Home » Member Page
Dorian Wallace
Composer, pianist, music therapist.
About Me
Dorian Wallace is a composer, pianist, and music therapist who explores music's healing
qualities in therapeutic work, social action, and community engagement. His practice
integrates contemporary classical composition, free improvisation, and a deep
commitment to fostering meaningful, emotionally resonant experiences.
Dorian's compositions often engage with sociopolitical, emotional, and psychological
themes. He has had the privilege of collaborating with artists like Paul Pinto, Pamela Z,
Bonita Oliver, and John Sanborn. His music draws from experimentalism, expressionism,
romanticism, and rhythmic complexity, creating thought-provoking, cathartic works.
Alongside violinist Hajnal Pivnick, Dorian co-founded NYC-based new music collective
Tenth Intervention. They have performed live silent film scores at venues like Nitehawk
Cinema, Threes Brewing, and the late Videology. He accompanies the Sing In Solidarity
chorus, amplifying activists, marginalized communities, and international labor and
decolonial movements.
His music therapy work extends to people incarcerated at Rikers Island, Crossroads
Juvenile Detention Center, and Sing Sing Correctional Facility; survivors of cults through
the Lalich Center for Cults and Coercion; and patients on hospice care at Calvary
Hospital. He integrates dynamic listening, improvisation, and lyric analysis to support
trauma-informed, liberation-centered therapeutic spaces. His Liberation Music Therapy
concept has been presented at institutions such as Columbia University, the Trauma
Research Foundation, Montclair State University, the University of Louisville, and
Loughborough University, among others. He leads workshops for adult film workers
through Pineapple Support, activists experiencing burnout through the Democratic
Socialists of America, and people transitioning out of insular communities with
Footsteps.
Dorian is an active dance and ceremony accompanist who creates responsive
soundscapes to support movement, storytelling, and rituals. He teaches a course at the
Martha Graham School to deepen professional dancers' relationship with musicality.
Dorian's work as a composer, pianist, and therapist remains committed to exploring the
ways music can facilitate connection, healing, and social change.
