Ben Hjertmann is a composer and vocalist based in Asheville, NC. He composes notated music for ensembles, and writes/performs with the Grant Wallace Band, Kong Must Dead, and Vinesines. Prior to this, he composed and performed with the Sissy-Eared Mollycoddles. He has collaborated with adventurous chamber ensembles including Spektral Quartet, PRISM Quartet, Axiom Brass, Zzyzx Quartet, Third Coast Percussion, Quince Contemporary Vocal Ensemble, New Thread Saxophone Quartet, Friction Quartet, Borromeo Quartet, Anubis Quartet, Callithumpian Consort, International Contemporary Ensemble (ICE), and many others. With Grant Wallace Band he wrote and performed a dramatic song cycle with the Houston Grand Opera in 2016. His large ensemble works has been performed by Northwestern, UT-Austin, Louisiana State, Michigan State, Central Michigan, Kansas State, Lawrence, U-Nebraska at Lincoln, NYU, and Texas Tech.
Hjertmann's music has been featured at Resonant Bodies Festival, Fast Forward Austin, Midwest Band and Orchestra Clinics, the conference of the College Band Directors National Association, and the South by Southwest NonClassical showcase. He has had residencies at MacDowell, 360 XOCHI QUETZAL, the Djerassi Resident Artists Program, and the Shell Lake Arts Center. He was a Fellow at the 2013 Bang on a Can Summer Music Institute, and at the 2011 Other Minds Festival. He has received awards including the 2015 Barlow Prize, the 2014 Third Coast Percussion Emerging Composers Partnership, a 2014 Project Grant from New Music USA, and first prize (Grade VI) in the 2013 Frank Ticheli Composition Contest.
Hjertmann received his doctor of music degree in composition from Northwestern University in 2013. His dissertation research was on microtonal harmonic structures derived from sum and difference tones. Prior to that he earned a bachelor of music degree in composition from Illinois Wesleyan University in 2007. He has taught music technology, composition, theory, aural skills, and song writing at Northwestern University as well as theory and composition for the Chicago Youth Symphony Orchestras, and served as assistant professor and coordinator of composition at Appalachian State University from 2014-2018.
