Shawn E. Okpebholo
Composer

Born in Lexington, Kentucky, Shawn E. Okpebholo began private composition study at age 14 with James Curnow. He received a B.A. in music composition and musicology from Asbury College where he studied composition with James Curnow and Ronald Holz. Currently Okpebholo is attending the University of Cincinnati College, College-Conservatory of Music pursuing graduate work in composition. At CCM he is studying composition with Joel Hoffman.

Okpebholo has been honored with several composition awards. He has twice won the Kentucky Music Educators Association All-College Composition Contest for his choral composition, A Musicians Prayer, and his piano trio, On Poems of William Carlos Williams. He is also a three-time winner of Asbury College's Peniston Honors in Composition for the two previously listed pieces along with a solo work for piano titled, Concertpiece for Piano.

Okpebholo had the privilege to study with the Disney Legend, Buddy Baker, at New York University in an ASCAP-sponsored film-scoring workshop. He was also a part of the National Band Association and Bands of America's Young Composer Mentor Project (YCMP) where he was one of five composers selected to have intense composition study with Frank Ticheli and Mark Camphouse. As a part of the YCMP, the United States Army Field Band, conducted by Colonel Finley R. Hamilton, premiered Ritual Dances, a work Okpebholo composed especially for the occasion.

Along with being a free-lance composer of concert works and film, Okpebholo hopes to someday be a professor of theory and composition.

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