Judith Dvorkin is an American composer and librettist. She also uses the pseudonym Judy Spencer. Dvorkin was born in New York and studied music at Barnard College

Barnard College

Barnard College is a private women's liberal arts college and a member of the Seven Sisters. Founded in 1889, Barnard has been affiliated with Columbia University since 1900. The campus stretches along Broadway between 116th and 120th Streets in the Morningside Heights neighborhood in the borough...

 with Otto Luening

Otto Luening

Otto Clarence Luening was a German-American composer and conductor, and an early pioneer of tape music and electronic music....

 and at Columbia University

Columbia University

Columbia University in the City of New York is a private, Ivy League university in Manhattan, New York City. Columbia is the oldest institution of higher learning in the state of New York, the fifth oldest in the United States, and one of the country's nine Colonial Colleges founded before the...

 with Luening and Elliot Carter. She continued her studies in seminars with Roger Sessions

Roger Sessions

Roger Huntington Sessions was an American composer, critic, and teacher of music.-Life:Sessions was born in Brooklyn, New York, to a family that could trace its roots back to the American revolution. His mother, Ruth Huntington Sessions, was a direct descendent of Samuel Huntington, a signer of...

 at the University of California

University of California

The University of California is a public university system in the U.S. state of California. Under the California Master Plan for Higher Education, the University of California is a part of the state's three-tier public higher education system, which also includes the California State University...

 at Berkeley

Berkeley, California

Berkeley is a city on the east shore of the San Francisco Bay in Northern California, United States. Its neighbors to the south are the cities of Oakland and Emeryville. To the north is the city of Albany and the unincorporated community of Kensington...

.

Works

Dvorkin is known for chamber opera and theater works, but also composes vocal and instrumental works. Selected works include:

• Humpty Dumpty, 1988, opera based on Alice in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll
• Blue Star, 1983, opera
• The Capitoline Venus, 1969, opera in one act after an episode in the writings of Mark Twain
  Mark Twain
  Samuel Langhorne Clemens , better known by his pen name Mark Twain, was an American author and humorist...
  
  , libretto by Judith Dvorkin
• Marpessa: A Myth, for soprano, clarinet and piano
• Cyrano based on the play by Rostand as translated by E.W. Dvorkin ca. 1964
• Maurice
• Perspectives for flute
• Song Cycle choral
• Four Women choral
• The Children for bass, flute, oboe and violin

Her work has been recorded and issued on CD, including:

• Lament for April 15, New World Records