What I do
Director, Producer, Composer / Music, Educator, Festival / Organization
Country
United States
State / Region
California
Experience level
Educator
About Me
Denise is an independent artist, composer, producer, arranger, and music publisher on her record label Dancing Horses Music. She lives in Southern California. Her latest studio album is "Winds of Change", released in November of 2019.
Denise grew up in the suburbs just outside St. Louis, Missouri. Playing by ear at age 4 and beginning formal lessons at age five, she started composing original music in her early teens. Denise holds a Bachelor of Science in Music Therapy (a double major in music and psychology), and a Master of Arts in Psychology.
She composes original piano-centered instrumental music that combines a contemporary style with arrangements that often include bass, cello, violin, vocalizations, percussion, acoustic and classical guitar, English horn, clarinet, and other wind instruments. Her musical influences include, Hans Zimmer, Rachel Portman, John Williams, Michael Nymann, Chopin, Mozart, and Beethoven.
Her musical accomplishments include three studio albums of original music, a music score for a full-length documentary, Broadway Treasures (2019), and original scores for three short films, two were shown at the LA Short Film Festival. Her music has earned two nominations for Best Piano Album by Zone Music Reporter, and one nomination for Best New Age album by Just Plain Folks. On the Zone Music Reporter top 100 radio airplay chart, her album Something You Dream Of… charted at number two, and her album Passionata charted at number three.
Her passion, some say her calling, is composing music that connects with people and helps them emotionally. For her university graduating project, and at the request of the University’s program director, Denise started the first music therapy program for a division of the Missouri Department of Mental Health.
After graduating and completing her internship, Denise worked as a music therapist in Los Angeles California. She soon found herself specializing in treating autistic and special-needs children from diverse economic, cultural, and ethnic backgrounds.
Some of the parents worked in the music and film industry. At this time, she also began teaching piano to children during her off hours that included two children and the wife of a well-known celebrity.
For a girl who grew up in Missouri riding a quarter horse gelding named Bombay, it was a dream adventure to find herself working as a music therapist in Los Angeles, driving along streets with names like Mulholland drive and Coldwater Canyon with her guitar and keyboard in the passenger seat of her red two-seater sports car on her way to see clients.
