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.)
Your guide to mapping out a classic classical summer in Utah | The Salt Lake Tribune
(Salt Lake Tribune © 06/13/2015)
Summer has come to Utah, which means the schedule is heating up for many area musicians. From Logan’s Utah Festival Opera & Musical Theatre to the Moab Music Festival, here’s what some of the state’s leading musical organizations have in store.
June 26 American pianist Barry Snyder, winner of three prizes at the 1966 Van Cliburn Competition and now a professor at the Eastman School of Music, will perform favorites by Ravel, Schumann, Chopin and Haydn.
The teens Vivien Goh taught are now SSO musicians
(Singapore Straits Times 06/22/2015)
When Vivien Goh picks up her violin, she transforms instantly from the kindly woman-next-door into an imperious muse: back straight, head high, feet positioned in a graceful Y, her entire body perfectly poised to play.
At 67, she has mentored young musicians in Singapore for more than four decades and continues to teach, conduct and support them, most recently through various musical prizes set up in the name of her late father Goh Soon Tioe.
At 17, she gave her first recital at the Kuala Lumpur Town Hall and soon after, received a full-tuition scholarship for her music degree from the Eastman School of Music in Rochester. Four years later, she gave up what could have been a promising career as a solo performer to return to Singapore and follow in her father’s footsteps as a teacher and mentor.
Author and pianist Sara Solovitch overcame the plight of ‘Playing Scared’
(San Jose Mercury News 06/15/2015)
For Sara Solovitch, the symptoms of stage fright were as familiar as the keyboard on her beloved piano. The Santa Cruz author, who once dreamed of becoming a concert pianist, was struck with performance anxiety so severe she nearly gave up playing altogether.
Solovitch’s musical talent emerged in childhood. At 10, she was whizzing through scores by Bach and Mozart; as a teen, she attended the Eastman School of Music. She remembers the pleasure of learning new works by Bach, still the composer she loves above all others. But she also remembers the terror that struck her in recitals. In her late teens, it became so severe that she quit performing. (Also reported by Paste )
Carl Atkins brings long experience to the stage
(Democrat & Chronicle 06/20/2015)
For Carl Atkins, playing saxophone is like drinking whiskey — a bad habit he just couldn’t kick. “I’ve tried to give up playing,” he said. “A dozen times, I don’t know.”
He almost made it stick once. It was 1978 and he’d just been accepted into doctoral program in composing and conducting at the Eastman School of Music.
He got the doctoral degree then, in 1984, put together a 13-piece band, Sheer Energy, to test-drive his compositions. He would write, they would play; but it didn’t work out that way.
Jazz Festival: Spevak’s picks for June 21
(Democrat & Chronicle 06/21/2015)
Kneebody, 6:15 p.m. and 10 p.m., Max of Eastman Place. This is what happens when you let some former Eastman School of Music students off the leash and let them run loose in Los Angeles. Cool West Coast grooves and keyboard fusion.
Organ conventions comes to Pittsburgh, highlights St. Paul’s Cathedral instrument
(Pittsburgh City Paper 06/18/2015)
There’s a famous Mozart quote in which he calls the organ “the king of instruments.” The French composer Hector Berlioz went a little deeper with it, referring to the organ and orchestra as “pope and emperor,” respectively. Less majestically, Bach said of playing the instrument, “There’s nothing to it.”
For a longer, more verifiable quote, ask Nathan Laube. He’s the assistant professor of organ at Eastman School of Music in Rochester, N.Y., and an elite organist who spends time between classes performing all over the world.
Jazz Fest spotlights sense of community
(Democrat & Chronicle 06/21/2015)
How did XRIJF become one of the best jazz festivals in the world? Why Rochester and not some other mid-sized city? The answer is found all around us — an unparalleled sense of community.
After many years of hosting an educational jam session on the last Saturday of the festival, XRIJF partnered with Wegmans four years ago to offer educational workshops for kids Monday through Friday from 1 to 2:30 p.m. in the Rayburn Wright Room at Eastman School (yes, kids, bring your instruments). These workshops offer the opportunity for kids to jam with amazing international artists (assisted by me and Eastman students) and learn about the art form of jazz. Encounters that I had as a youth, hearing and meeting Benny Golson, Art Blakey, Sonny Rollins, Dizzy Gillespie, Barney Kessel and Chuck Mangione, inspired me to practice and changed my life.
Bob Sneider is a jazz guitarist and assistant professor of jazz studies at the Eastman School of Music
10 move on in KC Superstar competition
(Kansas City Star 05/16/2015)
Ten Kansas City area high school students, including three who made the finals last year, have been chosen to vie for the 2015 title of KC SuperStar, which brings with it a $10,000 scholarship.
