Keith Fitch currently heads the Composition Department and holds the Vincent K. and Edith H. Smith Chair in Composition at the Cleveland Institute of Music, where he also directs the CIM New Music Ensemble. Called “gloriously luminous” by The Philadelphia Inquirer, his music has been consistently noted for its eloquence, expressivity, dramatic sense of musical narrative, and unique sense of color and sonority. His works have been performed throughout the United States, Europe, and Asia by such ensembles and soloists as The Philadelphia Orchestra, the American Composers Orchestra, the League of Composers Orchestra, the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, the St. Luke’s Chamber Ensemble, the Colorado Quartet, the Da Capo Chamber Players, Yolanda Kondonasiss and Jason Vieaux, and many others. His music has been heard at the Norfolk Chamber Music Festival, the June in Buffalo Festival, the Atlantic Center for the Arts, and New York’s Carnegie and Merkin Halls. Highlights of recent seasons include the premieres of Knock on Wood for the harp/guitar duo of Yolanda Kondonassis and Jason Vieaux; Cascade, a fanfare commissioned by Cleveland’s Museum of Contemporary Art for the inauguration of their new building; In Memory, commissioned by the League of Composers, and a new Piano Quartet, Last Words.
A native of Indiana, Keith Fitch began composing at age eight and began formal musical training on the double bass at age eleven. While still in high school, he received his first professional orchestral performance. He attended the Indiana University School of Music, where he studied composition with Frederick Fox, Eugene O’Brien, and Claude Baker, double bass with Bruce Bransby and Murray Grodner, and chamber music with Rostislav Dubinsky, founder of the Borodin Quartet. He also counts Donald Erb and Joan Tower among his compositional mentors. Among his many awards are three each from ASCAP and the National Society of Arts and Letters, an Individual Artist Grant from the Indiana Arts Commission and the National Endowment for the Arts, a Fromm Music Foundation Commission, a 2012 Individual Excellence Award from the Ohio Arts Council, a Copland House Residency Award, and the 2016 Walter Hinrichsen Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters. He has enjoyed multiple residencies at MacDowell and the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts, among others. Highly regarded as a teacher, chamber music coach, and conductor of new music, he has taught at Indiana University, Bard College, and for eleven years served on the faculty of the Mannes College of Music in New York.
Portrait by Alex Cooke
