Vanessa Rose comes to Minnesota via New York City's American Composers Orchestra. (Photo by Julia Gang)

The American Composers Forum will have a new leader come January. The organization issued a statement on Tuesday, announcing the appointment of Vanessa Rose as president and CEO.

Rose currently resides in New York City, where she works as an expert consultant on emerging composers with the American Composers Orchestra's EarShot program. An ACF board member since 2018, she has served on grant panels for the Aaron Copland Fund for Music, Opera America's Female Composer Discovery Grants and the Brooklyn Arts Council. She previously worked in fundraising for the Metropolitan Opera and the League of American Orchestras.

"The American Composers Forum's commitment to nurturing the rich ecosystem that supports composers links to my own experiences and passions," Rose said in a statement.

Rose stood out, explained ACF board chair Anne LeBaron, for her years of experience working with "contemporary music ensembles that are fiercely committed to supporting the music of living composers." Rose replaces John Nuechterlein, retiring December 31 after 15 years as the organization's president and CEO.

A violinist by training, Rose inherits an organization whose members work in virtually every musical genre — including classical, world music, opera, music theater, electroacoustic and jazz. According to LeBaron, Rose will be tasked with boosting the group's national and even international presence.

The American Composers Forum already has an impressive national reach, though, with 2,000 members nationwide. But its roots are solidly Minnesotan. Founded in 1973 by Twin Cities composers Libby Larsen and Stephen Paulus — when both were still University of Minnesota students — the ACF is a membership-based service organization that supports the careers of living composers in all 50 states via grants, commissions, education and performance programs.