Biography
Nancy Reale Gifford is a choral musician and composer from Doylestown, Pennsylvania. A native of New Jersey, she graduated with honors from Rutgers University, New Brunswick, NJ with a BA in Music. Her concentration was piano performance, with certification to teach music. In 2013 Nancy earned a Master of Music degree in Composition with distinction from Westminster Choir College, Princeton, New Jersey. In addition to the composition major, many courses were in the areas of Conducting and Sacred Music.
Nancy has taught music and directed choirs in southeastern Pennsylvania for more than thirty years, where she visits local schools and churches as a guest composer/clinician. She composes on a commissioned basis and also has written for her choral groups. She founded the Girl Choir at Our Lady of Mt. Carmel Church, Doylestown, Pennsylvania and is a member of the Bucks County Choral Society.
The music of Nancy Gifford is listed in the catalogs of Hinshaw Music, Morningstarmusic, Santa Barbara Music, Choristers Guild, Galaxy Music, ECSchirmer, and the Lorenz Corporation. Several of her pieces have received national awards, including an award by the American Composers Forum and VocalEssence.
A member of ASCAP in both composer and author categories, Nancy often writes original texts for her music. Passages from Scripture or from classical poetry (Keats, Mary Coleridge, Langston Hughes) are also her inspiration, and she chooses texts which seem to sing on their own.
Nancy has been a writer, director, and cast member with State Street Players, Doylestown, since 2013.
Nancy Gifford and her husband/patron John Humphreys have three grown children who have all sung in her choirs, six grandchildren, and a cat.