Composer-conductor Steven Sametz is the Ronald J. Ulrich Professor of Music at Lehigh University and serves as the Artistic Director of the professional a cappella ensemble, The Princeton Singers.

He is Founding Director of the Lehigh University Choral Union and the Lehigh University-American Choral Directors Association Summer Choral Composers’ Forum.  Dr. Sametz is active as a clinician, adjudicating national composition competitions and conducting all-state choirs and is currently the Chair of the ACDA Composition Advisory Committee.  His works are published through this website, Notenova, ECS, Oxford University Press, Walton Music, and GIA.  Dr. Sametz holds degrees from Yale University, the Frankfurt Hochschule für Musik und Darstellende Kunst and the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

Check out the complete catalogue of works for choir, orchestra, chamber ensembles, and solo voice and instruments here.

Chanticleer premieres and tours new commissioned work, Birds of Paradise

Chanticleer premiered Birds of Paradise, a setting of Christiana Rossetti’s “Paradise: A Symbol” at the Voices 8 “Live from London” festival, and has taken it on tour, most recently performing it in a joint concert Jan. 30, 2022 with Cantus.

For the Earth – new cantata premiere

For the Earth (2021) is a new cantata drawing on Biblical, Objibway, Mayan and Native American texts, as well as poetry of Walt Whitman, Chief Dan George and Chang-Tsai. Set in a post-apocalyptic world, the narrative asks us to consider our stewardship of the earth. Developed during remote learning in a collaboration with The Lehigh University Choir and Voices 21C, For the Earth is a powerful addition to the repertory.

A Woman Wept at the River

Written with the Indian soprano and tampura player Arati Shah-Yukich, A Women Wept at the River combines Indian rāgās with western choral sounds to tell a story – richly personal and universal – of environmental sustainability in our time.