Category: Headlines

NEA Chair Testifies on Hill

National Endowment for the Arts Chairman Dana Gioia delivered a prepared statement to the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Interior and Related Agencies on April 1. Gioia reported on the status of the agency and spoke in support of the President’s 2005 NEA budget request for $139.4 million.

After a year in office, Gioia spoke positively on the progress made in four objective area he considers key—to improve the effectiveness and efficiency of the Agency, to create model programs of indisputable artistic merit and broad national reach, to ensure truly national coverage of our programs, and to develop and promote effective models for arts education.

He also made special mention of the American Masterpieces: Three Centuries of Artistic Genius, a three-year program designed to acquaint Americans, especially school children, with the best of their artistic heritage through touring programs, local presentations, and arts education. $15 million of the requested $139.4 million is earmarked for this program.

Gioia concluded his remarks by reaffirming the agency’s commitment “to supporting excellence in the arts—both new and established—bringing the arts to all Americans, and providing leadership in arts education…We are proud to take a positive leadership role in shaping American culture for the better.”

Gioia’s complete testimony is available at: http://www.arts.gov/news/news04/Testimony4-1.html.

David Lang Work Included on IAMIC Conference Concert

The International Association of Music Information Centers has announced details on its2004 Annual Conference to be held in Warsaw. Among the conference activities, a festival concert will be held on September 26 featuring the work of six composers, including American David Lang’s Sweet Air for chamber ensemble. His piece will share a program with works by Marco Marinoni (The Netherlands), Bernard Cavanna (France), Toivo Tulev (Estonia), Martin Marek (The Czech Republic), and Klaus Ib Jrrgensen (Denmark).

EMI Announces Shifts in Organization; Cuts 1,500 Jobs

EMI Group announced restructuring plans to “maximize efficiency and effectiveness in the changing global music marketplace.”

In order to meet this goal financially, the company has reduced its staff by approximately 20% (1,500 positions), of which approximately 900 are related to the outsourcing of manufacturing. At EMI Jazz & Classics, Andria Tay, VP of Marketing, and Nell Mulderry, director of marketing, are reportedly leaving.

EMI is reducing its global roster by approximately 20 percent, which according to a press release from EMI, affects “largely niche and under-performing artists. The roster is being rebalanced to focus resources and efforts more effectively on the artists who have the greatest potential on both a global and local level.”

A major point in the announcement is the shift in product manufacture, much of which will be moved to Uden in The Netherlands. EMI will be closing its manufacturing facility in Jacksonville, Illinois, though it intends to maintain its supply group, physical warehouse and distribution facilities and functions there. Cinram International Inc. will manufacture for EMI companies who currently receive product from the Jacksonville facility.

Alain Levy, Chairman & CEO of EMI Music, commented: “The time is right to further reposition EMI Music. Exiting manufacturing in our two primary regions of Europe and the US will allow us to lower our costs while flexibly meeting our supply needs in the future. These additional steps will more closely align us with the evolution we are seeing in our markets. We believe that by concentrating our efforts on a tightened roster of artists we will increase our revenue-generating potential while reducing our costs, even as we continue to invest in artists worldwide and in developing our digital capabilities.”

Paul Moravec

Paul Moravec has been recognized with a Pulitzer Prize for his Tempest Fantasy. The work was premiered on May 2, 2003, with David Krakauer and the Trio Solisti at the Morgan Library in New York.

• LISTEN to a RealAudio except of Tempest Fantasy.The salutation is for “distinguished musical composition of significant dimension by an American that has had its first performance in the United States during the year.” The award is accompanied by a $10,000 cash prize, an increase of $2,500 over last year.

  Currently head of the Music Department at Adelphi University, Moravec has already been honored with a number of distinctions, including a Rome Prize Fellowship from the American Academy in Rome, a Fellowship in Music Composition from the National Endowment for the Arts, a Rockefeller Foundation Fellowship, a Camargo Foundation Residency Fellowship, a Goddard Lieberson Fellowship and a Charles Ives Fellowship from the American Academy of Arts & Letters. Moravec holds degrees from Harvard and Columbia University. Many of his works are published by Subito Music, though Tempest Fantasy is currently self-published.

  Other recent world premieres of Moravec’s work include: The Time Gallery with Eighth Blackbird at the Metropolitan Museum of Art; Montserrat: Cello Concerto with the Orchestra of St. Ignatius Loyola (NYC); A Crowd of Stars with Robert White and Brian Zeger at the Metropolitan Museum of Art; Spirit, a cantata commissioned for the 75th anniversary of the flight of the Spirit of St. Louis; and Chamber Symphony, commissioned by the Bridgehampton Festival for its 20th anniversary season in August, 2003.

  Pulitzer Winners from the Last Decade 2004: Tempest Fantasy Paul Moravec 2003: On the Transmigration of Souls John Adams 2002: Ice Field Henry Brant 2001: Symphony No. 2 for String Orchestra John Corigliano 2000: Life is a Dream, opera in three acts: Act II, Concert Version Lewis Spratlan 1999: Concerto for Flute, Strings, and Percussion Melinda Wagner 1998: String Quartet No. 2, Musica Instrumentalis Aaron Jay Kernis 1997: Blood on the Fields (Oratorio) Wynton Marsalis 1996: Lilacs for soprano and orchestra George Walker 1995: Stringmusic Morton Gould 1994: Of Reminiscences and Reflections Gunther Schuller

  A recording of Tempest Fantasy along with his Mood Swings, B.A.S.S. Variations, and Scherzo performed by the Trio Solisti and clarinetist David Krakauer will be released by Arabesque Records.

  Also nominated as finalists in this category were: Piano Concerto No. 3 by Peter Lieberson, premiered by the Minnesota Orchestra on November 26, 2003, in Minneapolis, Minn. (G. Schirmer, Inc.), and Cello Counterpoint by Steve Reich, premiered on October 18, 2003, at The Krannert Center, Champaign-Urbana, Ill. (Boosey & Hawkes).

  The complete roster of 88th annual Pulitzer Prizes in Journalism, Letters, Drama and Music, awarded on the recommendation of the Pulitzer Prize Board, were announced this afternoon by Columbia University.

