Brent Michael Davids

Hello! I’m Brent Michael Davids, a professional concert and film score composer, and wrote a bio in first person, fresh! I was birthed as a citizen of the Stockbridge-Munsee Band of the Mohican Nation on an 83-degree supercool Thursday in June. This pleb is a seasonal blend of Mohican, Munsee-Lenape, and English, all frybread and scones in my bones. Since my Native navity, I’ve filled my days with (mostly) composing and daydreaming, along with a smattering of educating, producing, consulting, writing and directing. Amazingly (to me, anyway), a 45-year composer career has elapsed, and I’m still at it.

Composing? I didn’t consume this cup of tea so much as it tippled me.

I’ve been a lucky scamp too, bounding to places I’d only imagined before. Bulgaria. England. Ireland. Italy. Japan. Russia. Scotland ... Oakland, California. Concocting tunes with some of the world’s crackerjack performers has been my unforeseen yet serendipitous treasure. Chanticleer. Dale Warland Singers. Joffrey Ballet. Kronos Quartet. Miró Quartet. Vocalessence. Symphonies tagged with the names: Civic of Green Bay, Grand Rapids, Greater Twin Cities Youth, Indianapolis, Mankato, National, New Mexico, Phoenix, Santa Fe, South Dakota, Syracuse, and Utah. And, now, The Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra!

What has this dedicated and fluky life brought me? I would love to say wisdom, but my director’s cut would be more akin to a staggering reconnoiter than acquired illumination. I’m generally a happy joe but still sketching the dramatic underscore to my own developing cinematography. Any composer’s accolades and kudos notwithstanding, music and life seem as braided uncertainty to me — each a hair’s breadth away from screwy heartache to crazy beautiful.

From this viewpoint, what I collect off the cutting room floor of my biography, is a loosely congregate oeuvre: I strongly believe that when we collaborate and experiment in song, the benefits go beyond music itself. Our interactions as composers, performers, audiences, students and teachers — Indian and non-Indian alike — constitute important relational skills. If we can excite creativity and cooperation in each other, we have accomplished a magnificent thing!