Seth Boustead, composer and cofounder of Access Contemporary Music

Seth Boustead is a composer, pianist, and arts manager. Raised by a single mother in Missouri and Arizona, Boustead studied composition at the University of Missouri, then moved to Chicago in 1995. In 2004, he cofounded the nonprofit Access Contemporary Music (ACM), where he still serves as executive director. ACM works to foster a public understanding of classical music as a living tradition open to new players and diverse voices, not a relic that belongs to dead white men in strange wigs.

In 2015, ACM launched Thirsty Ears, Chicago’s only street festival devoted to classical music. This year’s Thirsty Ears takes place on Saturday and Sunday, August 23 and 24, on Wilson between Hermitage and Ravenswood.

In September, ACM will open a venue called the CheckOut in a forme