  The nominating jurors in the music category were previous Pulitzer winners Robert Ward, professor emeritus, Duke University, Durham, NC (chair), Tim Page, music critic, The Washington Post, and Wayne Peterson, professor emeritus of composition, San Francisco State University, as well as David Baker, distinguished professor of music and chairman of the jazz department, Indiana University, and Ara Guzelimian, senior director and artistic advisor, Carnegie Hall, New York City.

  The presentation of the awards will be made at a luncheon on May 24, 2004, at Columbia University.

American Mavericks, a Minnesota Public Radio music series and website, produced in association with the San Francisco Symphony and its music director, Michael Tilson Thomas, has won a Peabody award, which recognizes distinguished achievement and meritorious public service across a broad range of topics by stations, networks, producing organizations and individuals.

A total of 29 Peabody award-winners for excellence in electronic media, chosen from more than 1,100 entries, were announced Wednesday. The awards will be presented May 17, 2004, at a luncheon at The Waldorf-Astoria Hotel in New York. Katie Couric, co-anchor of NBC’s “Today” and contributing anchor for “Dateline NBC,” will host the ceremony.

American Mavericks is a 13-part radio series—hosted by singer Suzanne Vega—and a website project that tells the stories of the iconoclastic composers who shaped the development of American music in the 20th century—music that is seldom heard in performance or on the radio.

“We wanted to bring this extraordinary music, and the ideas behind it, to the public radio audience,” says Sarah Lutman, senior vice president for cultural programming and initiatives at Minnesota Public Radio. “It’s unlike anything produced by public radio—it brings together accessible and engaging broadcasts with one of the biggest Web sites we’ve ever created.”

The Web site, www.musicmavericks.publicradio.org, features a comprehensive collection of performances—including 60 unreleased performances of music by the San Francisco Symphony—interviews, essays, film, video, art, on-demand streams of major works and two Web radio streams of hard-to-find underground classics. There is also a “talk” section where users can engage in discussions about American Mavericks, and virtual instruments—including simulacra of Harry Partch’s 43-tone-to-the-octave constructions and the legendary Rhythmicon built in 1931 by Leon Theremin at the request of Henry Cowell—on which visitors can compose their own works.

The Peabody Awards, established in 1940, are administered by UGA’s Grady College of Journalism and Mass Communication.

Last September, the American Music Center began receiving complaints and inquiries concerning the 2nd Annual International Composers Competition held by STUDIO for New Music. Their concern was due in part to the rather unconventional application system which required that prospective applicants first send in a $40 fee in order to be issued an application number. The first composers to contact the AMC were concerned when their checks were cashed or credit cards charged but no number was received. In November, it was announced that “as a result of unforeseen administrative changes” certain postponements were necessary, but that competition would otherwise proceed as planned.

Composers again voiced concern when January 15, 2004, the date the winners were to be announced, came and went. Meanwhile, many composers have had difficulty contacting clarinetist and conductor JD Hixson, the man behind STUDIO for New Music, complaining of unreturned emails and phone calls.

Due to these concerns, JD Hixson was contacted and asked for an update. He responded in an email that he was “aware of the host of complications that surround the competition and truly apologize[s] for the inconvenience.”

He noted that an announcement would be posted shortly on the STUDIO for New Music website to clear up the confusion and provided that information to NewMusicBox this morning. It reads in full:

STUDIO for New Music (NY) wishes to extend to all applicants its most sincere apologies for the confusion and complications involved in this year’s 2nd Annual International Composers Competition.

After a regrettable hiatus in processing applications and the subsequent delay in the jurying process, the competition is again underway.

The new deadline for materials is May 21, 2004, at which point the finalized jury panel will be announced. Results will be announced July 19, 2004. Winners concert TBA Fall, 2004.

Please direct all specific requests and inquiries to [email protected]—please allow 48 hours for response.

Meanwhile, composers who have applied to this competition and continue to have concerns are urged to contact Lyn Liston at the American Music Center (see sidebar).

Composer Eric Flesher, the second-prize winner from the first STUDIO for New Music competition, said that that competition was run in a timely manner—it was not until after the winners were announced that delays began. The first issue was the winner’s concert, which was postponed from May to September, and then cancelled three days before. It was then rescheduled for December, and though Flesher said he was skeptical it would actually occur, his piece was given “a very good performance. [Hixson] got some really good musicians.” However, he says the concert was very lightly attended, likely due to poor advertising.

As of this writing, Flesher has not received his prize money. He has been told by Hixson that the organization that serves as STUDIO for New Music’s fiscal conduit would not cut the check until the performance occurred. Flesher has made several inquiries since the performance, but has not received a response.

Flesher remains patient, despite the hold ups. “It’s my impression after meeting him that he was working himself to the bone, so correspondence and things got moved to the back of the shelf. It seems like he works too many jobs,” he said, adding that Hixson apologized for the delays when they met in New York. He also said that Hixson’s actions did not seem dishonest, but that it was more a “matter of [Hixson] not having time to do everything he wants to do.”

(L to R) Composers Keeril Makan, Gabriela Lena Frank, and Lisa Bielawa

Composers Selected for first Upshaw/Harbison Workshop at Carnegie Hall

Lisa Bielawa, Gabriela Lena Frank, Keeril Makan, and James Matheson are the four composers selected to participate in the Weill Music Institute at Carnegie Hall’s first Dawn Upshaw/John Harbison Workshop for Young Singers and Composers (part of the Perspectives: Dawn Upshaw series). Spanning two seasons, this professional development workshop will feature soprano Dawn Upshaw and composer John Harbison working in tandem to guide four pairs of singers and composers through the compositional process, from conception to completion of a work. Special emphasis will be placed on the challenges of writing for the voice and text setting.

“The relationship between composer and performer is a singular and gratifying one,” Upshaw commented when making the participant announcement. “I hope that this seminar will give young composers, young singers, and even audience members an opportunity to better understand and appreciate the inner workings and possibilities of collaboration in creating new pieces.”

Workshop Participants:

Natalie Janssen, Soprano
Lisa Bielawa, Composer

Robert Gardner, Baritone
Gabriela Lena Frank, Composer

Laurie Rubin, Mezzo-Soprano
Keeril Makan, Composer

Leena Chopra, Soprano
James Matheson, Composer

Four Young Composers Land NYYS First Music 21 Commissions

The New York Youth Symphony has announced the four composers commissioned under the auspices of the FIRST MUSIC program. Since 1984, the NYYS annually commissions three orchestral ($1,500 each) and one chamber work ($1,000) from young American composers and premiered during the orchestra’s Carnegie Hall season.

