Emerson Eads (b. 1980)

Dr. Emerson Eads is the Director of Choral Studies at Southern Illinois University and an American composer and conductor known for his deeply expressive works centered on themes of social justice. His music reflects a profound commitment to advocacy through art, often illuminating overlooked or urgent human rights issues.

A signature work, Mass for the Oppressed, is a striking setting of the Mass Ordinary featuring interpolated texts by his brother Evan Eads and a Credo adapted from the diary of Pope Francis. The piece was composed to raise awareness and public support for the Fairbanks Four—four Indigenous men from Eads’ hometown in Alaska who were wrongfully imprisoned for eighteen years. Continuing this thread of advocacy, his cantata …from which your laughter rises, written for the mothers of the Fairbanks Four, was performed to critical acclaim alongside Haydn’s Stabat Mater.

For more information on Dr. Eads and his compositions, please visit http://www.emersoneads.com/