(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.)
Out of the classroom, onto the stage
(Jazz Police 06/05/2015)
Long-time jazz educator, head of Jazz Studies at the University of Minnesota, renowned arranger for the Glenn Miller Orchestra and more, Dean Sorenson is also an accomplished trombonist and bandleader who is not heard on the bandstand often enough. Dean comes out of the classroom this weekend, leading a sextet on the Bridge Series at Jazz Central Studios at 8:30 pm on June 5.
Dean Sorenson is Associate Professor and Director of Jazz Studies at the University of Minnesota as well as a prolific and highly sought-after composer, arranger, trombonist, educator, and clinician. He received his bachelor’s degree in trombone performance from the University of Minnesota and his master’s degree in jazz arranging and composition from the Eastman School of Music.
Intense, literate songwriters invade western New York
(Democrat & Chronicle 06/05/2015)
The Eastman School of Music pays tribute to the late baritone Derrick Smith with a 3 p.m. June 14 show at Kilbourn Hall, 26 Gibbs St. Smith earned his master’s degree from Eastman in 1988 and was on the school’s faculty from 1999 until his death last November at age 56. Smith performed around the world in Porgy and Bess, Show Boat, Don Giovanni and the title role of Eugene Onegin in Russia. He originated the role of John Tubman in the premiere production of Harriet Tubman at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Smith was also heard in the Rochester area in performances of Handel’s Messiah, Mendelssohn’s Elijah, Mozart’s Requiem and Brahms’s German Requiem. Soprano Cecile Saine, baritone Jason Holmes, tenor Matthew Valverde and pianist Howard Spindler, all Eastman faculty, will be performing at the tribute. The program also includes the school’s Eastman Youth Chamber Singers and Eastman Community Chamber Singers, and student vocal soloists Kenneth Bailey, Mike Motkowski, Shannon Ogden and Yvonne Trobe.
Brass band polishes up for 25th anniversary
(Battle Creek Enquirer 06/03/2015)
On Saturday, the youth will play two songs during the concert under the direction of guest conductor Michael J. Garasi.
One interesting story from Garasi’s file: He has directed percussionist John Beck Jr. the past three concerts, but studied under John Beck Sr. at the Eastman School of Music. Because Saturday’s concert requires more percussionists, John Beck Sr. was asked to play, forming a bit of a surreal moment for Garasi. “I haven’t seen him in years,” Garasi said. “I’ve been directing his son for three years, but now I’m going to direct my former teacher.”
Known around the world for his music, Bob Milne to play at Lyric Live Theater
(Rolla Daily News 06/04/2015)
Bob Milne for years has played piano at more than 250 concerts a year, often with hundreds, sometimes with thousands, of people in the audience, in concert halls, churches and other venues with great acoustics.
Milne did not start out his musical career as a pianist. He was a French horn player in high school and afterwards went to the Eastman School of Music in Rochester, New York, where in a couple of years he began playing with the Rochester Philharmonic while continuing his studies. One night after a concert, Milne and other students went to a “sing-along saloon” and the piano player didn’t show up. Milne, who had never taken piano lessons, filled in, and the saloon hired him.
Dale Kavanagh leads off Hamilton Guitar Festival
(Hamilton Spectator 06/03/2015)
Why mess with success? Emma Rush certainly wasn’t about to when she programmed her Hamilton International Guitar Festival which kicks off in two weeks’ time at the Hamilton Conservatory.
Saturday, June 20 at 11 a.m., Michael Hardy, who was an instructor at the 2012 festival, will lead a lecture-recital on The Manuscripts of William Walton’s Five Bagatelle’s for Guitar, a warm-up for one of his doctoral requirements at the Eastman School of Music in Rochester, New York.
Montana oboist, friends work to revive forgotten composer
(KAJ18 06/03/2015)
Marilyn Cole is trying to get to Japan to pay tribute to a forgotten French composer. Cole is a 2002 graduate of Billings Senior High School who is now a professional musician in New York City. She belongs to a reed trio that has been invited to the International Double Reed (referring to oboes and bassoons) Society Conference in Tokyo this August. There they are to give a presentation on and play the music of Fernande Decruck, who flourished in the 1930s and ’40s but never had a chance to publish most of her works.
She earned a degree in oboe performance and music education from the University of Montana, then spent a semester in Germany, teaching at the Frankfurt International School, and another semester teaching in Seattle. She later earned a master’s degree in music from Eastman School of Music in Rochester, N.Y., and she now performs and gives private piano and oboe lessons. She has played with numerous groups in New York, where she moved in 2009, and is currently working as a substitute oboist in two Broadway shows, “Les Miserables” and “Wicked.”
Opera Performance in Sparta
(West Milford Messenger 06/02/2015)
A live opera performance comes to Sparta with “A Night at the Opera” at the Sparta Avenue Stage featuring professional artists, soprano Chelsea Bonagura, tenor Matthew Arnold and piano accompanist Krista Sweer.
Bonagura received her Bachelor of Music in Voice Performance from the Eastman School of Music and her Master’s Degree in Voice Performance from UNC-Greensboro in the studio of Dr. Carla LeFevre. (Also reported by New Jersey Herald)
Helping Keep Music in the Schools
(Mountain News 06/06/20150
Guests at the Arrowhead Arts Association annual fundraising gala were greeted by members of the MountainTop Strings playing in the lobby of the Lake Arrowhead Resort and Spa.
Board member Ken Camarella called the strings students “our crown jewel.” He was pleased to introduce Tamara Win, who studied through Arrowhead Arts, attended the music camp in Arrowbear for five or six years and then mentored four of the five students who played at the gala. Win is now getting her master’s degree at the Eastman School of Music in Rochester, N.Y., and plans to teach strings.
Eastman concert features Hong Kong students
(Batavia Daily News © 06/04/2015)
Four award-winning music ensembles from a historic Hong Kong school will give a free public performance in Kodak Hall at Eastman Theatre as part of the group’s upcoming tour.
The ensembles’ conductors include Eastman School of Music graduate Gary Ngan, a violinist who received his Bachelor of Music degree at the school in 2009. He directs the string orchestra and appears as a soloist.