance of past musical idioms, and a fascination with the connections performers and listeners make between deeply familiar and newly-heard pieces.

Matthew is a C. V. Starr Doctoral Fellow at The Juilliard School, having completed his master's degree there in 2022. He has studied with Matthias Pintscher since 2020. He has collaborated with the Tokyo Symphony and Juilliard Orchestras; Ensemble intercontemporain; Attacca, Mivos, JACK, and Hausmann Quartets; IU New Music Ensemble, and Sound Icon. Recent and upcoming commissions this year include works for solo piano (Jacob Skiles), chorus (New York Virtuoso Singers), solo viola (Sam Kelder), flute and percussion (Coriolis Duo), and violin and piano (Magpie Duo). Matthew’s music has received three consecutive BMI Student Composer Awards and additional honors from ASCAP, the Society of Composers, Inc., the Music Teachers National Association, and the IU composition department.

An accomplished pianist dedicated to performing new music, Matthew has frequently premiered his own works throughout his time as a student, in addition to giving recitals of music in the standard repertoire. He formed Magpie Duo with violinist Lauren Conroy in 2023; together they have performed recitals of 20th and 21st century music at venues in New York and Chicago.

Jacqui Armbruster is a dynamic multi-instrumentalist, singer, songwriter, and improviser from Allentown, PA. An active performer in the Greater Boston area, Jacqui can be found in a wide array of musical settings ranging from concert halls to house concerts. Most recently, Jacqui won the 2024 Freshgrass Fiddle competition and their project, Almost Olive, released their debut EP in July of 2024.

Jacqui’s varied musical interests have led them to collaborate with and study from musicians all over the globe. Notable collaborators include Becca Stevens, Leo Genovese, Chico Pinheiro, Layth Sidiq, and Arun Ramamurthy. Past teachers include Kirsten Docter, Nick Cords, Jamey Haddad, Adriana Linares, Eden Macadam-Somer, Carla Kihlstedt, and Lautaro Mantilla.

Jacqui earned their Bachelors degree in Viola Performance from Oberlin Conservatory as a recipient of the Pi Kappa Lambda Award for Musicianship, the Theodore Presser Undergraduate Award, and a Flint Initiative Grant. Jacqui has been a featured soloist with the Oberlin Contemporary Ensemble led by Tim Weiss, where they premiered a concerto for singing violist. Jacqui received their Masters of Music in Contemporary Musical Arts from the New England Conservatory, where they were part of the CMA Honors Ensemble, “redbird.”

In their spare time, Jacqui is a devout plant parent and a passionate consumer of coffee.