The orchestra also covers production costs and provides a travel stipend.

The 2004-05 FIRST MUSIC 21 composers are:

Orchestral Commission:

Joshua Penman (premiere: 12-05-04)

age at premiere: 25
originally from Brookline, Massachusetts

B.A., Music and Mathematics, 2001, Yale University; M.M. candidate, 2004, University of Michigan
Tanglewood Music Festival, Fellow, summer 2004; Nouvel Ensemble Moderne, Forum commission, 2002, American Composers Orchestra, Whitaker New Music Reading Sessions, 2001
Studies with Louis Andriessen, Michael Daugherty, Betsy Jolas, Bright Sheng

Thomas Osborne (premiere: 03-06-05)

age at premiere: 26
originally from Greenfield, Indiana

B.M., 2000, Indiana University School of Music; M.M., 2002, Rice University Shepherd School of Music DMA candidate, 2005
Southern California Thornton School of Music Commission, T’ang Quartet, premiere, Tanglewood Institute, Commission, Jason Hardink, keyboardist, Utah Symphony Orchestra
Studies with Edward Applebaum, Donald Crockett, Don Freund, Stephen Hartke

Judd Greenstein (premiere: 05-29-05)

age at premiere: 25
originally from New York, New York

B.A., 2001, Williams College; M.M. candidate, 2004, Yale School of Music
Charles Ives Scholarship, Academy of Arts and Letters, 2004 Tanglewood Music Center, fellowship, summer 2004 Bang on a Can Summer Institute of Music, 2002
Studies with Martin Bresnick, David Kechley, Aaron Jay Kernis, Ezra Laderman

Chamber Music Commission (for clarinet, piano, and cello):

Devin Keith Arrington (premiere: 04-25-05)

age at premiere: 27
originally from Westport, Connecticut

B.A., 2001, Middlebury College; M.A. candidate, 2004, Carnegie Mellon University
CFAMC 2004 Scholarship winner, First Prize in Harry Archer String Quartet Competition, premiere by Cuarteto Latinoamericano, 2003 Grant from the Vermont Arts Council and the NEA
Studies with Leonardo Balada, Su-Lian Tan

FM21 Advisory Committee: John Corigliano, Chair; Samuel Adler, Michael Gordon, David del Tredici, Jennifer Higdon, Stewart Wallace

American Erin Gee Among Six IMPULS Commissions

IMPULS, which offers study courses for musicians and composers in Graz, Austria, in co-operation with the University of Music and Pictorial Arts, has commissioned work from six composers, including American Erin Gee, as part of their International Composers’ Competition.

The winners will write a new work for Klangforum Wien, a 24-member ensemble founded in 1985 by Beat Furrer for the performance of contemporary music. The commissioned pieces will be workshopped next February with the intention of creating an “intensified dialogue between composers and the musicians… and a greater understanding of the processes of composition and their current representation in contemporary music.” At the end of the workshop, the pieces will have their first public performances. From the live recording of this concert, a documentary CD will be produced.

The commissions are * 1000 each (a fee to be considered compensation for all uses of the piece in association with the competition, including two live performances, a live recording, and the documentary). A portion of the travel and living expenses are also covered by the commissioning organization.

The jury—which included Annette Bik, Pierluigi Billone, Beat Furrer, Gunde Jäch and Florian Müller—selected the winners from a total of more than 260 submissions from 50 countries.

Gee is currently studying in Graz with Beat Furrer. Her music has mainly been written for small chamber groups, but she has also used electronacoustics and composed for theater. With the support of the Pelzer Composition Award, she participated in the Internationale Ferienkurse für Neue Musik in Darmstadt, Germany (2000) where she attended the premiere of The left wing of inhale no. 37, on commission from duo Contour. Gee previously studied at the University of Iowa.

Realtime Music Solutions’ Sinfonia

In today’s edition of Newsday, Gordon Cox reports the latest in a series of ongoing disputes between New York City theater and opera producers and the local musicians’ union.

This new clash revolves around an off-Broadway musical which is seeking to augment its three-musician pit orchestra with Realtime Music Solutions‘ Sinfonia—basically a computer designed to augment live orchestral sounds. The Local 802 has protested, contending that its use in tandem with fewer live players is a threat to union jobs.

David Weinstein, the 28-year-old composer for the new musical The Joys of Sex in question, is a member of AFM’s Los Angeles union, the Local 47. In response to the 802 outcry he told Playbill that the show’s original orchestration using live players has not changed since its Fringe run—piano, bass, and drums. He is using the machine as “a separate tool.”

Whether true in this case or just a convenient cover story after the fact, this does expose a real debate to be addressed by both composers and musicians: Is this merely a way to cut musician income (and arguably production quality) or, like the other computer-generated sounds that have fueled the creativity of modern composers, should the Sinfonia be considered an instrument in its own right?

“It’s like an oversized synthesizer. With this show in particular, I’m using it for that reason,” explains Weinstein in the Playbill report. “There are a couple colors in there that sound a little bit like real instruments, but I’m not trying to make an orchestral mock-up, or symphony orchestra or anything nearly like the classical European orchestrations that you’ll hear on a Broadway stage.”

Amusingly, David Lennon, president of Local 802, is quoted by Cox as saying that the “idea of composing for the virtual-orchestra machine is about as valid as composing for a tape recorder.” Someone needs to get this guy to a Phil Kline show, ASAP.

Coleridge-Taylor Perkinson

The Center for Black Music Research of Columbia College in Chicago reports that Coleridge-Taylor Perkinson passed away on March 9, 2004, of cancer. He had served the Center since 1998 as its Artistic Director, Performance Program.

