Erik Nielsen has been composing for 30 years and his catalog includes works for chorus, orchestra, wind ensemble, solo instruments, chamber music of many configurations and electronic music. His works have been performed in Canada, Europe and Australia as well as many locations in the United States and have been performed by ensembles  including the Amabile, Emerson and Ying String Quartets; the National Symphony Orchestra;  the Killington and Manchester Chamber Players; Bread and Puppet Theater; the Vermont Contemporary Music Ensemble; Vermont Symphony; Vermont Youth Orchestra and Village and Northern Harmony. He has won awards from ASCAP, the Vermont Arts Council, and in 1991 was chosen Vermont Composer of the Year by the Vermont Music Teachers Association. In 2004 he was awarded a Creation Grant by the Vermont Arts Council to compose a companion piece to Stravinsky's L'Histoire du Soldat.  The work, The Crane Maiden, will be toured by the Vermont Contemporary Music Ensemble during the 2006-07 season.   In 2002 he received the National Symphony Orchestra's composition prize for Vermont.  The resulting commissioned work, Mr. Nielsen's Quintet for Clarinet and Strings,  was premiered at the Kennedy Center in Washington, D. C. on March 20, 2004.   He has also recently received commissions from the Vermont All-State Music Festival, Chandler Center for the Arts in Randolph, the Vermont Contemporary Music Ensemble and the Vermont Youth Orchestra. He was a 1994-95 recipient of a Vermont Council on the Arts Fellowship in music. In 1995 his piano quintet was performed at Carnegie Hall by the Manchester Chamber Players. In October, 2000, his opera, A FLEETING ANIMAL: An Opera from Judevine, a collaboration with poet/playwright David Budbill, was premiered to great acclaim in several locations in Vermont. In addition, Mr. Nielsen is the former Director of the Consortium of Vermont Composers, a position he held for three years. He is Composer-in Residence at Bloomfield, East Hartford, Simsbury and Wethersfield High Schools in Connecticut, BFA-St. Albans, Randolph and Spaulding high schools in Vermont, as well as composition mentor with the Vermont Midi Project and the Vermont Teen Voices Project.  He also teaches music theory and composition with the Vermont Youth Orchestra. Mr. Nielsen lives in Brookfield, Vermont.

Erik Nielsen has been composing for 30 years and his catalog includes works for chorus, orchestra, wind ensemble, solo instruments, chamber music of many configurations and electronic music. In 2002 he received the National Symphony Orchestra's composition prize for Vermont.  The resulting commissioned work, Mr. Nielsen's Quintet for Clarinet and Strings,  was premiered at the Kennedy Center in Washington, D. C. on March 20, 2004.  He has also recently received commissions from the Vermont All-State Music Festival, Chandler Center for the Arts in Randolph, the Vermont Contemporary Music Ensemble and the Vermont Youth Orchestra. He is Composer-in Residence at Bloomfield, East Hartford, Simsbury and Wethersfield High Schools in Connecticut, BFA-St. Albans, Randolph and Spaulding high schools in Vermont, as well as composition mentor with the Vermont Midi Project and the Vermont Teen Voices Project.  He also teaches music theory and composition with the Vermont Youth Orchestra. Mr. Nielsen lives in Brookfield, Vermont.