Anne Kilstofte, Ph.D.

Biography

Composer Anne Kilstofte began her career as a professional pianist, and regularly collaborates or is in-residence with international ensembles, universities, and sacred organizations. Her work as an educator and musician has varied between different age groups and didactic goals. For example, while an assistant professor and composer-in-residence at Hamline University (1995-2007), she served as a composer/mentor to topranking high school students through Hennepin County (Minneapolis), created cultural diversity student-composer projects with Hancock Elementary School students (a primarily Hmong school), taught Music in World Cultures students on the Gamelan installation at Hamline, and led a pilot project for the state of Minnesota to raise graduation standards for public schools.

As an educator at Glendale Community College since 2008, she became one of the first online instructors in music, certifies peer-reviewed online courses, was named an Outstanding Adjunct at GCC, and a Master Teacher in the Maricopa County Community College District. She is an instructional designer in online coursework, and teaches courses in musicology and ethnomusicology at GCC. She is a writer, writing for major newspapers in Denver and St. Paul, and is a concert and recording producer, producing concerts of international luminaries for Boettcher Concert Hall, The Denver Center for the Performing Arts, the American Composers Forum, and independently under her own label. As president of the International Alliance for Women in Music in 2008, she created a week-long conference of concerts and events in Beijing, China with representatives from twenty-one countries, helped develop the IAWM Congress in Flagstaff in 2011, and served in different positions on the Executive Committee of SCI, Society of Composers, Incorporated from 2008 to 2015, and the IAWM from 1997-2011.

Among her honors, Dr. Kilstofte was named a full-year Fulbright Senior Scholar as part of the Council on International Exchange of Scholars and the Fulbright Association to teach, compose, and research at the Estonian Academy of Music in Tallinn, Estonia. Her composition awards include The American Prize Judges’ Citation for Unique Artistic Excellence, the Miriam Gideon Award from the Search for New Music, through the International Alliance for Women in Music, as well as grants from ASCAP, the American Composers Forum, the Bush Artist Fellowship, the Jerome Foundation, the McKnight Foundation, the Minnesota State Arts Board, the Arizona Humanities, and the Arizona Commission on the Arts.

She received her Ph.D. in Music Theory and Composition from the University of Minnesota, studying with Pulitzer-prize winner Dominick Argento, and privately with Grammy-award winning composer Libby Larsen. She also holds a Masters of Music in Composition, and a Bachelor of Science in Music and Media in Sound Design/Synthesis, Recording, and Music Business from the University of Colorado.

Dr. Kilstofte has taught studio composition and piano, sound design, music theory, arts marketing, intellectual property rights, desktop publishing and music engraving, and Honors Courses in counterpoint, theory, special studies, and musicology. She volunteers at Silver Spur Therapeutic Riding Center for individuals with Special Needs, and practices fencing, riding, and yoga.

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