Eastman News Highlights February 9, 2015

Eastman School Professor, Alumnus win Grammys

(WROC TV Channel 8 02/09/2015)

Two people with ties to the Eastman School of Music won Grammy Awards Sunday!

Robert Ludwig won three Grammys, including the award in the Best Engineered Album (Non-Classical) category for “Morning Phase” by Beck. He also won in the Best Surround Sound Album for Beyoncé and Best Album, as Master Engineer with Beck.

Paul O’Dette won for Best Opera Recording for an album of a French Baroque opera.

The Eastman School of Music is no stranger to the Grammys. Countless alumni, including Ludwig, have walked down the red carpet for the star-studded event before. Ludwig says he’ll never forget his first win.

“I remember when I got my first Grammy; people were kidding me, they said, ‘you know when you win a Grammy, it changes your obituary forever,'” jested Ludwig. “Your obituary always starts out as ‘Grammy winner.'” (Also reported by WXXI )

In NYC’s Premiere Music Conference, One Old School Presents New, Groundbreaking Ideas
(Music School Central © 02/03/2015)

It’s compelling to see a music school frequently associated with tradition break out of its mold, daring to present unheard ideas that will better serve our professional musicians of tomorrow.

At New York City’s premiere music conference, Chamber Music America, that is exactly what the world-renowned Eastman School of Music did.

Rupert returns to conduct Youth Symphony Orchestra

(Washington Post 02/01/2015)

Anne Rupert is returning to the Youth Orchestras of Prince William as the conductor of the Youth Symphony Orchestra.

Rupert, a cellist and graduate of the Eastman School of Music in Rochester, N.Y., has spent the past several seasons focused on directing the high school and advanced middle school orchestras at Robinson Secondary School in Fairfax. John Devlin, who served as the music director and YSO conductor in her absence, is leaving.

Classical concert set to go with the winds
(The Detroit News © 01/30/2015)

The Detroit Chamber Winds and Strings, whose members are culled mostly from the Detroit Symphony Orchestra and the Michigan Opera Theatre Orchestra, will also import another Northwestern pedagogue, Mallory Thompson, to conduct the performance. Thompson is a music professor and coordinator of conducting at the university. In addition, she conducts the school’s Symphonic Wind Ensemble and, outside the university, she’s artistic director of the Chicago-area Northshore Concert Band.

A Minneapolis native, Thompson says her upcoming concert here has a strong German/Austrian bent with music by Beethoven, Stamitz, Hindemith and Schubert, along with selections from “Miniatures,” a world-premiere piece for wind quintet by the young American composer and clarinetist Theo Chandler.

“It’s an arrangement of a Stamitz cello concerto by Verne Reynolds, the former horn teacher at the Eastman School of Music,” explains Thompson, who earned her doctorate at Eastman.

“It’s a very lyrical piece that translates beautifully to the horn,” she adds.

Acclaimed Tenor Presents Concert at Weymouth

(The Pilot 02/02/2015)

American tenor Anthony Dean Griffey has captured critical and popular acclaim on opera, concert and recital stages around the world. Griffey appears for the first time at Weymouth Center for the Arts & Humanities on Sunday, Feb. 15.

Griffey holds degrees from Wingate University, the Eastman School of Music, the Juilliard School and was a member of the Metropolitan Opera’s Lindemann Young Artists Program. He was awarded the Doctorate of Humane Letters from Wingate University in May 2012, and was also inducted into the North Carolina Music Hall of Fame in 2011. He currently holds the position of Distinguished Artist in Residence at the University of North Carolina School of the Arts.

Smith to Present Preview of Carnegie Hall Recital at Lee University Feb. 13

(The Chatanoogan 02/04/2015)

Dr. Cahill Smith, assistant professor of music at Lee, will present a preview of his upcoming Carnegie Hall piano recital for the School of Music faculty recital on Friday, Feb. 13, at 7:30 p.m. in Squires Recital Hall.

