The Lancaster Symphony Orchestra Composer Award for 2011 will be awarded to American composer Christopher Theofanidis. In 2007 he was nominated for a Grammy for best composition for his chorus and orchestra work, The Here and Now, based on the poetry of Rumi. His orchestral concert work, Rainbow Body, has been one of the most performed new orchestral works of the last ten years, having been performed by over 100 orchestras internationally. In the upcoming Lancaster Symphony Orchestra concert, May 20-22, the orchestra will perform a work of his entitled Muse, inspired by the Bach Brandenburg Concertos. We talked with Maestro Stephen Gunzenhauser about the Composer Award and about the other music on the concert, Dvorak’s Symphonic Variations and Tchaikovsky’s Piano Concerto No 1 with pianist Ivan Rudin. You can hear our conversation with the Maestro below.