Joseph Waters

May 31, 2025 Waters' rock opera "El Sidd and the Healers" was premiered in concert form at The Cutting Room in NYC. The work is a reimagining of Hermann Hesse's Siddhartha set in California and Mexico in 1969. His first musical theater work, “El Colibrí Magico - The Magic Hummingbird” was premiered by Opera Tijuana in Mexico June 4th & 5th 2023. October 19, 2024 His work “Garden Mother” for traditional Korean instrument, Piri, along with vibraphone, was commissioned and performed by Jeongmin Son at the Gugak Center in Seoul, Korea. May 26, 2020 NWEAMO Festival (during pandemic) included a remote performance of “Things” from EUM Studio, Seoul Korea by Jaeonghyeon Joo (Haegeum) and Seunghee Han (harp). December 28, 2018 Ensemble Phase performed “Air, Earth, Ocean” in Ilshin Hall, Seoul, Korea. In 2011 Orchestra Nova conductor Jung-Ho Pak commissioned Waters to create a double concerto for violin (featuring Lindsay Deutsch) and alto saxophone (featuring Todd Rewoldt) on the subject of the ocean. The resultant work, entitled "Surf" was premiered by the orchestra on May 11, 12 & 14, 2012. "Surf" also featured live electronics, performed by the composer, and live video created by Brooklyn artist Zuriel Waters and performed via software created by Chris Warren. In 2003 the city of San Diego commissioned sculptor Roman De Salvo, along with Waters, to create a public artwork in the form of a safety railing on the civilian overpass on Interstate 94 at 25th Street. Entitled Crab Carillon, the result is a set of 488 tuned chimes, that can be played by pedestrians as they cross the overpass. Each chime is tuned to the note of a melody, composed by Waters. The melody is in the form of a [palindrome], to accommodate walking in either direction. The music can be heard on the City of San Diego Civic Art Collection. He performs and composes for the Waters_Bluestone_Duel, a collaboration with percussionist Joel Bluestone that explores the combination of live electronics and percussion, as well as SWARMIUS an interdisciplinary quartet comprising Felix Olschofka (violin), Todd Rewoldt (alto saxophone), Joel Bluestone (classical percussion) and Waters (composer and electronics performance). His work has been performed at venues which include: CEART (Tijuana, Mexico), Gugak Center, Seoul Korea, Australasian Computer Music Conferences Melbourne & Perth (Australia), Beethoven-Haus (Bonn Germany), Bomb the Space Festival Wellington (New Zealand), Composer's Hall Moscow Conservatory (Russia), Festival Internacional Cervantino Guanajuato (Mexico), Hong Kong Cultural Center, Hungarian Radio hosted Budapest & Nadasdy Castle (Hungary), Ljubljana Cultural Center (Slovenia), Rosario & San Martin de los Andes (Argentina), SEAMS Fylkingen Stockholm (Sweden), Joe's Pub (New York City), Southern Theater Minneapolis, Theater Kikker (Utrecht Netherlands), Tsing Hua University (Beijing China), UNAM (Mexico City), University of Cadiz & Conservatorio Superior de Musica Valencia (Spain), Univ of Chile (Santiago), Wellington (New Zealand), Venetto Jazz Festival & Acadamia di Canto (Venice Italy), Warsaw Electronic Festival (Poland), and other locations.

Tere Mathern Dance Company Elements 2004 Portland, OR & San Diego, CA Leslie Seiters, Ron Estes, Justin Morrison, Niamh Condron with SWARMIUS, 2008 Neurosciences Institute, La Jolla, CA

In 1983 Waters co-founded Network for New Music (NNM) (along with pianist Dr. Linda Reichert). Based in Philadelphia, NNM was originally a support and service organization for living composers. Waters co-managed NNM until 1988, when he left to pursue other projects. Under Reichert, NNM continues today as a professional chamber music ensemble dedicated to the commissioning and performance of new works. In 1998 Waters founded and is currently artistic director of NWEAMO (New West Electronic Arts & Music Organization). NWEAMO is a festival in which composers, performance artists and musicians present their work with the aim of integrating avant-garde classical, popular, experimental electronic music and visual media. The NWEAMO festival has traveled to Berlin, Boulder (CO), Mexico City, Miami (FL), Morelia (Mexico), New York City, Portland (OR), San Diego (CA), Stony Brook (NY), Venice (Italy) and Tokyo (Japan).

Professor of Music (Composition and Computer music) at San Diego State University (San Diego, California, U.S.)

Waters studied composition at Yale University (M.M. 1982), the Universities of Oregon (Ph.D. 2002) and Minnesota (B.S. 1980), as well as Stockholms Musikpedagogiska Institut. Primary teachers were Jacob Druckman, Bernard Rands, Roger Reynolds, Dominick Argento, and Martin Bresnick. He began his career as a teenage keyboardist and composer for rock bands.