Composer-vocalist Akmal Parwez was born into a musical and artistic family in Punjab, Pakistan. He studied electronics in Tokyo on a Japanese government scholarship, receiving B.E. and M.E. degrees. However, after a brief engineering career, and encouraged by his composition teachers Yasushi Akutagawa and Klaus Pringsheim, he felt compelled to devote his life to composing, singing and teaching music. He came to the U.S. to study voice with Joseph Klein, and later studied composition with Florence Jolley, Leo Kraft, Samuel Adler, Warren Benson and Joseph Schwantner. He received an M.A. in Composition from Queens College and a Ph.D. in Composition from the Eastman School of Music.

Parwez is a bass-baritone soloist, choral conductor and voice teacher who often performs his own works. His music, which is a romantic and uniquely dynamic synthesis of Eastern and Western compositional techniques, has been extensively performed – and well received – throughout the U.S., as well as in several European and Asian countries. He was the winner of the William Cullen Bryant Bicentennial Composition Prize for his “Song of the Prairies”, a SUNY Award for his “Pneumatic Polychrome” for Symphonic Wind Ensemble, ASCAP Standard Awards annually since 1984, several grants from Meet The Composer, and four Composer Assistance Program Grants from the American Music Center.

Dr. Parwez has taught at the Malaysian Science University, Penang, as well as at SUNY-Potsdam, NYU, Hofstra, and Queens College.

Dr. Akmal Parwez

150-74A Village Road

Kew Gardens NY 11432-1012

Tel: 718/969-3353

Mobile: 718/685-4440

E-Mail: akmalparwez@gmail.com

SoundCloud.com/AkmalParwez

Library.NewMusicUSA.org/AkmalParwez

YouTube.com/AkmalParwez, Composer