Anthony Hernandez (b. 1987) is a composer and pianist, who recently earned a BM in Music Composition from the University of Missouri-Columbia in December 2009. His composition teachers were Dr. Stefan Freund and Dr. Thomas McKenney. His piece “Clarinet Sonata (2008)” won Mr. Hernandez a place as finalist in the 2009 and 2010 Sinquefield Composition Prize Competitions and first place in the 2009 Young Composers Competition, Level II division. Hernandez was coached in master-classes with composers Samuel Adler and Chen Yi. In the summer of 2009, he was a composition/piano teaching assistant for the New York Summer Music Festival, where he taught theory classes and worked with and studied under composers Daniel Ott, Eric Sessler, Adam Silverman and pianist Peter Miyamoto. In October of 2009, he had his first orchestra piece, "Two roads diverged (2009)," premiered by the Columbia Civic Orchestra, lead by Dr. Stefan Freund.
As pianist, Mr. Hernandez has studied with Dr. Julie Knerr and Dr. Karen Larvick and has been in master-classes with Malcolm Bilson and Wei-Yi Yang. He has accompanied the Pomme de Terre Community Choir, Hitt Street Harmony, an ensemble devoted to vocal jazz performance and has been the rehearsal accompanist for several Columbia Entertainment Company shows. In 2008, he was awarded first place in the MMTA Collegiate Piano Upper Division. Currently, Hernandez accompanies the Columbia Independent School choirs, the Agape choir at the Missouri United Methodist Church, and is assistant accompanist for the Columbia Chorale. He also teaches piano lessons out of his home studio to various ages of students, striving to continue teaching and playing as much as possible.
