The music of Charles Halka (b 1982) has been performed in the United States, Mexico, and Europe, including performances by counter)induction (New York), ÓNIX Ensamble (Mexico), the chamber choirs Jauna Muzika (Lithuania), Volti (San Francisco), and Aquarius (Belgium), Pictures on Silence (Baltimore), and the California State University Northridge Symphony, among many others. As a 2008-09 Fulbright grantee, he spent a year in Vilnius, Lithuania writing an opera with director and librettist Marija Simona Šimulynaitė. The opera, Julius, was premiered in 2010 in Vilnius, and a choral excerpt from the opera, Dipukų Rauda, was performed at the ISCM World Music Days 2012 in Belgium. In 2011, his work Round and Round was premiered at the Coolidge Auditorium of the Library of Congress.

Charles studied at schools of music and conservatories in the United States, Russia (Saint Petersburg Conservatory), and Lithuania (Lithuanian Academy of Music and Theater) and holds degrees in both piano and composition from the Peabody Conservatory. In May 2013, he will earn his Doctor of Musical Arts from Rice University. His teachers have included Michael Hersch, Judah Adashi, Richard Lavenda, Kurt Stallmann, Pierre Jalbert, and Arthur Gottschalk. Charles is Artist-in-Residence at the Foundation for Modern Music (Houston).


Composers List