“Music sets the tone and feel for a film or television presentation, and Mihai has a unique talent to enhance the quality of storytelling.” Darren Lashelle, WGTE Public Media Television
Award-winning composer and educator Mihai Popean received degrees from Bowling Green State University of Ohio, USA (DMA and MM), and West University of Timisoara, Romania (BM). His teachers include Distinguished Artist Professor Marilyn Shrude, Mikel Kuehn, Elainie Lillios, Doctor Honoris Causa Remus Georgescu and Constantin Rîpă, Professor Emeritus Vasile Beluska (Violin), Professor Emeritus Vernon Wolcott (organ), Ecaterina Bothar (viola) and Russell Schmidt (jazz) as well as Distinguished Research Professor Verner Bingman and Professor Patricia Sharp (neuroscience/music cognition).
Mihai Popean is the first post-revolution Romanian composer to write, promote and give live concerts for wide audiences with electronic music in non-conventional spaces in Romania (first-ever electronic music concerts in the Turda Saltmine, Tonitza Gallery within the National Museum of Art in Cluj-Napoca, Transylvania Expo Tech Transfer Festival, etc.). His works and performances encompass a wide range of musical genres, and have been featured on TV and radio stations in Romania and the USA. In 2010 he was a co-producer for one episode (Star Formation) and composer of the original title song for the Emmy Award-winning Plugged-In science show (WGTE Public Media Television, Toledo, Ohio, USA).
Popean’s works have received awards and performances (ATEM New Music Ensemble 2017, Detroit Symphony Concert Orchestra 2015, All-State Orchestra 2012-2015, Alarm Will Sound reading of Twittering Machine in 2012, Toledo Symphony Youth Orchestra commission 2010, winner of the Bowling Green State University Concerto Competition 2008, 1st Prize for The University of Toledo Craig’s Piano Competition 2007, Maximilian Kolbe Theater Play original soundtrack commission for the 2001 Colloque Internationale Ionesco après Ionesco in Cluj-Napoca, Romania, the Grand Prize of The Metal Fan Gala 1992) and were featured in Contemporary Music Festivals such as TIMSONIA (2018), INTRADA – Remus Georgescu (2018), MUSICAL TIMISOARA (2018), Ohio Northern University (2008), Heidelberg University (2007) and the University of Toledo (2007).
Other honors include CMA Distinguished Document/Thesis Award 2016, Teacher of the Year 2006-2007, Educator of the Year 2006, and several nominations for Who’s Who Among American Teachers. During 2001-2006 he was the orchestra director and piano teacher at Eau Claire High School in Columbia, South Carolina. Research interests include the Tibetan Yang musical notation based on research completed at Rangjung Yeshe Institute CBS from Kathmandu University in Nepal (2015-2016) and transdisciplinary research in music composition, education, musicology, cognition, medicine and artificial intelligence.
Currently he is an Associate Professor Doctor Habilitatus at the Faculty of Music & Theatre from the West University of Timisoara (WUT) where he teaches music harmony, 20th-century music analysis, music technology, academic ethics and integrity, and the methodology of dissertation research and elaboration. He is also the Director of the Doctoral School of Music and Theater, the Music & Transdisciplinary Research Center as well as the MUSiQ research journal at WUT.