Free concerts featuring works by Steven Stucky will highlight the Pulitzer Prize-winning composer’s residency at the Eastman School of Music Dec. 5 through Dec. 9.
A full evening will be devoted to the “Chamber Music of Steven Stucky,” beginning at 8 p.m. on Thursday, Dec. 8, in Hatch Recital Hall. On Friday, Dec. 9, the Eastman Wind Ensemble will perform Stucky’s Concerto for Percussion and Wind Orchestra during the Ensemble’s 8 p.m. concert with the Eastman Wind Orchestra in Kodak Hall. In addition, the public can attend Stucky’s lectures and master class and an interactive performance of his work Boston Fancies.
Stucky has an extensive catalogue of compositions ranging from large-scale orchestral works to a cappella miniatures for chorus. He is also active as a conductor, writer, lecturer and teacher. For more than two decades he has enjoyed a close partnership with the Los Angeles Philharmonic: in 1988 André Previn appointed him composer-in-residence of the Los Angeles Philharmonic, and later he became the orchestra’s consulting composer for new music. Commissioned by the orchestra, his Second Concerto for Orchestra brought him the Pulitzer Prize in music in 2005. Stucky has taught at Cornell University since 1980 and now serves as Given Foundation Professor of Composition.
The all-Stucky program on Dec. 8 features guest artists the Los Angeles Piano Quartet. The group has been a popular guest on Minnesota Public Radio’s St. Paul Sunday, has been featured at the Bermuda and Tucson Festival and the Eugene and Carmel Bach Festivals, has conducted several tours of Europe, and has commissioned works for piano quartet from such composers as Stephen Hartke, Gerard Schurmann, and Stucky. The LAPQ will perform Stucky’s Piano Quartet, which the ensemble premiered at the 2005 Tucson Festival. Members of the ensemble are Steven Doane, cello, who is professor of cello at the Eastman School of Music; Katherine Murdock, viola; Xak Bjerken, piano; and Michi Wiancko, violin
The Dec. 8 program also includes Album Leaves for solo piano, performed by Xak Bjerken; Isabelle Dances for marimba, Tomasz Arnold; Notturno, with Diane Hunger, saxophone, and Priscilla Yuen, piano; and Gravity and Eyesight, performed by the Eastman Chorale under Felix Shuen, conductor.
The Dec. 9 Eastman Wind Ensemble performance of Stucky’s Concerto for Percussion and Wind Orchestra will feature Michael Burritt, professor of percussion at Eastman.
During his residency, Stucky will also attend rehearsals, coach performers, and meet with composition students. His schedule of public activities features:
Tuesday, Dec. 6
Lecture by Pulitzer Prize-Winning Composer Steven Stucky. Presented by the Theory and Musicology Departments of the Eastman School of Music
4:30 p.m.
Ciminelli Formal Lounge, Student Living Center, 100 Gibbs St.
Free
Wednesday, Dec. 7
Music Nova: Interactive performance of Boston Fancies. The work by Steven Stucky is a string of seven miniatures, played without pause and lasting together about 15 minutes.
2 p.m.
Eastman School of Music Annex 902, 26 Gibbs St.
Free
Thursday, Dec. 8
Lecture by Pulitzer Prize-Winning Composer Steven Stucky. Stucky will give a presentation to the Composition Symposium of the Eastman School of Music.
3:35 p.m.
Eastman School of Music Main Building, Room 209
Free
Thursday, Dec. 8
Chamber Music of Steven Stucky. The program includes Stucky’s Piano Quartet, performed by the Los Angeles Piano Quartet; Album Leaves for solo piano; Isabelle Dances for marimba; Notturno for saxophone and piano; two works for choir: Gravity and Eyesight
8 p.m.
Hatch Recital Hall in the Eastman East Wing, 433 East Main St.
Free
Friday, Dec. 9
Composition master class by Steven Stucky
10 a.m. to 1 p.m.
Hatch Recital Hall, Eastman East Wing, 433 East Main St.
Free
Friday, Dec. 9
Eastman Wind Ensemble and Eastman Wind Orchestra. Stucky: Concerto for Percussion and Wind Orchestra; Ticheli: Postcard; Daughert: Niagara Falls; Maslanka: Give Us This Day; Prangcharoen: Mantras; Little: East Coast Attitude.
8 p.m.
Kodak Hall, 60 Gibbs St.
Free
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