2026 State of the Art Prize, Virginia

About David Dominique

Richmond, VA

David Dominique is an artist and educator based in Richmond, VA. His output spans theater, electronics, and music for instrumental ensembles, as well as political journalism and activism. With longtime collaborator, Joseph Tepperman, he is currently working on a speculative fiction multimedia opera, synthesizing contemporary politics with historical texts and literary criticism. His forthcoming instrumental album, Something Might Amount, features a live ensemble transformed through electronic processing. His past jazz ensemble albums, Mask and Ritual, have received acclaim, including NPR, LA Times, The Boston Globe, Downbeat Jazz, Jazz Times, and The National Sawdust Log. Recent projects include a chamber opera commission at the Museum of Modern Art (NYC), in collaboration with visual artist Sable Elyse Smith and an ambient/drone score for Kevin Everson’s When the Sun is Eaten (Chi’bal K’iin). Dominique is the recipient of Guggenheim and Radcliffe Fellowships, as well as recognition from the Mellon Foundation, New Music USA, MacDowell, Yaddo, Bogliasco and others. He holds a Ph.D. in Music Composition and Theory from Brandeis, where his advisors were David Rakowski and Eric Chasalow. He is currently the Sallie Gertrude Smoot Spears Associate Professor of Music at the College of William & Mary.

David Dominique is an artist and educator based in Richmond, VA. His output spans theater, electronics, and music for instrumental ensembles, as well as political journalism and activism. With longtime collaborator, Joseph Tepperman, he is currently working on a speculative fiction multimedia opera, synthesizing contemporary politics with historical texts and literary criticism. His forthcoming instrumental album, Something Might Amount, features a live ensemble transformed through electronic processing. His past jazz ensemble albums, Mask and Ritual, have received acclaim, including NPR, LA Times, The Boston Globe, Downbeat Jazz, Jazz Times, and The National Sawdust Log. Recent projects include a chamber opera commission at the Museum of Modern Art (NYC), in collaboration with visual artist Sable Elyse Smith and an ambient/drone score for Kevin Everson’s When the Sun is Eaten (Chi’bal K’iin). Dominique is the recipient of Guggenheim and Radcliffe Fellowships, as well as recognition from the Mellon Foundation, New Music USA, MacDowell, Yaddo, Bogliasco and others. He holds a Ph.D. in Music Composition and Theory from Brandeis, where his advisors were David Rakowski and Eric Chasalow. He is currently the Sallie Gertrude Smoot Spears Associate Professor of Music at the College of William & Mary.