When Nancy Hill Cobb was 15 years old, she started writing arrangements and compositions for her church youth choir. Already the choir’s accompanist, she had a keen interest in being involved in church music, and that led her to matriculate at Oklahoma Baptist University (OBU) in Shawnee, Oklahoma. It was the golden age of church music, and she was steeped in great oratorio and anthem literature. While she began her college studies as a music education major with a piano emphasis, success in music theory and aural skills plus professor compliments on creative assignments for those classes led her to break the news to her parents that she was going to pursue a composition/theory degree, one that would not guarantee employment after college.
After receiving her Bachelor of Music Degree in Composition she completed a Master of Music in Composition at Michigan State University. Her 44-year career in academia started at Mercer University, but after one year she returned to her alma mater, OBU, where she taught for 26 years, receiving her Doctor of Musical Arts in Composition at the University of Oklahoma along the way. It was at OBU that her choral publications (many being sacred) began to be published and performed nationwide. Most of her final years in academia were spent as an administrator, including being the Director of the School of Music at Indiana State University. In 2013, she was appointed Associate Provost for Faculty at the University of Northern Iowa, a position she held until 2017 when she decided to spend the last two years of her academic career teaching composition and aural skills in the School of Music.
Cobb’s published choral compositions have been performed throughout the United States and worldwide, including in Denmark, New Zealand, Japan, France, and Germany. Her choral/orchestral work “Threnody” won the honor of Special Distinction in the 1999 ASCAP Rudolph Nissim Orchestral Competition. Postponed for a year because of the pandemic, in July 2021, her most recent large composition premiered at the Gallagher Bluedorn Performing Arts Center in Cedar Falls: a full-length musical entitled The Suffragist (book and lyrics by Cavan Hallman). The cast and production staff were comprised of a combination of Broadway stars and Eastern Iowa music and theater professionals and students.
When Cobb enthusiastically accepted the commission to write a work for Orchestra Iowa’s Centennial, she pondered for some time what direction she should take the piece. She wanted the work to be both reflective and celebratory. Given Orchestra Iowa’s distinction of being the oldest orchestra in Iowa, it seemed fitting to honor both familiar history and that of the land before Iowa became part of the Westward expansion. Cast in two movements, “Shades and Illumination” is Cobb’s attempt to present both reflection and celebration. “Shades” begins with ethereal gestures from which a lyrical line emerges and takes over. That lyrical line is soon infused with tension coming from polychordal structures (multiple independent chords) and an ominous bass line. After that tension reaches its pinnacle, there is a return to the original gestures, but they are transformed into a more hopeful sound. “Illuminaton” is a rollicking celebration cast in a rondo-like structure marked by a recurring jubilant theme. The movement is filled with changing meters, rhythmic and harmonic surprises, more polychords and soaring melodies. She invites audience members to extract their own meaning of Cedar Rapids’ place and time from the melodies, rhythms, chords and orchestral colors they hear.
Program notes by Nancy Hill Cobb