Perkinson was born in New York in 1932. After graduating from New York’s High School for Music and Art he studied composition at the Manhattan School of Music, receiving his bachelor’s degree in music in 1953 and a master’s degree in composition in 1954. He later studied conducting at the Berkshire Music Center, at the Salzburg Mozarteum, and with Franco Ferrara and Dean Dixon. From 1965 to 1970, he was co-founder and associate conductor for the Symphony of the New World and served as its acting music director during the 1972-73 season. At various times in his career he also served as music director or composer-in-residence for the Negro Ensemble Company, the Alvin Ailey Dance Company, the Dance Theatre of Harlem, and for productions at the American Theatre Lab, the Denver Center for the Performing Arts, and the Goodman Theatre. At the time of his death he was also composer-in-residence for the Ritz Chamber Players of Jacksonville, Florida.

Perkinson’s composing career began in high school, when his composition, And Behold, won the High School for Music and Art choral competition in 1948. His career demonstrates his versatility as a composer of classical music, popular music, theater and film music, and jazz. He composed and arranged for a variety of jazz and popular artists including Harry Belafonte, Donald Byrd, and Marvin Gaye (for whom he arranged Gaye’s first platinum album, I Want You, issued in 1976 on the Motown label). He served as pianist for the Max Roach Jazz Quartet in 1964-65. He composed and conducted scores for a number of award-winning theatrical, television, and documentary and feature films, including A Warm December, starring Sidney Poitier (1972). He also served as guest conductor for numerous orchestras all over the world. His classical compositions have been recorded by the Chicago Sinfonietta, the Moravian Philharmonic Orchestra, flutist Harold Jones, pianists John Cheek and Karen Walwyn, and cellist Anthony Elliott.

At the Center for Black Music Research, Perkinson was artistic advisor to Ensemble Stop-Time, the Center’s grant-funded ensemble formed to explore the commonalities between the various black vernacular music forms, including jazz and gospel. In 1999, he began his tenure as conductor and music director of the New Black Music Repertory Ensemble, a group of musicians dedicated to performing a spectrum of music by black composers, from popular music and jazz to concert music. The Ensemble staged a successful series of 34 concerts in Chicago, at the South Shore Cultural Center, Buntrock Hall of Symphony Center, and other venues. The Ensemble also performed for members of congress in Washington, D.C. and in New York City. In 2001, he conducted the Ensemble’s world-premiere concert performance of Doxology: The Doxy Canticles, an opera with libretto by Paul Carter Harrison and music by Wendell Logan.

Survivors include a daughter, Joetté Thompson, a son-in-law, Henry Allen Thompson, and two grandchildren, LaFrance T. Smith III (Trey) and Skylar Thompson, all of Kansas City, Missouri; a sister, Beverly Perkinson Thomas, two nieces, Monica and Michelle Thomas, and one nephew, Curtis Thomas, all of Houston, Texas; cousins; other family members; and a host of friends.

Funeral arrangements are pending.

Courtesy of the Center for Black Music Research of Columbia College

Next year’s season announcements from American orchestras are trickling in, which always makes me wonder if Yo-Yo Ma and Itzhak Perlman have successfully cloned themselves. In addition, it’s been rather eye opening to see what American works and premieres, especially from living and breathing composers, the majors and their music directors are (and are not) offering up. Admittedly big budget orchestras are not the only game in town, especially when it comes to modern and progressive programming, but as the recipients of largest shares of public and private funding their actions perhaps warrant the most public scrutiny. So far, here’s how next year’s season is shaping up.

Robert Spano and the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra Photo courtesy of the orchestra

The Atlanta Symphony Orchestra has announced what local critic Pierre Ruhe is calling “another big step on its path toward contemporary cultural relevance.” Largely to be performed under the baton of Music Director Robert Spano, the ASO has commissioned two works—from Chris Theofanidis and David Del Tredici—and planned performances of John Adams’s Pulitzer Prize-winning On the Transmigration of Souls, Elliott Carter’s Allegro Scorrevole, Osvaldo Golijov’s Oceana, and Tan Dun’s Concerto for Water Percussion as well as older American works such as Paul Creston’s Fantasy for Trombone and William L. Dawson’s Negro Folk Symphony.

The Baltimore Symphony Orchestra will announce their season later this month, but at least two premieres are reportedly on the table from Michael Hersch and Daniel Brewbaker, plus a performance of Charles Ives’s Central Park in the Dark.

The Boston Symphony Orchestra, as has already been mentioned in these pages, welcomes new Music Director James Levine next season. He will lead new work commissioned from Milton Babbitt, John Harbison, and Charles Wuorinen, plus additional works by Carter. Guest conductor David Zinman’s program opens with a new piece from Michael Gandolfi and Robert Spano will lead the orchestra in the world premiere of a BSO commission from Yehudi Wyner for piano and orchestra.

In addition to a year-long exploration of musical masterworks by sometimes-in-America Béla Bartók, the Chicago Symphony Orchestra and Music Director Daniel Barenboim will present Elliott Carter’s Boston Concerto; Lorin Maazel takes the podium for Augusta Read Thomas’s Gathering Paradise, musical settings of texts by Emily Dickinson scored for soprano and orchestra; and Pierre Boulez will conduct Bernard Rands’s Cello Concerto. Also, Duke Ellington’s Happy-Go-Lucky Local, arranged by Wynton Marsalis will appear on a program with a version of the Peer Gynt Suite that alternates excerpts of Edvard Grieg’s original work with jazz arrangements by Ellington and Billy Strayhorn.

Franz Welser-Most will conduct The Cleveland Orchestra in Roy Harris’s Symphony No. 3 and Ingolf Dahl’s Concert for Alto Saxophone and Wind Orchestra, as well as a new work by the orchestra’s Daniel R. Lewis Young Composer Fellow Susan Botti. Leon Kirchner will lead his own Music for 12 and Matthias Bamert will be on the podium for Bruce Broughton’s Piccolo Concerto.

The Dallas Symphony Orchestra will present the world premiere of a work by North Texas composer Cindy McTee. Off the regular season, the DSO will also present Hannibal Lokumbé’s African Portraits in partnership with The Potter’s House church.

Neeme Järvi and the Detroit Symphony Orchestra Photo courtesy of the orchestra

The Detroit Symphony Orchestra will present the world premiere of Hannibal’s “Dear Mrs. Parks” led by Resident Conductor Thomas Wilkins. The large-scale choral work is based on imaginary letters to Rosa Parks from writers of different generations. The season also includes Ned Rorem’s Symphony No. 3 and John Adams’ Naïve and Sentimental Music. Jazz composer and pianist Herbie Hancock will join the DSO for a concert celebration of jazz composers of the 20th century such as George Gershwin, Duke Ellington and Hoagy Carmichael.

