Thomas Alexander Otto Goedecke (PhD, Music Composition), based on Maui, Hawaiʻi, is known for work that connects western and Pacific sound worlds. His creative focus centers on Indigenous languages of the Pacific and the ways they can live within traditionally western ensembles. He is committed to the continued growth and visibility of Polynesian, Asia-Pacific, and American Indigenous arts in contemporary music.

Goedecke has written for ensembles across the Pacific and the United States. These include the Cathedral Choir of St. Andrew, where he was an Orvis Choral Scholar and Composer in Residence, and wrote “When Love is the Way” for the Most Reverend Michael Curry, Presiding Bishop and Primate of the Episcopal Church; the N.E.O. Voice Festival, an experimental vocal music festival hosted in Los Angeles; Nā Wai Chamber Choir, a treble ensemble committed to the preservation, propagation, and innovation of Hawaiian choral music; Ke Aloha Pau ʻOle of Central Union Church, who premiered Messiah i ka ʻŌlelo Hawaiʻi, a Hawaiian language translation of Handel’s Messiah; Duo Yumeno, who performed Turtle and Crane for koto and cello; Pro Musica Nipponia, who performed A Space Between for shakuhachi, koto, and shamisen; Ji-young Yi, a leading master of the gayageum; TILT Ensemble, who premiered The Girl from the West for electric guitar and piano in Uzzano, Italy; the Honolulu Chorale, who premiered Kali Loa Ko e Taki Maama as the winning work of their 2015 Composer Competition; and Los Robles Master Chorale, who performed Yamabiko for the one year remembrance of the Tohoku tsunami and earthquake, winner of LRMC’s Young Composer Competition.

His academic training includes composition studies with Donald Crockett, Frank Ticheli, Stephen Hartke, Morten Lauridsen, and Veronika Krausas at the University of Southern California, completing a Bachelor of Music in composition. He later earned his Masters of Music in composition and PhD in Music at the University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa, studying with Donald Womack, Thomas Osborne, and Takuma Itoh.

Goedecke participates actively in national conversations on choral practice and culture. He has presented interest sessions at the American Choral Directors Association Western Region and Midwestern Region Conferences in 2026, and his compositions were featured in reading sessions at the ACDA Western Region Conferences in 2022 and 2024. He also leads the Nā Haku Mele Call for Scores, an initiative that supports contemporary mele composition and expands the body of Hawaiian language choral literature.

He currently serves as a tenure-track Instructor of Music at the University of Hawaiʻi Maui College, where he leads the music area and the Institute of Hawaiian Music. He continues to sing, conduct, and compose on the island of Maui, where he and his wife, Katrina, both teach.