About

Biography

Conner Leigh Shaw’s life in the majestic open spaces of Colorado, and his emotional interpretations on both his life and the cataclysmic events occurring in the world shape his writing into a style simultaneously haunting and beautiful.

During the summer of 2019, Shaw’s works were featured at both the SPLICE Festival in Kalamazoo, Michigan as well as Opera Elect’s New Opera series in Boise, Idaho. During this same season, he also released his fifth album entitled ExoResonant, which details humanity’s troubled relationship with space.

In March of 2019, Shaw premiered his first opera entitled Home On Blue Mountain, which relays the enormous struggles his ancestors encountered on their settlement in western Colorado during the 1920’s.

In November 2018, Shaw made his national composer-performer debut at the University of Tennessee Martin New Music Festival playing his yearning, yet elegant electronic-sample and electric guitar art song Pain, Trains; Wane. In October of the same year, Shaw was featured as both performer and composer on the University of Northern Colorado’s contemporary ensemble release UNCOmmon Ensemble at the Tank, which was recorded at the infamous reverb chamber studio The Tank in Rangely, Colorado.

In May of 2018, Shaw released his debut album Portraits, Moods, and Places on UNC’s Bear Records label, featuring twenty-four contemporary chamber pieces with six different groups from around the Northern Colorado area.

Shaw’s first compositional accolade dates to March of 2017, where he won the Open Space Festival Call for Scores with his American art song Epitaph on the World. This same month, Shaw’s first guitar concerto was premiered in Greeley, Colorado. As evidenced by these compositional projects, Shaw’s major influences include Charles Ives, George Crumb, and Ted Hearne.