Dolly Gray Landon

Acclaimed composer Gary Lloyd Noland (who goes by the anagrammatic nom de plume Dolly Gray Landon as a writer of plays and fiction) was born in Seattle in 1957 and grew up in Berkeley. As an adolescent, Noland lived for a time in Salzburg (Mozart's birthplace) and Garmisch-Partenkirchen (home of Richard Strauss), where he absorbed a host of musical influences. Having studied with a long roster of well-known composers and musicians, he earned his undergraduate degree in Music from UC Berkeley in 1979, continued his studies at the Boston Conservatory, and earned his graduate degrees in Music Composition from Harvard University in 1989. Noland's catalog consists of hundreds of works, which include solo piano, vocal, chamber, orchestral, experimental, and electronic pieces, as well as full-length plays in verse, "chamber novels," and graphically notated scores. His critically acclaimed, award-winning 77-hour long Gesamtkunstwerk, JAGDLIED: A CHAMBER NOVEL FOR NARRATOR, MUSICIANS, PANTOMIMIST, DANCERS & CULINARY ARTISTS (Op. 20), was listed as the Number One Book of 2018 by Amy's Bookshelf Reviews. His 39 Variations on an Original Theme in F Major for solo piano (Op. 98) is, at approximately two hours duration, one of the lengthiest and most challenging sets of solo piano variations in the history of the genre. It has been described by American composer Ernesto Ferreri as "a historical variation set for piano, a true descendant of the Goldbergs and Diabellis, beautifully targeted to an apotheosis of supreme grandeur." Recent projects by Noland have included settings of poems by American novelist/poet/essayist Alexander Theroux in various vocal/instrumental combinations. Gary resides in the Portland, Oregon metro area.