Each concert Friends After Good Sound seeks to work with three composers from around the Portland Oregon Area. WE LOVE OUR COMPOSERS. We consider them to be a vital part of our collective, helping us better showcase the ingenious art Porltand has to offer. Below is a list of those who have or will be working with us.

Betty Booher studies composition at Portland State University with Professor Renée Favand-See and jazz voice with Professor Sherry Alves. In combining jazz studies with her classical background, Betty incorporates influences from both in her compositions, often including vocal parts and improvisation in her chamber music. Her double reed quartet, The Emmett Variations, was a recent winner of the international Double Reed Society’s 50 for 50 competition and was featured at the IDRS convention last July. Returning to school had been a longtime goal, and she’s delighted to have the chance to tell stories through her music.

(Wrote Creating Good Sounds together for FAGS Summer 25’)

Francisco Botello is a Mexican/American sound artist and educator born and raised in Chula Vista, California. Growing up a dual citizen on the dividing line between the United States and Mexico, their work reflects on the nature of place and belonging. Gathering and composing with field recordings, alongside electronics and computer music tools, they explore questions of identity, ancestry, geography, change, and loss. Recently, they have been experimenting with gestural control and working with immersive, multi-channel sound systems as ways to connect their work more intimately with their body and audience. Their multi-channel work has been showcased at places such as Oregon Center for Contemporary Art, PNCA, Portland Art Museum as well as many other community spaces.

(Wrote Threshold No. 1 for Viola, Cello, Accordion and Harmonium for FAGS Winter 25’)

Frances Bigelow is a Seattle-based composer and coloratura soprano. She holds a dual Bachelor of Music degree from Portland State University, where she studied composition with Renée Favand-See and voice with Christine Meadows. Her work has been performed by groups including the Choral Chameleon Ensemble and the Portland Symphonic Choir. She has performed variously as a soloist and chorister with PSU Opera, Queer Opera, PSU Rose & Thorn, Kirkland Choral Society, and the Oregon Symphony. Her primary interest is in writing for voices, whether that be choral music, art song, or opera.

(Wrote XYZ for FAGS Winter 25’)

Michael Anderson is a composer based in Portland Oregon. He is ever curious how something gross becomes delectable, how one situation lends itself into the creation of another, and how an ecosystem based in the familiar gets warped into the unknown. These types of psycho-emotional reactions to sound are what inspires him to make odd little jewels of electroacoustic creation. Michael studied with Renee Favand-See at Portland State University where he received his Bachelors of Music Composition. In early 2024 he created Friends After Good Sound, a new music collective focused on premiering new works by local composers.

(Wrote Pundit for FAGS Winter 25’)