Dr. Smith’s upcoming performance, which will mark his third appearance at Carnegie, will take place in March. The program is titled “Forgotten Melodies” and is presented by the Eastman School of Music in a series called “Eastman in New York.” Dr. Smith’s program includes pieces by well-known as well as rare composers, including Scarlatti, Mozart, and Liszt alongside Sebastian Currier and Nikolai Medtner.

Dr. Smith holds a doctorate from the Eastman School of Music, a master’s from the University of Michigan, and a bachelor’s from the University of Alabama at Birmingham. While at the Eastman School of Music, he served as the teaching assistant to Natalya Antonova and was inducted into Pi Kappa Lambda honor society for his academic achievements and contributions to the musical community.

Saxony grad earns praise for ‘West Side Story’ performance

(Southeast Missourian 01/30/2015)

Locally grown talent Paige Kiefner pulled down strong reviews as Maria in a recent theater production in Rochester, New York.

Kiefner, a 2011 graduate of Saxony Lutheran High School and a senior at Eastman School of Music, was cast as Maria, one of the musical’s lead roles, in “West Side Story,” presented by the Roberts Wesleyan College Community Theatre in Rochester

UA horn master got start in Israeli orchestra

(Arizona Jewish Post 01/20/2015)

Daniel Katzen blows a mean shofar. As a professional French horn player, you might expect he’d be a natural on the ram’s horn. But that’s not the case, says Katzen, associate professor of horn at the University of Arizona. “Brass players find it particularly challenging to play the shofar,” he says, “because we are used to blowing into specialized mouthpieces.”

It was not happenstance that Katzen and his brother attended concerts in Israel. Music had infused their childhood years in Rochester, N.Y. Rochester is home to the prestigious Eastman School of Music, where Katzen attended a preparatory program for local high school students who wanted to pursue careers in music.

The king of the low notes

(Buffalo Spree January 2015)

A star athlete can easily name coaches, teachers and other inspirations for his or her success. So can a star musician.

Meet Don Harry, 70, Buffalo Philharmonic Orchestra tuba player. He is regarded as one of the best tubists in the world. Harry has a strong build, long arms, stories to tell and a deadpan sense of humor that likely comes, at least in part, from touring the world as a virtuoso of the low notes on 37 pounds of brass.

“I’m doing the same thing I’ve been doing since grade school,” he claims. Harry, half Native American (“Dad was full-blooded,” he says), started in Oklahoma, the place he calls “a concentration camp for Indians, all tribes” while explaining some of the horrors and tragedies of American history’s forced marches and resettlements. There followed Indiana University, the Oklahoma City Symphony, New York’s Juilliard School of Music, the NBC Orchestra, and now the Buffalo Philharmonic and a teaching position at Rochester’s Eastman School of Music.

CLASSICAL | University of Rochester Press Anniversary
(Rochester City Newspaper © 02/04/2015)

The University of Rochester Press will celebrate its 25th Anniversary with performances by the entire organ faculty of the Eastman School of Music. The all-organ concert at Christ Church is titled “Organ Music of Mendelssohn” and will feature performances on the Craighhead-Saunders and Hook Hastings organs. With this performance comes a new book edited by Jürgen Thym who will also introduce the concert. His book “Mendelssohn, the Organ, and the Music of the Past,” published by the University of Rochester Press, will be available for signing. All the organists on this program are nationally and internationally recognized as specialists in their fields and this will be a rare opportunity to hear them all in one space.

The University of Rochester Press anniversary performance will take place Friday, February 6, at Christ Church, 141 East Avenue. 8 p.m. Free. (Also reported by Rochester Business Journal)

Robert Blaine dean of JSU’s undergraduate studies

(The Clarion Ledger 01/31/2015)

Robert Blaine will be dean of Undergraduate Studies and CyberLearning at Jackson State University, effective Feb. 15.

Blaine, who has been a special assistant to the provost for CyberLearning and associate professor of music, has served as interim associate dean of the College of Liberal Arts, among other duties. He and a team of other JSU faculty and staff launched the 2012 iPad Technology Advantage. He has been on faculty since 2004. He has a bachelor’s degree in music from Indiana University, a master’s from Catholic University and a doctor of musical arts from Eastman School of Music.

