About Maddie Grills
Maddie Grills is a Los Angeles-based media composer and vocal arranger. In July 2023, she received her Masters of Music in Film Music Composition at the Pacific Northwest Film Scoring Program in partnership with the Seattle Film Institute. Studying under Hummie Mann, she worked as a composer on several student films with both live and remote recording sessions and rounded out the year by composing, orchestrating, and conducting for a 52-piece orchestra.
In 2021, she received a BFA in Music Composition and Digital Media Production from Tulane University in New Orleans with a minor in Gender and Sexuality Studies. During her time at Tulane, she spent her final semester working on her honors thesis in music composition, “Nova:” a 10-movement, 30-minute narrative piece about processing grief. As a student she also worked as a composer, sound supervisor, and sound editor on several student films. She was also a member and music director of Tulane University Ladies Acapella, running rehearsals and creating acapella arrangements. At Tulane, Maddie was a member of Newcomb Scholars, a cohort honors program for undergraduate women through which she has published a case study in the Newcomb Institute’s Women Leading Change journal on the representation of women composers in the film industry.
Originating in Tampa, Florida, Maddie has been playing piano since 2003, singing in choirs since 2006, and composing since 2010. In 2016, she attended the Young Composers Program at University of Southern Florida, premiering two pieces. Later that year, she was commissioned to write “The Sound of Peace” for the Berkeley Preparatory School Lower Division Choir. In 2019, she attended and performed three times at the Orfeo Music Festival in Sterzing-Vipiteno, Italy as a solo and accompanying pianist. In 2021 she spent six weeks at the Atlantic Music Festival in Waterville, Maine, studying composition and film scoring, having pieces performed by the Contemporary Ensemble and read by the AMF orchestra. Currently she works as a freelance acapella arranger, receiving commissions for acapella arrangements from TULA, as well as other groups.
