# Alexandra Pierce

alexandra pierce (born February 21, 1934) is an American composer, pianist, music theorist, movement educator, author, and Emerita Research Professor of Music and Movement at the University of Redlands. == Biography == Born and raised in Philadelphia, her family later moved to Washington, D.C., where she studied piano with contemporary music specialist, Margaret Tolson. She received a Bachelor of Music, Phi Beta Kappa (1955), from the University of Michigan, where she majored in piano performance and medieval history; a Master of Music in piano performance from the New England Conservatory of Music (1958); a Master of Arts in music history from Harvard University (1959); and a Ph.D. in music theory and composition from Brandeis University (1968), where her teachers included composers Irving Fine and Harold Shapero.