Indianapolis Symphony Orchestra is celebrating its 75th anniversary with four commissions—works from Claude Baker, James Beckel, David Newman, and Carolyn Yarnell. In addition, the season includes John Corigliano’s Promenade Overture, Michael Daugherty’s “Red Cape Tango” from Metropolis Symphony, Harris’s Symphony No. 3, Jennifer Higdon’s blue cathedral, Aaron Jay Kernis’s New Era Dance, Behzad Ranjbaran’s Concerto for Violin and Orchestra, Roberto Sierra’s Concerto for Saxophones & Orchestra, and Steven Stucky’s Son et Lumière (Sound and Light).

The Los Angeles Philharmonic and New Music Group give the world premieres of pieces commissioned by the orchestra: Peter Lieberson’s Neruda Songs for mezzo-soprano and orchestra, Mason Bates’s new work, and Eduardo del Barrio, who is writing a 30-minute jazz work for 60-person choir and full orchestra, plus Henry Brant’s Tremors (commissioned by Getty Research Institute). The new music-heavy season line-up also includes four works from Music Director Esa Pekka Salonen (Insomnia, Mania, Memoria, and Wing On Wing), three other works from Lieberson (Horn Concerto, Piano Quintet, and Three Rilke Songs), two works by John Adams (The Dharma at Big Sur and the Violin Concerto), plus works from Becker, Frank, Harrison, Ives, Lang, Meltzer, Reich, Stucky, and Tan Dun.

Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra will host a number of guest conductors during the 2004-05 season, some of whom will be leading new work. James Paul will lead Charles Wuorinen’s Symphony Seven, an MSO commissions, and Gregory Vajda will conduct Philip Glass’s Concerto Fantasy for Two Timpanists and Orchestra. Bobby McFerrin’s program will include his own new works for chorus and orchestra, including Brief Eternity & He Ran for the Train. Miguel Harth-Bedoya, will lead the US Premiere of Daniel Schnyder’s Cello Concerto. Plus David Alan Miller is set to lead a program that will include Michael Torke’s The Healing and Copland’s Symphony No. 3.

Christopher Rouse’s Oboe Concerto will be given its world premiere by co-principal oboe Marilyn Zupnik and the Minnesota Orchestra. The rest of the orchestra’s season line up includes Todd Levin’s Blur, Lowell Liebermann’s Violin Concerto, Steve Heitzeg’s The Tin Forest, Golijov’s Last Round, Ives’s Ragtime Dan
ces, and Richard Einhorn’s My Many Colored Days by Dr. Seuss.

The National Symphony Orchestra commissioned two works that will appear this season—Jefferson Friedman’s The Throne of the Third Heaven and Philip Glass’s Symphony No. 7. The NSO also offers up an all John Williams program—Soundings, Violin Concerto, Tree Song for Violin and Orchestra, and Selections from American Journey—with the composer on the podium and two all-American nights: the first featuring Thomson’s Fugue and Chorale on Yankee Doodle, Creston’s Frontiers, Op. 34, and Carter’s early Musicians Wrestle Everywhere. Additional American composers appearing next season include Irving Fine’s Notturno for String Orchestra with Harp, Donald Erb’s Evensong, Mark O’Connor’s Double Concerto for Two Violins, and Corigliano’s Piano Concerto.

Lorin Maazel will lead the New York Philharmonic in the world premiere performance of Augusta Read Thomas’s Gathering Paradise, Emily Dickinson Settings for Soprano and Orchestra (which he will also take with him to Chicago), as well as Golijov’s Last Round and Kernis’s Lament and Prayer. Three guest conductors are also bringing American work with them to the podium—David Robertson will lead Steve Reich’s Triple Quartet, Slatkin brings Friedman’s The Throne of the Third Heaven…, and James Conlon will conduct Lieberson’s Red Garuda.

Oregon Symphony Music Director Carlos Kalmar will conductor the world premiere of the Kevin Walczyk’s completed Symphony: Corps of Discovery (the first half will be performed in the fall by the St. Louis Symphony), Schwantner’s Percussion Concerto. Yakov Kreizberg will lead the Adams Violin Concerto.

The Philadelphia Orchestra will present the world premiere of Richard Danielpour’s commission, Songs of Solitude, which will be led by David Robertson. Also in the line up, Music Director Christoph Eschenbach will conduct Sierra’s Concerto for Violin, Viola, and Orchestra (a co-commission with the Pittsburgh Symphony), Salonen’s Insomnia, and Thomas’s Trainwork. Tan Dun will lead a performance of his The Map: Concerto for Cello, Video, and Orchestra.

Mariss Jansons with the Pittsburgh Symphony Photo courtesy of the orchestra

For the fourth time, the Pittsburgh Symphony has designated a living composer to be the orchestra’s “Composer of the Year.” This season’s nominee is Christopher Rouse, and he his work will be celebrated with performances of Concert de Gaudi (Guitar Concerto), The Nevill Feast, Phaethon, and Symphony No. 2. The orchestra will also perform two works by Adams—Short Ride in a Fast Machine and Violin Concerto, plus Masterprize nominated Einstein’s Violin by Robert Henderson and winning composition Rainbow Body by Theofanidis.

The San Francisco Symphony has commissioned two works this season—John Thow’s Rhapsody for English Horn and Orchestra and William Kraft’s Timpani Concerto No. 2. SFS Music Director Michael Tilson Thomas will lead his own Island Music, plus performances of Steve Mackey’s Lost and Found and Reich’s For Strings, with winds and brass. In addition, Alan Gilbert will lead Adams’s Naïve and Sentimental Music and Franz Welser-Most’s program includes Dahl’s Concerto for Alto Saxophone.

The Seattle Symphony under Gerard Schwarz will present two centennial commissions during the season—works by Schoenfield and Gabriela Lena Frank—as well as the world premiere of David Schiff’s Intrada. In addition, Marin Alsop will lead Bright Sheng’s Tibetan Swing during her guest appearance with the orchestra.

