Tony Conrad Author

Tony Conrad (1940–2016) was a musician, composer, filmmaker, and teacher. After completing his degree in mathematics at Harvard in 1963, Conrad moved to New York where he collaborated with the director Jack Smith on Flaming Creatures; with La Monte Young, Marian Zazeela, and John Cale in the Theatre of Eternal Music; and with his partner Beverly Grant on a series of important structural films including Coming Attractions and Straight and Narrow. In 1976, Conrad joined the new Media Study Department at SUNY-Buffalo, where he was an influential professor and artist across film, video, public access television, music, protest, and visual art for the rest of his career.

Patrick Nickleson is Assistant Professor of Musicology at the University of Alberta, where his work explores theories of authorship, ownership, and collaboration in experimental musics. His past writing on Conrad has been published in Twentieth Century Music, the Journal of the Royal Musical Association, and in his book The Names of Minimalism: Authorship, Art Music, and Historiography in Dispute.