Claude Baker

W. Claude Baker Jr. (born April 12, 1948 Lenoir, North Carolina) is an American composer of contemporary classical music. Biography Claude Baker attained a B.M. degree, magna cum laude, from East Carolina University in 1970. He subsequently studied composition at the Eastman School of Music with Samuel Adler and Warren Benson, and holds M.M. (1973) and D.M.A. (1975) degrees from that institution. He is currently Class of 1956 Chancellor’s Professor Emeritus of Composition in the Jacobs School of Music at Indiana University, Bloomington, where he is also the recipient of the university-wide Tracy M. Sonneborn Award for accomplishments in the areas of teaching and research. Before his appointment at Indiana, he served on the faculties of the University of Georgia and the University of Louisville, and was a visiting professor at the Eastman School of Music. In the eight-year period from 1991 to 1999, he held the position of Composer-in-Residence of the St. Louis Symphony, one of the longest such residencies with any major orchestra in the country. During this time, he initiated numerous community-based projects, the most notable of which was the establishment of composition programs a