CORRECTION: The Houston Symphony has since contacted NewMusicBox to alert us that, although the works were not mentioned in their February season press release, they have scheduled three works by American composers in 2004-05: Richard Lavenda’s Clarinet Concerto and Jennifer Higdon’s Blue Cathedral to be conducted by Music Director Hans Graf, and Richard Danielpour’s First Light which will be led by Michael Stern.

The American Academy of Arts and Letters has announced the recipients of this year’s awards in music.

Academy Award in Music—$7500 plus an additional $7500 toward the recording of one work, honors outstanding artistic achievement and acknowledges the composer who has arrived at his or her own voice

• Miguel Chuaqui
• Justin Dello Joio
• Jorge Liderman
• Richard Wilson

Wladimir and Rhoda Lakond Award—$5000

• Trent Johnson
• Virginia Samuel

Goddard Lieberson Fellowships—$15,000, endowed in 1978 by the CBS Foundation, given to mid-career composers of exceptional gifts

• Susan Botti
• Evan Ziporyn

Walter Hinrichsen Award—for the publication of a work by a gifted composer, est. by the C.F. Peters Corporation

• Stephen Blumberg

Charles Ives Fellowships—$15,000 each, drawn from the bequeathed royalties of Charles Ives’ music

• Kristin P. Kuster
• Harold Meltzer

Charles Ives Scholarships—$7500, given to composition students of great promise

• Judah E. Adashi
• Judd Greenstein
• Matthew Kajcienski
• Tamar Muskal
• Jeff Myers
• Aaron Travers

The winners were selected by a committee of Academy members: Olly Wilson (chairman), Samuel Adler, Jack Beeson, Mario Davidovsky, Andrew Imbrie, Ezra Laderman, and Ned Rorem. The awards will be presented at the Academy’s annual Ceremonial in May. Candidates for music awards are nominated by the 250 members of the Academy.

Biographies of 2004 Award Winners in Music (courtesy of the Academy)

Judah E. Adashi (Charles Ives Scholarship), of Baltimore, MD, is a graduate of the Peabody Conservatory of Music of the Johns Hopkins University, where he studied with Nicholas Maw and earned a Master’s degree in composition. He also holds a Bachelor of Arts degree in music with honors from Yale University. He is pursuing his composition studies with John Harbison. Mr. Adashi’s honors include the P. Bruce Blair Award in Composition, the Ada Arens Morawetz Memorial Award in Composition, Peabody Director’s Career Development Grants, Peabody Merit Scholarships, cum laude recognition in the Diana Barnhart Art Song Competition, and a BMI Student Composer Award. He has recently won the Cantate Chamber Singers’ Young Composer Contest, the Auros Group for New Music’s Composition Competition, the Aspen Summer Music Festival’s Jacob Druckman Orchestral Composition, and an ASCAP Foundation Morton Gould Young Composer Award.

Stephen Blumberg (Walter Hinrichsen Award) was born in New York City in 1962, received his Ph.D. in composition from the University of California, Berkeley, and his M.A. and B.A. degrees from the University of California, San Diego. He has studied with Richard Felciano and Andrew Imbrie at U.C. Berkeley, and Bernard Rands, Will Odgon, Joji Yuasa, Pauline Oliveros and Roger Reynolds at U.C. San Diego. In France from 1991 to 1993 as the recipient of the U.C. Berkeley Music Department’s George Ladd Prix de Paris Fellowship, he studied privately with Ivo Malec, participated in a three-week workshop, “La Session de Composition,” led by Brian Ferneyhough and Luis de Pablo at l’Abbey de Royaumont, and worked at Les Ateliers UPIC, the computer music center founded by Iannis Xenakis. Blumberg has also won two Nicola De Lorenzo Prizes for Composition and a BMI Student Composer Award. Blumberg has taught as a graduate student instructor and lecturer at the University of California, Berkeley, and is Assistant Professor in composition and Music Theory at California State University, Sacramento, where he was appointed Artist in Residence for the 1997-98 academic year.

Susan Botti (Lieberson Fellowship) is the Daniel R. Lewis Young Composer Fellow with the Cleveland Orchestra. In 2003-2004, they will premiere a new orchestral work, and have commissioned a large piece for orchestra to premiere in the 2004-2005 season. Her orchestral work, EchoTempo, for soprano, percussion, and orchestra, was commissioned and premiered by Maestro Kurt Masur and the New York Philharmonic, with Ms. Botti as soprano soloist. A CD of her vocal chamber music, listen, it’s snowing, features Ms. Botti’s operatic soliloquy, for soprano, string quartet, harp, piano & percussion, Telaio: Desdemona. A commission from the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra for solo violin and chamber orchestra, Within Darkness, was premiered at Carnegie Hall and The Kennedy Center in 2000. A native of Cleveland, Ohio, Ms. Botti’s early training included studies in music, art and theater. She earned her Bachelor of Music from the Berklee School in Boston and her Masters in Music Composition from the Manhattan School of Music. She is the recipient of grants from Meet The Composer, the NEA, The Aaron Copland Fund, The Mary Flagler Cary Charitable Trust, The NY Foundation for the Arts, The Greenwall Foundation, The Jerome Foundation, ASCAP, and the Foundation for Contemporary Performance Arts. Ms. Botti is Assistant Professor of Composition at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor.

Miguel Chuaqui (Academy Award in Music), a Chilean-American composer, began his studies in music at the Escuela Moderna de Música and the Universidad Católica de Chile. In 1984, he transferred to the University of California at Berkeley and went on to pursue graduate studies in composition there under the guidance of Andrew Imbrie. Dr. Chuaqui’s compositions have been commissioned by, among others, the Fromm Foundation and Earplay. His works are recorded on CRI and Albany Records and have been performed in the U.S. and abroad by ensembles such as Parnassus, Speculum Musicae, Earplay, the Abramyan String Quartet, Left Coast Ensemble, Empyrean Ensemble, Octagon, New York’s Riverside Symphony, Canyonlands, and the Chilean ensembles Bartok and ANCC (Asociación Nacional de Compositores de Chile). His awards include the Eisner Prize, the Nicola de Lorenzo Award, and an Ives Scholarship from the American Academy of Arts and Letters.

