degree in 1955 from the Mannes School of Music, having studied with Felix Salzer, Roy Travis, and Roger Sessions.
[4] He received his master's in music from the Hartt School in 1958, studying under Arnold Franchetti and Goffredo Petrassi.
[7] Winning early acclaim for his avant-garde music (principally published by C. F. Peters), he felt trapped by the prevailing orthodoxies and moved to California in 1970, beginning a period of wandering during which he also studied Buddhism and Anthroposophy.
In 1981 he settled in Sacramento and resumed composition at his former prolific rate, having newly embraced a neotonal musical language.
He won awards from the Boston Symphony Orchestra, the Pacifica Foundation,[9] and the National Institutes of Arts and Letters.