Catching up with Philip Seward

Philip Seward, formerly of Carroll County, is now a Chicago composer and performer.

After graduating from Carroll High School in 1978, he received his bachelor's degree from Wabash College in 1982. He also studied for a time at the University of Vienna in Austria and later completed his master's at Northwestern University in Evanston, Ill.

Seward currently free-lances in the arts.

He is an artist-in-residence at Columbia College of Chicago. He is co-conductor of the Lira Ensemble of Chicago and has served both as a free-lance conductor and performer for many ensembles, musical shows and operas. He is also the music director at St. James Presbyterian Church in Chicago.

Seward has written three youth operas for Lyric Opera of Chicago. Another commissioned work was "Blessing" (2003), written for the Lira Chamber Chorus to celebrate the 25th Papal anniversary.

Other works by Seward include the opera "Spreading the News," and the musicals "Downtown," "Nobody Likes Retsina," and Juan Peron's Hand."

In November, the Lira Symphony Orchestra played some of Seward's works at Symphony Center's Orchestra Hall in Chicago.

The musical, "Hans Brinker," which Seward wrote with John Sparks and Jane Boyd, received an After Dark Award for Best Musical Score, and also a Joseph Jefferson Citation.

Seward's light opera, "High Fidelity," was performed both at Merkin Hall in New York and in the Chicago Humanities Festival.

His piece, "Les Dames à trois...et piano" has been performed in Chicago, New York, Dallas, and will appear in the Edinburgh Fringe Festival in Scotland this coming summer.

As a performer, Seward plays piano or sings in many different venues.

In December, he was the tenor soloist for the "Messiah" with the Elmhurst Chorale Union and Orchestra.

Some of his other singing roles have been in "South Pacific," "The King and I," "Cinderella," "The Beggar's Opera," and Frank McCourt's "The Irish...and how they got that way."

Seward has concertized in the United States and in Europe, performing his own compositions and the works of other American composers.

He has several European concert dates coming up this summer. He also has piano concerts scheduled in March and April in Chicago.

For more information on Seward, visit his website at www.philipseward.com.