Michael Edward Edgerton

Michael Edward Edgerton (born October 31, 1961 in Racine, Wisconsin) is an American composer, pedagogue and authority on the 'extra-normal' voice produced by extended vocal techniques.

Edgerton received his doctorate in Musical Arts (DMA) in composition from the University of Illinois at Urbana in 1994, the Masters of Music (MM) from Michigan State University in 1987 and the Bachelor of Arts (BA) from the University of Wisconsin–Parkside in 1984. From 1996 to 1999, Michael was a Postdoctoral Fellow with the National Center for Voice and Speech, where he conducted research on voice science for his book, The 21st Century Voice. He has studied composition with William Brooks, Morgan Powell, Jere Hutcheson and August Wegner.

His concert music is focused on systematic explorations of instruments and voices, less so with electronics. In addition to concert music, he previously had interest in bringing music together with other mediums, such as theater, movement and visual art, often in collaboration with artists from these disciplines. Since the mid-90s, his work increasingly leans toward complexity and acoustical exploration, such as the virtuosic Tempo Mental Rap, for which he won the Kompositionspreis der Landeshauptstadt Stuttgart. in 2007.

His compositions have also received prizes or recognition in the

• 2007 Composition Contest of the Netherlands Radio Choir – Semifinalist (Kalevi Matus, #58)
• 2003 5th Dutilleaux International Composition Compétition – Selection (1 sonata, #70)
• 2001 31 Festival Synthese Bourges - Sélection (The Elements of Risk in Creation, #59)
• 1999 Sal Martirano composition competition – Finalist (Regret of a Noiseless Sundering, #22)
• 1995 MacDowell Club Award for composition – First Prize (Unspoken Crime, #9)
• 1993 Friends and Enemies of New Music – reading (Net/Byrinth, #15)
• 1988 Midwest Composers Symposium - selection (A Penny for the Young Guy, #3 )
• 1987 National Federation of Music Clubs Composition Competition – Third Prize (Ai, #5)
• 1987 National Federation of Music Clubs Composition Competition – Honorable Mention (Dwellers of the Southwest, #2)
• 1986 Michigan State University Orchestral Composition Competition – First Prize (The Final Diary of a Branch, #1)

On March 3, 2008, his composition, A Marriage of Shadows, received its world premiere during the AV Fest08 in Middlesbrough, England, as the result of a commission by the Institute for Digital Innovation at the University of Teesside. The premiere was performed by the ensemble Ars Nova (Sweden) and singer Angela Rademacher (Germany).