When it comes to sources of inspiration, Indiana-native composer Doug Opel rules out nothing: "Pretty much anything goes. The only criterion I have is that the idea has to stick. If I lose sleep over it, that's when I know it's worth the writing." Drawing from a seemingly bottomless pool of wide-ranging styles and genres - very often for a single work - he creates a strange and wonderful sort of musical stew for the concert stage that incorporates everything from rock, to jazz, to electronica and more. The end result is a music that is at once dark and humorous, controlled and chaotic, reflective and passionate, traditional and contemporary.

Doug holds a Bachelor's degree in music education from Ball State University (1990) where he studied piano with Pia Sebastiani and composition with Ernesto Pellegrini, at the same time receiving lessons from composer David Foley. During this period he also received a fellowship in musicology for transcribing early sacred music from the Italian Renaissance period. He then moved to Ann Arbor where he received his Master's degree in composition from the University of Michigan (1993) again studying piano, this time with Dickran Atamian, and composition with Kamran Ince, George B. Wilson and William Albright as his primary mentors. In 2002, he completed his Doctoral degree in composition at Indiana University where he studied under Don Freund, Jeff Hass, Eugene O'Brien and Claude Baker. He has also studied with U.K. composers Oliver Knussen and Colin Matthews.

His music has been performed at New York City's MATA Festival, the Pianoforte Salon Series in Chicago, the Scotia Festival of Music, the Aldeburgh Festival at the Britten-Pears School for Advanced Music Studies, by the Duquesne Contemporary Ensemble and the Fort Wayne Philharmonic. Broadcast radio appearances include the CBC, WMBC's "art@radio" in Baltimore and WFMT in Chicago. Past commissions include works for the MATA Micro-Orchestra, the Fort Wayne Philharmonic and bass-baritone Timothy Jones.

In 2003, he became one of seven composers to receive the Aaron Copland Award, a residency that allows up-and-coming composers to work uninterrupted and in privacy at Copland House - the last home of Aaron Copland located in the Peekskill area of New York state.

Doug's most recent work, "3 preludes to missing the point" was recently released on the American Composers Forum's Innova label as part of a larger collection of piano works commissioned, performed, published and recorded by pianist Nicola Melville.