BIOGRAPHY
Based in New York City, Mason Bynes is a composer, vocalist, and multimedia artist. After growing up in Houston, TX she finds her inspiration and influences from gospel, R&B, rock, funk, and acoustic music. Her compositions blend these genres together, bringing different listeners, different people, together. She received her Master of Music in Composition from the Boston Conservatory at Berklee, and she also holds a Bachelor of Music in composition from the University of North Texas.
Mason’s musical curiosity fuels her pursuit of collaboration in a variety of artistic mediums, including film, spoken word, music for acoustic performance, and even the culinary arts. In her latest artistic season, she's enjoyed a variety of premieres and releases of her music, including: her first operetta with Boston Lyric Opera, in collaboration with Boston's Poet Loreate, Porsha Olayiwola, and Castle of Our Skins; the release of her brass quartet piece "For Rosa" on The Westerlies' latest album, MOVE; and the premiere of her music by Art of Elan for a new film by British-American visual artist, Daniel Dean. The Washington Master Chorale recently awarded Bynes the inaugural Florence Price Prize and premiered her new choral work, "Dust Bowl", last fall.
Her passion for bringing listeners together has sparked a variety of commissions with various ensembles and composer led initiatives, including: The National Association of Teachers of Singing (NATS), Ex-Aequo, Bass Players for Black Composers, Boston Art Song Society, Philadelphia Chamber Music Society, WindSync, Emmanuel Music, Parlando, The National Youth Orchestra of Great Britain, and Lumedia Musicworks. Mason’s music has been featured with Bang On a Can, the North End Music and Performing Arts Center (NEMPAC), the International Society of Bassists, Dallas Opera, Fort Worth Opera, BBC Radio 3, IDAGIO Live, and Green Leaf Music Podcast. She has also appeared in different interviews with Soundboard Magazine, Boston's The Scope, CBS, NBC -DFW and Fox 4News. Additionally, Mason was honored to have been the University of North Texas College of Music's 2021 Commencement Speaker.
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In addition to serving on the film/tv composition team at Raging Cloud Studios, Bynes currently serves as a Career Development Counselor at New York University after years of coaching emerging artists at Berklee College of Music in Boston. When she's not composing, you can usually find her cooking for her friends or pounding the pavement in the city. This season, Mason is looking forward to the reprise of her work "The Wanderer's Tethering" with Castle of Our Skins.