Eastman News Highlights April 13, 2015

(Here are some select recent clippings showing the variety of hits/mentions identifying musicians and scholars as Eastman School of Music alumni, faculty or students. (Note: Some links may have expired.)

From the community: Schola Antiqua to Perform at Cantigny Park
(Chicago Tribune © 04/07/2015)

Founded in 2000, Schola Antiqua is a professional vocal ensemble dedicated to the performance of repertory before the year 1600. The group’s program at Cantigny, “A Renaissance Call to Arms,” will highlight the Renaissance fascination with arms and battle by exploring sixteenth-century “battaglia” along with the more ceremonial and metaphorical traditions associated with warfare.

Artistic Director Michael Alan Anderson is a founding member of Schola Antiqua of Chicago and currently serves on the musicology faculty of the Eastman School of Music at the University of Rochester. He specializes in music and devotion from the late Middle Ages and Renaissance.

Lawyers rock out to feed the hungry

(London Free Press 04/09/2015)

Elsewhere on Friday, the Ying Quartet plays a Jeffery Concerts event at the Wolf Performance Hall. As quartet-in-residence at the Rochester, N.Y, Eastman School of Music, the Ying Quartet members hold faculty positions in the string and chamber departments. The Ying Quartet emerged two decades ago as resident quartet of Jesup, Iowa, a farm town of 2,000. The emerging quartet played before audiences of six to 600 fans in homes, schools, churches, and banks.

Former Eastman Music School Director Robert Freeman Honored
(WXXI PBS News © 04/07/2015)

A longtime former director of the Eastman School of Music has been honored for his contributions. A dedication ceremony held Tuesday at the Sibley Music Library on Gibbs Street named the atrium of that library after Freeman.

He also received an honorary Doctor of Music degree from the University of Rochester.

Houston Symphony violinist Frank Huang named to prestigious position with New York Philharmonic
(Houston Chronicle © 04/09/2015)

“More than any other musician, the concertmaster shapes the persona of an orchestra,” said Alan Gilbert, the New York Philharmonic’s music director. “In Frank Huang we have found just the right mix of virtuosity, flair, musicality and collegiality.”

Before joining the Houston Symphony, Huang was first violinist with the Grammy-winning Ying Quartet and a member of the faculty at the Eastman School of Music in Rochester, N.Y. (Also reported by WNYC 93.9, WQXR )

Local Musician Takes First In National Trumpet Competition
(IBerkshires.com © 04/08/2015)

Steven Felix, a Drury High School graduate, made his hometown proud last month by placing first in the solo graduate division in the National Trumpet Competition in Mechanicsburg, Pa.

Everyone that goes to this thing are all phenomenal players, Felix, an Eastman School of Music graduate student, said. It is a privilege to compete and listen to the performers who play. They all sound phenomenal. It is incredible.

Although this success represents a milestone in his career, this is not Felixs first run in this national competition. He said this is his fourth time competing. He first competed as a senior while at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst in a trumpet ensemble, placing second in the finals. He also made the finals with an Eastman trumpet ensemble as a graduate student.

New Horizons helps musicians revisit old skills
(Olympian © 04/09/2015)

The music is important, but it’s not the only ingredient that holds the South Puget Sound New Horizons Band together.

“The thing about this group is that they all have to pay to play,” said band director Vic Jowders, 78, who served as band director at Lincoln, Wilson and Foss high schools in Tacoma from 1965 to 1989. “Because of that, we have no prima donnas.”

The Olympia group is one of many New Horizons bands across the country under the banner of the New Horizons International Music Association, which was started 25 years ago by Roy Ernst of the Eastman School of Music in Rochester, N.Y. Ernst wanted to launch an inclusive music program for seniors, building on the belief that music for adults forges friendships, lifts moods and improves health. The model seems to be working quite well in South Sound.

Best Seat in the House: Lenoard Hayes puts on a show
(WHEC TV NBC 10 Rochester © 04/09/2015)

Its not often I get teary eyed when doing an interview, but then, its not often I run into someone who is so genuinely happy to be where they are in life.

Leonard Hayes is a student at the Eastman School of Music. Getting there wasn’t as easy as he imagined. That’s just one reason this gifted pianist is being honored with a generous scholarship from the local chapter of The Links, Incorporated. In Thursdays Best Seat in the House, we introduce you to Leonard Hayes.

He is a special young man and he’ll share his love of music with you in a free recital on Sunday, April 26 at 3 p.m. at Kilbourn Hall on the Eastman School of Music campus.

Retired college professor devotes time to teaching kids music
(Charleston Gazette © 04/05/2015)

After 34 years of teaching music in college many of them spent at West Virginia Tech Meyer could have set aside musical instruction in exchange for the relaxed life of retirement in his suburban home in South Charleston.

But instead, for the past nine years, Meyer’s passion for music — the same one that led him to start playing the clarinet in fourth grade and later prompted him to attend Eastman School of Music at the University of Rochester — has compelled him to start the first string instrument program in Putnam County, where he now teaches around 30 students.

“Before I was there, I didn’t know of any other string program,” Meyer said. “It seemed like a logical thing to do, although it is a big challenge.”

This year’s Eastern New Mexico University Jazz Fest the two day event is a display of style, skill, and emotion from students and faculty alike.

This year’s guest performer is pianist Bill Dobbins, a professor of jazz studies at the Eastman School of Music in Rochester, New York. Dobbins will join the ENMU jazz ensemble and combos for performances throughout the two-day festival.

Connie Evingson and Jon Weber celebrate spring and ‘Blue Skies’ at the Jungle April 5

(Jazz Police 04/30/2015)

Some musical partnerships were just meant to be. Twin Cities vocalist Connie Evingson and New York-based pianist and honorary Twin Citian Jon Weber paired up during the 2012 Twin Cities Jazz Festival and on a Prairie Home Companion European cruise, where they cooked up the idea for a show for Connie’s Jazz at the Jungle series at the Jungle Theater in south Minneapolis.

Since you can’t get too much of a good thing, Connie and Jon now turn their attention to the “Blue Skies” of spring, presenting their favorite songs of the season with the expert support of saxophonist Dave Karr and bassist Gordy Johnson, at the Jungle Theater on Easter Sunday, April 5, at 4:00 (sold out) and 7:30 pm.

Son of pianist Thelma and late Minnesota Orchestra bassist Cliff Johnson, and brother of guitarist Jimmy Johnson (founder of Flim and the BBs), Gordon Johnson grew up in the Twin Cities, surrounded by music. His first instrument was the piano, followed by flute, which he continued to study through college at the Eastman School of Music, where Chuck Mangione needed his services as a Fender bassist.

On April 22, the William Warfield Scholarship Fund, Inc. board of directors* presents its annual luncheon, from noon until 2, featuring the vocal performance of Eastman School of Music student and current scholarship recipient, Alicia Rosser.

The William Warfield Scholarship Fund awards an academic scholarship each year to an Eastman School of Music voice student. The current recipient, soprano Alicia Rosser, is a junior at the Eastman School of Music who studies with Robert McIver. She hails from Maryland. Last year’s recipient was Joel Dyson.

The Downstairs Cabaret Theatre teamed up with the Eastman School of Music to offer The Grove Place Jazz Project, a weekly night of swing, ballads, and blues every Tuesday. A different grouping of highly talented jazz musicians primarily Eastman students is featured each week. From composers to teachers to undergrads, they run the gamut with impressively long CVs of experience. The April 14 evening features Eastmanites Theresa Chen, Billy Petito, Jakob Ebers, and Stephen Morris.