Last year’s KC SuperStar was Keith Klein, a graduate of Blue Valley Northwest, who is attending Eastman School of Music in Rochester, N.Y. His younger brother, Austin, 17, also a graduate of Blue Valley Northwest, is one of this year’s finalists. This is his first time in the competition.
Two Buffalo bassists win big
(Buffalo.com © 06/17/2015)
At the International Society of Bassists biennial convention, held earlier this month in Fort Collins, Colo., two local bass players emerged victorious. Sam Suggs of Amherst took first prize in the solo competition, and Danny Ziemann of Williamsville took second place in the jazz competition.
Suggs will be heading to Yale University in the fall to begin his work on a doctorate in music. Ziemann, a known talent to jazz fans around town, is teaching at SUNY Oswego and at the community school of the Eastman School of Music.
Eastman School of Music hosting international piano competition
(The Daily News Online © 06/19/2015)
Twenty-four of the world’s top teenaged pianists will vie for prizes in the Eastman School of Music Young Artists International Piano Competition next month. The week-long event of adjudicated performances, master classes, and recitals by award-winning guest artists — all of which are open to the public — begins Sunday, July 12.
“These young artists are among the best in the new, young generation of pianists,” said Douglas Humpherys, chair of the piano department at Eastman and founding director of the competition. “The audience has the chance to hear these tremendously talented and seasoned performers as they showcase their artistic achievements and build their musical careers.”
BOA hosts 7th annual Poetry Is Jazz event
(Rochester Democrat & Chronicle © 06/16/2015)
On June 23, BOA will host its 7th annual Poetry Is Jazz event in Rochester, held in collaboration with the Rochester Contemporary Art Center (RoCo), during the Rochester International Jazz Festival.
-JAZZ: Jazz music by the “4×4” band, featuring: Mark Kellogg (trombone); Jim Doser (saxophone); Chris Azzara (piano); and Danny Ziemann (bass), will accompany the event. All four jazz band members are prominent in the Rochester music scene, and have strong ties to the Eastman School of Music, the Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra, and other local, national, and international venues.
Neil Courtney, prominent bassist, dead at 82
(Philly.Com © 06/19/2015)
Neil Courtney, 82, of Center City, a double bass player with the Philadelphia Orchestra for 48 years and the “king of the double bass in Philadelphia,” died Wednesday, June 17, at home after many years of declining health from heart disease.
Born in Rochester, N.Y., and a graduate of the Eastman School of Music, Mr. Courtney, while still a student, played three seasons with the Rochester Philharmonic under Erich Leinsdorf. He joined the U.S. Marine Band, and studied with the Philadelphia Orchestra’s then-principal bassist, Roger Scott. He was principal bassist with the National Symphony Orchestra for four years before leaving for Philadelphia.
Violin virtuoso sounded good to Stouffville’s Music Town judges
(York Region.com © 06/18/2015)
His talent defies description — a violin virtuoso unlike any other in Whitchurch-Stouffville, perhaps Ontario. Because of his achievements, Matthew Eeuwes will be honored Wednesday at the 23rd annual Music Festival in Stouffville United Church. He’ll receive the coveted Music Town, Ontario award with Rick Lightfoot, a member of last year’s winner, The Albert St. Four, making the presentation.
Matthew, 21, currently enrolled in a bachelor of music performance degree course at the Eastman School of Music in Rochester, NY received his formal education at Whitchurch Highlands Public School and the Arts York Program at Unionville High School.
New River Edge Eagle Scouts take the oath
(NorthJersey.com 06/18/2015)
Aidan O’Connor is a senior at River Dell High School and will graduate on June 18. Aidan is an accomplished musician and has studied the tenor saxophone for the last seven years. He has played first chair in the Bergen County Band, Region I Band and NJ All State Jazz Band.
Aidan will attend Eastman School of Music at the University of Rochester where he will pursue a Bachelor’s of Music in Jazz Studies.
MaryKatherine Fechtel, Arianna Beyer vying for Miss Florida title
(Orlando Sentinel 06/20/2015)
When Arianna Beyer sashayed across the stage during the opening ceremonies of the Miss Florida Scholarship Pageant earlier this week, she wore something borrowed and blue — the same evening gown her mother wore when she was crowned Miss Michigan 1983.
Beyer attended Tavares High School before graduating as Valedictorian from the Douglas Anderson School of the Arts in Jacksonville. She is a rising junior at the Eastman School of Music in Rochester, N.Y., and plans to graduate with a double major in music performance and molecular genetics.