Wendy
As a studio
musician, performer and educator, Wendy is recognized throughout
the San Francisco Bay Area. Her melodies will touch your soul
as her technical prowess on the keyboard will challenge your
mind.
Wendy is
the composer, musical director, and co-producer of Copus whose
debut recording, Later Than You
Think, was released in 1999. Together with poet Royal
Kent and the fine Copus ensemble, Wendy is currently in the
process of completing arrangements for the ensemble's next CD,
The Birth of the Fool.
"The
music of Copus is a mixture of spoken word, jazz, a touch of
blues, and a hint of classical styles. The jazz styles are very
complex and the music that is created is absolutely masterful."
Michael Allison, MusicDish.com.
"Artistic
director, pianist and composer Wendy Loomis paints with a broad
palette of jazz, classical, new age, avant garde and world colors,
fusing styles ranging from Debussy to Thelonius Monk. Her dynamic
performance at the piano throughout Later
Than You Think by turns floats through the soundscape,
supports the other instrumentalists, vamps under poet Royal's
voice, then drives the ensemble with funky rhythms and jabbing,
percussive chords." Kelley Dolan, Bella Online Music Critic.
Piano
and Friends is the latest release of Wendy's piano compositions.
Her style crosses effortlessly between classical and jazz and
features solo works, duets, and trios. Featured are the renowned
poet Leslie Simon on "jazz is for white girls too",
flutist Elinor van Ommen, vocalists Liz McDonough and Barbara
Jaspersen, frame drummer Debra Podjed, harmonica player Pete
Barrett, and drummer Bennie Murray. The cover is from an original
collage entitled "Opus IV" by Lorraine Lauzon. One
of the pieces from Piano and Friends, entitled In The
Dark, was recently selected as a finalist from among over 4,000
entries worldwide in the Unisong International Song Contest.
Released
in 1996, Wendy's CD Strange Conjunction presents a gentler,
more internal approach to the piano. The spoken word poetry
featured on the title track references a quote from D.H. Lawrence's
"Women in Love".
Wendy has
studied and performed music and dance since age four. She earned
her B.A. from Denison University with a self-designed major
called "A Study in the Creative Art Process" and her
M.S. in Education from Syracuse University. She has worked with
young people through the Boston Symphony-sponsored Days in the
Arts program at Tanglewood and the San Francisco Symphony's
Adventures in Music series, as well as at various schools in
Massachusetts, New York, and California. Wendy is a member of
ASCAP, Bay Area Women in Creative Music, Taxi, and the Center
for Contemporary Composers, and received the ASCAP award for
composition for the years 1999-2000. Her interviews of other
female composers can be viewed at ComposersNet.com and MeetTheComposer.org.
All CDs
mentioned above are available through the Copus catalog at www.copuscatalog.com.
