Spark Artist

Ethan Gans-Morse is a critically acclaimed composer and producer based in Southern Oregon best known for the opera The Canticle of the Black Madonna, which The Oregonian called “A huge achievement… generous, carefully crafted and supremely compassionate."

He focuses on socially relevant projects that foster greater human connection, often in collaboration with his wife, the poet and artist Tiziana DellaRovere. Recent commissions include Bomb Shelter Variations for Grammy-winning pianist Nadia Shpachenko; Dreams Have No Borders, an operatic film developed with members of the Mexican-American community; Six Feet Apart: Stories of Resilience and Transformation, an oratorio based on real-life Covid stories; How Can You Own The Sky?, a Native American program symphony that was "the fruit of an extraordinary collaboration aimed at bridging two cultures" (Oregon Coast Today); and Tango of the White Gardenia, about which Oregon Arts Watch wrote, "Its messages are loud and clear and humane, and the art is fine enough to carry them."

Writing about Dreams Have No Borders, former LA Times critic Lucie Scheuer called it: “A masterwork… [that] reaches into your solar plexus and doesn’t let go... It isn’t just art; it teaches us about the resiliency of the human spirit.”

Gans-Morse's works have been performed by the Walla Walla Symphony, the Siletz Bay Festival Orchestra, the Rogue Valley Symphony, Bend Opera, the Portland Vocal Consort, Chorus Austin, and the 3C Ensemble in LA, and at such venues as the Seattle Opera Center, the Portland Center for the Arts, and festivals around the U.S. and abroad.