Biography
George Cacioppo, active both as composer and educator, helped launch the ONCE Group, the Ann Arbor-based collective of 1960s composers whose members were Robert Ashley, Gordon Mumma, Donald Scavarda, Roger Reynolds, and Robert Sheff ("Blue" Gene Tyranny). Although pieces such as "Time on Time in Miracles," "Holy Ghost Vacuum," and "Cassiopeia" stand as notable experimental statements in their own right, Cacioppo exerted his greatest influence across many years of classroom instruction. When his former pupil Gérard Pape learned of Cacioppo’s death in April 1984, he wrote "In Memoriam: George Cacioppo" for eight trombones, tape, and percussion. Fellow composers who had worked with Cacioppo responded in kind, producing Robert Morris’s "Four Fold Heart Sutra," Mumma’s "Epifont," and William Albright’s "Sonata for Alto Saxophone and Piano."