Religion News

(Charlotte Observer 01/28/2015)

Trinity Presbyterian

After 30 years of dedicated service, Minister of Music Jane Bostian Arant will retire at the end of January. Arant has served as the choir director for adults and children and as church organist. She has also led classes on books by modern and classic theologians and has educated the congregation on topics surrounding reformed liturgy and the worship experience.

After graduating magna cum laude from Salem College with majors in organ and religion, Arant obtained a master of arts in American church history from Duke University. She then earned a master of music in organ performance and literature from the Eastman School of Music at the University of Rochester. She served as dean of the Charlotte chapter of the American Guild of Organists for four years.

Samford University gives teaching awards to Nordlund, Epley

(Al.com 01/29/2015)

Samford University professors Moya Nordlund and Steven Epley received top university teaching awards during the 2015 spring semester opening convocation on Jan. 27. Each has taught at the school for more than 20 years.

Nordlund, chair of academic studies in the School of the Arts’ Division of Music, received the George Macon Memorial Award for outstanding performance as a teacher, counselor and friend who inspires greatness in students. The Hong Kong native holds bachelor’s and master’s degrees from Eastman School of Music at the University of Rochester in New York, and a doctor of education degree from the University of Alabama.

A concert featuring Bill Dobbins conducting the Eastman Jazz Ensemble in a celebration of the centenary of Billy Strayhorn would be promising enough. After all, Eastman School of Music Professor Dobbins is a leading scholar of the music Strayhorn wrote and arranged for the Duke Ellington Orchestra, and the jazz ensemble is a first-rate band. But it gets better: The group will be joined by Dave Glasser on alto saxophone. Glasser who graduated from Eastman and went on to perform with Dizzy Gillespie, Sarah Vaughan, and Clark Terry has a gorgeous tone reminiscent of Paul Desmond and Stan Getz.

Eastman Jazz Ensemble with Dave Glasser performs Monday, February 9, at Kilbourn Hall, Eastman School of Music, 26 Gibbs Street. 8 p.m. Free. 274-1100; esm.rochester.edu.

Tony Caramia is celebrating Valentine’s Day a little bit early in a program titled “A Time For Love In All Keys.” The Eastman School of Music professor will cover all aspects of love by way of the Great American Songbook. From the beginning (“Let’s Fall In Love”), to the rumors (“People Will Say We’re in Love”), through the doubts (“What Is This Thing Called Love?”), to the ultimate commitment(“Our Love Is Here To Stay”), Caramia will cover it all. The multi-media concert will also feature projections of dozens of covers from popular sheet music spanning five decades.

Tony Caramia performs Tuesday, February 10, at Kilbourn Hall, Eastman School of Music, 26 Gibbs Street. 8 p.m. $10 (free with UR ID). 274-1100; esm.rochester.edu.

Adventurous composer to hold residence at Eastman

German composer and pianist Moritz Eggert will serve as this year’s Howard Hanson Visiting Professor of Composition at the Eastman School of Music in Rochester.
During his residence from Feb. 25 through March 3, he will present a multi-media recital at 3 p.m. Sunday, March 1 at the school.

Organic matter: St. Mary’s Church to host concert of secular music on historic instrument
(Auburn Citizen © 02/05/2015)

Sunday’s organ recital at St. Mary’s Church in Auburn will see one history honored, and perhaps another made.

Accompanist Aaron James will perform his first formal recital on the church’s 125-year-old Carl Barckhoff organ. The Eastman School of Music student has prepared a program of more secular music than he’d normally perform on the instrument, all selected to show off its muscle — and his.

Sunday, James will perform pieces by Felix Mendelssohn, Gioacchino Rossini, Camille Saint-Saens and more — mostly music popular at the time of the organ’s 1890 construction. The program also reflects the reverence he and the church have for the organ, which is currently undergoing restoration. Fifty years ago, it likely would have been ripped out and its pipes recycled, James said.