paul novak

🍄announcing mycelium’s 25/26 season: deep roots, wild sounds 🍄 in our upcoming season, we invite you into a living musical network. with 3 performances across the city of chicago, we continue our mission of creating imaginative, multidisciplinary performances of contemporary music and showcasing diverse emerging voices. highlights include a show with pioneering composer/performer @pamelazed , the inaugural performance of our s.p.o.r.e. chamber series, our rhizome emerging composers project, and so much more. we hope you’ll join our mycelial network this season!🍄

so delighted to share this video of "odes to the body unsung" performed by the @contemporarycomposition grossman ensemble back in may! this was a really special collaboration, and i’m so grateful to this phenomenal ensemble for bringing this ambitious, crazy piece to life. each of the 4 movements imagines sound resonating in an “unsung” part of the body - this is the start of @taimursullivan ‘s epic saxophone solo in the 2nd mvmt, “ode to the gallbladder.” you can hear the full video on my website!

this friday - i’m looking forward to being back in new york to work with the phenomenal @unheardofensemble and @tribeca.new.music on my piece “entwining” at @thedimennacenter ! program also includes music by two of my fave composers, @starkcomposer and @carminoes . here’s a whirling, colorful clip from the first movement of “entwining,” performed by music from @coplandhouse .

Can’t believe my luck that I’m part of this incredible, interdisciplinary project! New poems, the brilliance of @plnvk_ and @shaneurton plus @balletcollective !! What???!! It’s a poet’s dream to spend a year collaborating and learning with other artists. Wanna watch the dance of it all, the ballet and music of it all? NYC November 2-5 this fall. Get your soul and heart ready. Get your dancing shoes on and come watch the joy and thrill of it all!

When I heard this piece on a story Paul Novak shared, I was captivated by his elusive interplay between the two performers, such that the listener will never know who’s playing what at the beginning, until it slowly unfolds and grows. But even at the piece’s height there’s an interlocking weave between the players. A couple of week ago @anthonyleepiano and I had the pleasure of performing this in Raleigh, and we wanted to record it to capture what we had to give to the piece. Due to illness we had to mask, but the music-making part was still thrilling. Full video on YouTube! #newmusic #contemporaryclassical

from “when i was nine,” a song from my ongoing cycle about the illness i had as a kid, psychoanalysis, hysteria, and dreams. @she_squawks and @blackboxnewmusic brought this one to life so beautifully in all of its strange microtonal glory!

grateful to @pianoleary and @anthonyleepiano for this wonderful, virtuosic performance of my piano four hand piece “two dreams about water”! here’s a clip of the first movement, “swimming pool labyrinth dream 😴🌊🤿 full video will be on my website!

Paul Novak is a Chicago-based composer and flutist. His "spellbinding" (Washington Post) music immerses listeners in shimmering and subtly crafted worlds full of color, motion, light, and magic. His recent projects engage with dreams and memory, queer identity, climate change and the natural world, and psychosomatic illness. From 2026-2029, Novak will serve as composer-in-residence of the California Symphony, where he will collaborate with the orchestra and music director Donato Cabrera on three new commissions over the course of his three-season residency. His 25/26 season includes premieres and performances by Orchestra of St. Luke's, International Contemporary Ensemble, Alarm Will Sound, Chicago Composers Orchestra, the JACK, Formosa, Balourdet, Attacca, Alinea, and Varo Quartets, ZOFO, Blackbox Ensemble, and more. Novak's recent projects include forest migrations, an orchestral piece commissioned by American Composers Orchestra inspired by the movement of forests around the world in response to environmental threats; impossible inventions, commissioned by Balourdet Quartet, which reimagines a string quartet as a series of fantastical sci-fi machines; and seven dreams about my body, a “stunning fantasia” (ICIYL) suite of microtonal interludes for Blackbox Ensemble inspired by his strange recurring dreams during the pandemic. Novak’s other recent collaborators include the Reno Philharmonic, Austin Symphony, Orlando Philharmonic, Civic Orchestra of Chicago, Grossman Ensemble, Music from Copland House, DanceWorks Chicago, Sandbox Percussion, Ekmeles, Quince Ensemble, Decoda, Earplay, Musiqa, Left Coast Ensemble, cellists Dmitri Atapine and Alexander Hersh, and Quatuor Diotima. His music has been heard at Carnegie Hall, the Kennedy Center, New World Center, and Chicago's Symphony Center. Original video: /watch?v=p3mooqcHzbU If you enjoy my work, please support me by buying a coffee =) buymeacoffee.com/OanaAdrianaOltean Copyright Notice This project includes third-party video excerpts used for educational and analytical purposes. All rights remain with their respective owners. #orchestral #classicalmusic #pianomusic #contemporarymusic

grateful for these new studio portraits by oriana camara, and for a beautiful + creative month in residence @macdowell1907 ❤️ (full disclosure: i forgot that i had scheduled this shoot and accidentally dressed like a minion)

When the composer coaches you and you're literally sightreading 😱 We premiere Paul Novak's "every song has an unsung stanza" on 3/26 at Guarneri Hall!! #Unsung #whatisamerica #chicagovoices #stringquartet #commission #newmusic

Big wins for our alumni composers! ✍️🎶 Nicky Sohn ('25) has been awarded a 2026 Charles Ives Fellowship from the American Academy of Arts and Letters. This highly regarded honor recognizes young composers of extraordinary gifts and comes with a $15,000 prize. Paul Novak ('20) has been selected as the next Composer-in-Residence for the California Symphony (2026–2029). Paul will spend the next three seasons writing new works and collaborating with the orchestra. Huge congratulations to Nicky and Paul! ✨

Introducing BMI Award Winning Composer Paul Novak @plnvk_ ✨ We'll be premiering his piece "seven dreams about my body" on March 11th at @roulette_intermedium 🎶 Grab your tickets at the link in our bio, and use discount code SHAPE20 for $5 off 🎟️ See you there 🌈