Composer, percussionist and technologist, Thom graduated from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in 1997 with a BA in Music and Philosophy, where he received the Thelma Thompson Award for Composition. He subsequently served on the percussion faculty of UNC-CH and worked as an audio engineer before starting graduate work in composition at Duke University where he received an MA (2006) and PhD (2010) in composition.
He is active as a composer and performer having composed both acoustic and electronic music for Burning Coal Theater Company and Duke Theater Studies productions and performed with Duke's Encounters New Music series, Duke/UNC Milestones Festival, Peace College Chamber Singers and Mallarmé Chamber Players. Thom is also a member of pulsoptional, a composers’ collective and new music ensemble based in Durham, NC. In addition to playing percussion and composing for the group, Thom engineered their self-titled debut CD as well as the title track of composer Christopher Adler's CD, Ecstatic Volutions in a Neon Haze, performed by pulsoptional. He worked with renowned ethnomusicologist Paul Berliner to record, edit and mix the audio included in Berliner's comprehensive publication on the Mbira Dzavadzimu, music of Zimbabwe, published by Chicago University Press in 2013.
Thom's music has been performed across North America and abroad and is published by Studio 4 Music, Keyboard Percussion Publications and FuguFish publishing (ASCAP).
He is currently Assistant Professor of Music at the Ernestine M. Raclin School of the Arts at Indiana University South Bend.
Fun Fact: The composition for Road to Hope marks Thom’s first experience in composing for film.