CU Boulder welcomes multidisciplinarian Stratøs to College of Music faculty

Aspiring career musicians need to prepare for a constantly shifting scene, one that bears little resemblance to the music industry of even a decade ago. It’s a reality that Stratøs knows well, and one that the incoming assistant teaching professor of composition at the CU Boulder College of Music is eager to impart to his students. 

Stratøs is a true multidisciplinarian: A saxophonist, composer, producer, photographer and cinematographer, the Michigan native has earned honors, plaudits and accolades across a spectrum of art forms and disciplines.

From his work as a saxophonist on film scores, to his musical contributions to in-game video soundtracks, to his role as a composer of ambitious works for jazz chamber orchestras, Stratøs has adjusted to a professional musical landscape that demands flexibility, deftness and resourcefulness: Skills that are sure to benefit his students here—and that align with the College of Music’s approach to developing universal musicians who are well-equipped to participate in the 21st century as artists, educators and scholars; as broadly based professionals with flexible career options; and as passionate, compassionate world citizens. 

“One of the things that I’m passionate about is giving students the facility to develop their own personal sound with as much information, as much detail as they possibly can,” Stratøs says. “The modern musician is someone who might have a lot of varying interests in fields that may be outside of music. As someone who lives in those spaces a lot, I want to help students bring those influences to bear. I want to help them get an understanding of themselves as musicians.

“That’s something I try to teach—how to be adaptable. You have inspiration from other mediums to draw upon,” he adds.

That lesson is also valuable for students through a creative lens, Stratøs says. Just as the business side of the music industry has fundamentally changed over recent decades, so has the nature of composition. Creative silos have disappeared within a music industry that’s no longer distinct and separate from other creative pursuits. Film melds into music, which blends into social media soundtracks and video game scores. Visual arts flow into the music behind a reel or a TikTok video; a song or a snippet of melody is likely to be inextricably tied to images, film or virtual artwork for a modern consumer. In the age of social media, artificial intelligence and immediate music distribution, the lines that long separated disciplines have collapsed.

“I finished my master’s in 2020, and I was thrust into an ever-changing music industry from the beginning,” Stratøs notes. “I think a lot of people in my specific class, in my generation of artists—we're all faced with a unique task. The music industry doesn’t exist anymore, what are we going to do?”

For Stratøs, the answer came in drawing on a wealth of creative skills and threads, finding inroads among art forms and acclimating to a media landscape in which music rarely stands on its own. As he heads to Boulder to inspire incoming composition students beginning spring 2026, he wants to help them fuse mediums and find musical inspiration in unlikely places.

“When I looked at the job description for this position, it was describing exactly what I do,” he says. “Someone adept in composition and music production—a synthesis, someone who uses both of those disciplines to make their art. For example, if you’re working on photography as well as music, your photography informs your composition.

“That’s something that I hope to bring and work on with the students.”