Australian-born composer Matthew Shorten envisions his compositions with an innate expressive sensitivity, ethereal harmonic language, and rich timbral sensibilities. He has received commissions internationally from countless trailblazing organizations, festivals, and concert artists, including VOCES8 & the VOCES8 Foundation, Choir & Organ Magazine, Kyo-Shin-An Arts, chatterbird, the Aster Quartet of the University of Michigan, Anwen Mai Thomas at the Royal Academy of Music, the Cortona Sessions for New Music, the New Haven Symphony Orchestra, Wintergreen Music, and the Blair School of Music at Vanderbilt University, among others. Reflecting the interdisciplinary nature of his compositional inspirations – traversing the bounds of music, art, literature, and the humanities – Matthew’s commissions include his chamber work Ekphrases, a string quartet which brings three cross-cultural portraits to life, and Impressions from the Floating World, divined from poetry by Amy Lowell and Japanese woodblock prints by Kawase Hasui.

In 2021-22, Matthew was a Henry Luce Scholar in Asia, forging an array of international artistic partnerships throughout Japan, Singapore, Thailand, and beyond. As part of this cross-disciplinary work at the nexus of composition, performance, and research, Matthew was a Visiting Artist and Guest Conductor with Voices of Singapore, a Visiting Researcher at the Tokyo University of the Arts, and a Guest Artist at the Phuket School of Music.

Matthew received his Bachelor of Music summa cum laude in Composition, Voice, and Violin from the Blair School of Music at Vanderbilt University, where he graduated as the 2020 Founder’s Medalist, the university’s highest honor. Matthew has received several awards and grants, including a Cortona Sessions Fellowship in Composition and Voice, designation as a Rhodes Scholarship Finalist, the Margaret Branscomb Prize, the S.S. and I.M.F. Marsden Prize in Musical Scholarship, a New Haven Symphony Orchestra Young Composers Fellowship, an Oregon Bach Festival Fellowship in Voice and Composition, designation as an American Composer’s Orchestra EarShot Residency Finalist, and the James Toland Vocal Arts Competition General Director’s Award.

Matthew is based in Massachusetts, where he is pursuing an M.A. at the Williams College Graduate Program in the History of Art at the Clark Art Institute, where he is also a Curatorial Fellow in Paintings and Sculpture.