Justin Dello Joio (Academy Award in Music) is the 7th generation of composers in the Dello Joio family. He began piano at age 5, studying with the renowned pianist and teacher Miecslav Munz. He began composing at age 5, and studied at the Juilliard School where he received a B.M., M.M., and D.M.A. degrees in composition, studying with Vincent Persichetti, Roger Sessions, and David Diamond. Dello Joio is currently published by G. Schirmer and Theodore Presser Co. His music has been performed by the Detroit Symphony and other orchestras; his Sonata for Piano was broadcast at its premiere at the Festival of American Arts at the National Gallery in Washington D.C., and his String Quartet #1 was premiered and recorded by the Primavera String Quartet. Mr. Dello Joio has received a Guggenheim Fellowship, as well as two previous awards from the American Academy of Arts and Letters: the Lakond Award and, while a student, the Charles Ives Scholarship. He has been recipient of grants from the National Endowment for the Arts, The CAPS grant from the New York State Council on the Arts, the New York Foundation for the Arts, and Meet the Composer. Mr. Dello Joio is currently the Faculty Composer-in-Residence at New York University.

Judd Greenstein (Charles Ives Scholarship) was born and raised in Greenwich Village in New York City. He attended Williams College, studying composition with David K
echley, and majoring in Music and Political Science. In the summer of 2002, he was an artist-in-residence at the first Bang on a Can Summer Institute of Music at the Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art in North Adams, MA. Greenstein is the co-Artistic Director of NOW Ensemble and is a second-year Masters student at the Yale School of Music, where he has studied with Martin Bresnick, Aaron Jay Kernis and Ezra Laderman. This summer, he will be a Fellow at the Tanglewood Music Center in Lenox, MA.

Trent Johnson (Wladimir and Rhoda Lakond Award) is a composer, organist, pianist and conductor. He has written works for the Oratorio Singers of Westfield, the Halcyon Trio, the New Jersey Saxophone Ensemble, and the Colonial Symphony. He was the featured composer on the new music forum, Ars Vitalis at Kean University, and been the recipient of several Meet the Composer grants. Mr. Johnson is a graduate of the Peabody Institute of the Johns Hopkins University and The Juilliard School. He is the Director of Music and Arts and Organist of the First United Methodist Church in Westfield, New Jersey, and conductor of the Oratorio Singers and Orchestra of Westfield. Johnson has appeared in organ recitals at the National Cathedral in Washington, D.C., in New York City at the Riverside Church and St. Thomas’ Church, at Boston’s Trinity Church in Copley Square, and Newark’s Sacred Heart Cathedral. He has been invited to be an organ recitalist at the Second International Organ Festival in Kiev, Ukraine, in May 2004.

Matthew Kajcienski (Charles Ives Scholarship) is studying with John Corigliano at the Juilliard School, where he is a Masters degree student. His composition teachers include Samuel Adler, Edward Bilous, Ladislav Kubik, and Paul Chihara. His awards include The Juilliard School Composition Competition, and an ASCAP/Morton Gould Award. He has been Composer-in-Residence with Manhattan Virtuosi, and with Ensemble du Monde. His works have been performed by The Juilliard Orchestra, the Seoul National Radio Symphony and Ensemble du Monde.

Kristin P. Kuster (Charles Ives Fellowship) recently completed Rorate caeli for mixed chorus, The Narrows for orchestra, and Ando: light against shade for chamber ensemble. Her most recent commissions are from Vox Early Music Ensemble, Quorum, and the Colby College Chorale. Dr. Kuster has received grants, awards from the Brave New Works ensemble, the University of Michigan, the University of Colorado, the Jack L. Adams Foundation, and ASCAP. She founded the Patricia C. Peterson Grants for the Humanities Fund, supporting University of Colorado graduate students in the Humanities. Dr. Kuster is currently an Adjunct Lecturer of Composition, Theory, and Performing Arts Technology at the University of Michigan.

Jorge Liderman (Academy Award in Music) was born in Buenos Aires, studied at the Rubin Academy of Music in Jerusalem, and earned his doctorate in composition from the University of Chicago where he worked with Ralph Shapey and Shulamit Ran. He is on the composition faculty at the University of California, Berkeley. His works have been commissioned and performed by the London Sinfonietta, the American Composers Orchestra, the Los Angeles Philharmonic, the Tanglewood Orchestra, Radio France, the Netherlands Wind Ensemble, the Nieuw Ensemble, the Arditti String Quartet, Cuarteto Latinoamericano, Boston Musica Viva, Milan Divertimento Ensemble, Chicago Pro Musica, and the San Francisco Contemporary Music Players. Liderman’s music has been featured at Darmstadt, Nuova Consonanza, Stuttgart’s Neue Musik, Semaines Musicales Internationales d’Orleans, Mexico’s International Forum, London’s Viva, Osaka’s Expo 90, the International Rostrum of Composers, Paris, and Holland’s Proms. He has been awarded a BMW International Music Theater Prize, a Radio France award, the Argentine Tribune of Composers Prize, and the ASCAP Raymond Hubell Music Award. He was a fellow at the Tanglewood Music Center and the Darmstadt Internationales Musikinstitut, and the ASCAP Raymond Hubell Music Award.

Harold Meltzer (Charles Ives Fellowship), has won prizes and fellowships from the Ford Foundation, ASCAP, NACUSA, and the Fisher Foundation, and has been in residence at the Rockefeller Foundation’s Study and Conference Center in Bellagio, Italy, the MacDowell Colony, Yaddo, Ragdale, VCCA, and the Atlantic Center for the Arts. He graduated summa cum laude from Amherst College, earned degrees in music from the Yale School of Music and King’s College, Cambridge, and a law degree from Columbia University. He has been commissioned by the Commissioning Music/USA program of Meet The Composer, the National Flute Association, the Chamber Music Society of Minnesota, and the Composers Commissioning Program of the American Composers Forum. Recordings of his music are on Albany and CRI labels. He is currently Sequitur’s Artistic Director and a John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Fellow.

Tamar Muskal (Charles Ives Scholarship) earned her BA from the Music Academy in Israel, and her MA from Yale University, where she studied with Jacob Druckman, Martin Bresnick and Ezra Laderman. She continued her studies at CUNY, with David Del Tredici and Tania Leon. Recent commissions have included pieces for Westchester Philharmonic, Richmond Symphony, Music From Copland House, Eighth Blackbird Ensemble and Ethos Percussion Group. Recent theater compositions include Angels in America, The Labor of Life, and The Seven Beggars. Ms. Muskal has received awards and fellowships from ASCAP, Meet the Composer, the Jerome Foundation, American Music Center, and Yale University.

