Two alumni composers, Joshua Harris (PhD 2013) and Mark Oliveiro (PhD 2016), were selected to participate in the ICMC 2018 Conference in Daegu, South Korea, 5-10 August 2018.

Graduate composer Bihe Wen’s work In Limbo for soprano recorder, male voice and fixed media won first prize in the mixed media category of the 2017 Musicacoustica-Beijing Competition. 

Alumnus composer Daniel Sabzghabaei (BM 2014) was recently selected for Beth Morrison Projects' new BMP: Next Generation program. Through this initiative, Daniel will be working with distinguished NYC-based chamber ensemble Contemporaneous and conductor David Bloom in a series of workshops in NYC, culminating in a performance of his work Two Reflections on The Belovèd at National Sawdust in Brooklyn on 17 March 2018.

Doctoral composer Michael Smith presented his research on using Virtual Reality for 3D spatialization at the Sounds in Space conference at the University of Derby (England) in June 2018. Michael discussed his software VRSoundMapper and its various options for positioning sounds in a 3D sound field. 

Faculty composer Joseph Klein will be the featured speaker at two concerts by Orchestra 2001 in April 2018, including the Philadelphia premiere of Frank Zappa's The Yellow Shark at The Fillmore Philly in April 2018.  This residency was supported by a grant from The Pew Center for Arts & Heritage, and will also include a program of works by Edgard Varèse, Igor Stravinsky, Anton Webern, and Pierre Boulez.

Alumnus composer Daniel Sabzghabaei (BM 2014) recently received a commission from the New York Festival of Song (NYFOS) for a new work for soprano, baritone, and piano to be performed on their Next concert series. The performance will be on 11 December 2017 in NYC at the CUNY Graduate Center inside the Elebash Recital Hall as part of the Bernstein Marathon, celebrating his 100th anniversary.

On 11-12 December 2017, Nothing in the Nothingness, an opera by alumnus composer Daniel Zajicek (MM 2006) and John Grimmet was performed by the Nautilus Music-Theater in Minneapolis/Saint Paul. This one-act operatic monologue chronicles the thought process of a young man trapped in a coma, and explores what it means to be alive and functioning in a vegetative state when consciousness is not possible. It featured Nautilus performers Eric Morris and Cathleen Fuller, with music director Mind Eschendor.

Nine UNT-affiliated composers were selected to participate in the SEAMUS 2018 Conference at the University in St. Cloud of Oregon, 29-31 March 2018: faculty members Panayiotis Kokoras and Marco Buongiorno Nardelli, students Miguel Espinel, Christopher Poovey, and Mark Vaughn, and alumni Paul Thomas, David Gedosh, Eli Fieldsteel, and Mikel Kuehn.