Rock Of Ages – SATB

A charming devotional for mixed chorus with the first verse in women’s voices, superb revival of a loved classic hymn.
About Dr. Michael Cox

A score by Dr. Michael Cox often reflects more than the imagination of a composer. It also reveals the instincts of a pianist, the ear of a conductor, the discipline of a theorist, and the practical understanding of a teacher who knows what performers encounter when music leaves the page. Across a career spanning more than five decades, Dr. Cox has brought these perspectives together in service to students, ensembles, churches, and audiences.

His musical journey began at Oklahoma Baptist University, where he completed a Bachelor of Music with honors in piano performance in 1970. After pursuing graduate study in orchestral conducting, he returned to OBU in 1972 as a faculty member. During the next 18 years, he taught composition, conducting, music theory, and church music while helping shape the university’s active culture of performance.

For 13 years, Dr. Cox directed the Bison Glee Club, continuing a men’s choral tradition that began at OBU in 1938. His connection to the ensemble also found its way into his compositions. Lift Us Up, for SATB choir, piano, and high-voice soloist, was written for the Bison Glee Club and soloist Allen Richard. Years later, his music remained part of the ensemble’s identity: Praise Him! was composed for its 50th anniversary, while If God Is for Us was commissioned for its 75th-anniversary celebration.

That legacy continues through the Michael T. Cox Bison Glee Club Scholarship, awarded to an OBU music major who sings in the ensemble. The scholarship provides a lasting connection between Dr. Cox’s years as a professor and conductor and the students who continue the Glee Club tradition today.

In 1990, Dr. Cox moved to Fort Worth to become Professor of Music Theory and Composition at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary’s School of Church Music. He remained on the faculty until his retirement in 2009, teaching within a program devoted to preparing musicians for leadership in churches, colleges, denominational organizations, and mission settings. He also contributed to the seminary’s performing life as a conductor of the Southwestern Seminary Men’s Chorus and the Southwestern Singers.

Dr. Cox’s compositions range from practical church anthems to ambitious concert works. His four-movement Te Deum is written for eight-part choir with woodwind quintet, string quintet, piano, and percussion. Lasting approximately 15 minutes, the work demonstrates his ability to create music of substantial scale while using chamber forces rather than a full orchestra.

Other works reveal the relationships that often stand behind his music. His setting of Lancelot Andrewes’ prayer Open Thou Mine Eyes was written for the Sanctuary Singers of First Presbyterian Church in Oklahoma City. Such commissions reflect a career in which new compositions frequently grew from the needs and personalities of particular choirs, churches, conductors, and performers.

Dr. Cox’s interest in musical education has continued beyond the traditional classroom. His study-score edition of Chopin’s Étude in C-sharp minor, Op. 10, No. 4, uses a reductive analytical method to help advanced pianists recognize melodic, harmonic, and formal patterns beneath the work’s demanding surface. By guiding students from underlying structures toward Chopin’s complete score, the edition brings together Dr. Cox’s experience as a pianist, theorist, composer, and teacher.

His professional recognition includes receiving the ASCAP Standard Award annually beginning in 1987. In 1995, Dr. Cox was selected as the commissioned composer of the Texas Music Teachers Association, joining a program established to support the creation and premiere of new American music.

Alongside his composing and teaching, Dr. Cox has conducted student, church, community, and orchestral musicians. His experience includes choral clinics across the country, Oklahoma Baptist University’s Concerto-Aria Competition, and guest appearances with the Fort Worth Civic Orchestra and the New Philharmonic Orchestra of Irving. He currently serves as Composer-in-Residence at Broadway Baptist Church in Fort Worth.

Dr. Cox earned a Master of Music in orchestral conducting from the University of Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music and a Doctor of Music in composition from Florida State University. He has also worked as a music copyist and engraver—an exacting craft that complements a career devoted to every stage of music-making, from the first structural idea to the score placed before a performer.