Based in Rochester, NY, Diana Rosenblum is pursuing a Ph.D in Composition at Eastman School of Music, where she holds a prestigious Sproull Fellowship and is a student of David Liptak, having also studied with Robert Morris and Ricardo Zohn-Muldoon.  

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She has earned a B.A. in Philosophy from Princeton University — where her senior thesis "Socratic Sophistry: inherent humors of playing the hypocrite" was advised by Hendrik Lorenz — and an M.M. in Composition from University of Oregon, where she studied with Robert Kyr and David Crumb and was named Outstanding Graduate Scholar.

 

Diana has been recognized for academic achievement at Eastman via the Imagination Fund, Samuel Adler Scholarship, and Pi Kappa Lambda membership.  She was recently awarded Eastman's Belle S. Gitelman Award for Piano Quartet, is a two-time recipient of the Wayne Brewster Barlow Prize -- awarded in 2018 for full-orchestral work, Gordian Knot, and 2017 for octet Myrioriama (commissioned by OSSIA New Music for their 20th season) -- and received the Anthony and Carolyn Donato Prize in 2016.  Diana joined the OSSIA Board in her third year at Eastman, serving as Secretary during the 2017-2018 season. 

A finalist for the Teaching Assistant Prize for Excellence in Teaching (2016-2017), Diana enjoys her responsibilities as TA, currently teaching composition to non-majors and formerly to Eastman’s freshman class of 2020 composition majors, the latter in collaboration with Professor Carlos Sanchez-Gutierrez.  Also in collaboration with Carlos Sanchez-Gutierrez, along with Eastman graduate composers Alex Stephenson, Aristéa Mellos, Nick Morandi, and Danny Hansen, Diana co-produced and co-hosted a weekly new music radio show, Music Matters, on Rochester's WAYO 104.3 FM from December 2015 - April 2017.  The show continues under the current direction of Nick and Danny, Wednesdays from 5-6 p.m. Archives of episodes that Diana co-curated and co-hosted are available for streaming at "Radio." 

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Compositionally, Diana has just completed her collection of four Curiosities for solo harpsichord, implementing both novel and archaic canonic techniques; the set is lovingly dedicated to her brother Andrew Rosenblum.  Likewise, she has completed 4 movements of a 5-movement duo for violin and viola,Twinned Suite, whose structural premise puts a unique twist on canonic form; it is dedicated to violinist Wendy Toh and violist Sergio Muñoz Leiva.  She also continues work on an series of historically informed organ works (centered around Fugues) for organist Chelsea Barton.  Her Antiphony for double septet (2018) will receive its long-awaited premiere on November 14, 2019 in Kilbourn Hall by the Eastman Graduate Composers' Sinfonietta.  Her full orchestral work, Gordian Knot (2018), was demo-recorded in September 2019 by the Baltimore Symphony Musicians at the UMBC campus, with the generous support and technical mastery of recording engineer Alan Wonneberger.  Diana’s setting of Shakespeare’s Sonnet 60, Like as the Waves, one of 3 winners in Oxingale Music’s inaugural International Composition Competition, is published by Oxingale and has been performed throughout the UK and northeastern U.S. by vocal trio Voice and cellist Matt Haimovitz.  For a complete listing of musical works, please visit "Music."

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Extra-musically, Diana has been recognized for talent in writing by the National Council of Teachers of English and by Princeton University Creative Writing department, which granted her the Sophomore Award for Outstanding Poetry while she studied under Paul Muldoon. 

 

On a personal note, Diana comes from a thoroughly musical background.  In her immediate family, her mother Lori Laitman is a renowned composer of vocal music; her aforementioned younger brother Andrew Rosenblum is a Chicago-based pianist and harpsichordist, who was recently awarded 2nd Prize in the Bach Competition in Leipzig (the first American to ever place in the harpsichord division); his wife, pianist Maria Sumareva, is Chair and Co-Founder of Kaleidoscope MusArt, a Miami-based non-profit organization that works with emerging artists and composers; her older brother James Rosenblum is an avid amateur pianist who practices law for a living; his wife Ana Glig is an actively concertizing pianist based in Cape Cod, MA; her father, Bruce Rosenblum, serves on the Board of the Heifetz International Music Institute and formerly the Boards of Baltimore Symphony and Washington Performing Arts, and has resumed playing double bass after a hiatus, performing with D.C.-area ensembles, including the Avanti Orchestra of the Friday Morning Music Club.  Diana herself began piano lessons at age four and cello lessons at age seven, spending formative years studying with Thomas Kraines of the Daedalus Quartet from middle school through college, at Peabody Preparatory and Princeton.  Though no longer performing actively, she had played for 20+ years in chamber ensembles and orchestras — sitting assistant principal in Peabody Preparatory Sinfonia under Gene Young and principal in Princeton University Orchestra under Michael Pratt — and has premiered dozens of new works as a member of Oregon Composers Forum, Eugene Contemporary Chamber Ensemble (ECCE) and Ova Novi Ensemble, a flexible performance collective she co-founded.  She has attended various summer festivals as a cellist (Colorado College Summer Music Festival, Killington Music Festival, Eastern Music Festival), and participated in master classes with the Trio Wanderer, as well as Emanuel Ax and Yo-yo Ma.  Several members of her extended family are also musicians, both professional and amateur; you can find links to their websites at "Links" [coming soon]. 

Lastly, Diana enjoys living in Rochester with her wife, pianist Tze-Wen (Julia) Lin, who freelances in affiliation with both Eastman and Hochstein Schools of Music, and is an invaluable source of insight at all stages of Diana's creative process, from conception to interpretation.  They love to cook collaboratively and adore their bedlington-poodle mix, Daphne (pictured below).