Jeff Myers (Charles Ives Scholarship) is a California native. He studied at San Jose State University with Brian Belet, at the Eastman School of Music with David Liptak, and is a DMA candidate at the University of Michigan, where he studies composition with Bright Sheng. He has received commissions from the Fromm Foundation, SCI/ASCAP, and the New York Youth Symphony. He has twice been awarded BMI Student Composer Awards.

Virginia Samuel (Wladimir and Rhoda Lakond Award) earned a Ph.D. in Composition at Harvard University, and has studied with Donald Martino, Malcolm Peyton, and Andrew Imbrie. Her Bachelor of Music degree in viola performance and Master of Music degree in composition were earned at New England Conservatory. Her composition awards include the Walter Hinrichsen Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, and commissions from EarPlay and the Peabody Trio. She won the Boston Chamber Ensemble competition, a fellowship from the New Jersey State Arts Council, and Harvard University’s Bohemian Prize for Uttermost parts of the sea and for solo viola. Her music is published by Henmar Press (C.F. Peters Edition). She currently lives in London, England.

Aaron Travers (Charles Ives Scholarship) was born in Portsmouth, Virginia in 1975. He received a BA in Classics and a BM in Composition from Oberlin College and Conservatory of Music, as well as an MA in Composition from the Eastman School of Music. His teachers include Richard Hoffmann, Sydney Hodkinson, Augusta Read Thomas, Christopher Rouse and Steven Stucky. Mr. Travers has received several awards including the AGO/ECS Publishing Award, the Chicago Symphony First Hearing Award and the Barlow Prize. He has received commissions from the Civic Orchestra of Chicago, the Barlow Endowment, the South Dakota Symphony, the Tarab Cello Ensemble and Gloria Musicae of Sarasota, Florida. Mr. Travers’ works have been performed throughout the United States, Canada and France. He has been active as a teacher at both Eastman and Hamilton College in both composition and theory, and he remains active as a performer and proponent of new music. He is currently completing his
doctorate at the Eastman School of Music.

Richard Wilson (Academy Award in Music) has composed over eighty works. His awards include the Walter Hinrichsen Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, the Stoeger Prize from the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, the Cleveland Arts Prize, and a Guggenheim Fellowship. Recent commissions have come from the Koussevitzky and Fromm Foundations. His works have been performed by the San Francisco Symphony, the London Philharmonic, the American Symphony, the Pro-Arte Chamber Orchestra of Boston, the Orquesta Sinfonica de Colombia, the Residentie Orkest of The Hague, and the Hudson Valley Philharmonic. Six CDs containing Mr. Wilson’s music have recently been released, and include his complete choral music, Symphony No. 1, an opera in seven scenes, and String Quartets Nos. 3 and 4. A Phi Beta Kappa graduate of Harvard, Mr. Wilson holds the Mary Conover Mellon Chair in Music at Vassar; he is also Composer-in-Residence with the American Symphony Orchestra, for which he gives pre-concert talks.

Evan Ziporyn (Lieberson Fellowship) has had compositions performed by the Kronos Quartet, Bang On A Can, Nederlands Blazer Ensemble, master p’ipaist Wu Man, Gamelan Sekar Jaya, Maya Beiser and Steven Schick, Arden Trio, California EAR Unit, pianist Sarah Cahill, and Orkest de Volharding. His work is informed by his 23-year involvement with Balinese gamelan, which has ranged from intensive study of traditional music to the creation of a series of groundbreaking works for gamelan and western instruments. He has been associated with the Bang On A Can Festival since its founding, appearing as composer, soloist, and ensemble leader. He regularly performs and records as a featured soloist with Steve Reich and Musicians, and shared in their 1999 Grammy for “Music for 18 Musicians”. Born in Chicago in 1959, Ziporyn received degrees from Yale University and the University of California, Berkeley, where his teachers included John Blacking, Martin Bresnick, Gerard Grisey, and David Lewin. Upon completing a Fullbright Fellowship in Indonesia, he became Musical Coordinator of San Francisco’s Gamelan Sekar Jaya in 1988. He has received grants from the Rockefeller Multi-Arts Program, Meet the Composer, the New England Foundation for the Arts, NEA/Arts International, ASCAP, the Cambridge Arts Council, and the National Endowment for the Humanities. He is Kenan Sahin Distinguished Professor of Music at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where he is Head of Music and Theater Arts.

Audition in Your Bunny Slippers? NWS Takes It High Tech

The Miami-based New World Symphony will hold what are likely the first-ever online auditions this week, taking advantage of its continuing relationship in the development of the ultra-high speed Internet2 technology (about 200,000 times faster than standard high-speed office connections). A group of Arizona State University string, woodwind, and brass players will vie for the highly competitive slots in the professional training orchestra from the ASU campus. The New World selection committee will listen and watch from the institution’s headquarters in Miami Beach.

Though still a developing (and expensive) technology, NWS Admissions Director Michael Linville explains that it “allows musicians to perform and communicate across vast distances as if they’re in the same room, without any loss of nuance or meaning, via high-fidelity audio and video…We think online auditions will help make the whole process less costly, time-consuming and stressful for artists and orchestral institutions.”

In Their Own Voice: ACF Launches Training Program for Native American Composers

Composer Brent Michael Davids has been named Artistic Advisor for the newly formed First Nations Composer Initiative (FNCI), a new chapter of the American Composers Forum. Composer Apprentice National Outreach Endeavor (CANOE) is one of the first initiatives, bringing the opportunity of composing to Native American students age 14 to adult. Georgia Wettlin-Larson, from the Fort Peck Reservation in Montana, will serve as the program’s administrative assistant.

CANOE is a series of composer “lessons” (both group and individual): each student learns to read written music notation, creates their own written music, and translate that into a string quartet example.

Brent Michael Davids explains, “The overflowing use of written notation worldwide probably came from the western European push for writing things down—in contrast to the exclusively oral ways of American Indians—but we can use this literary flood to our advantage. We can write music that tells of our experience, our thoughts, our lives in contrast to the mass of written music that sometimes contradicts who we are.”

Recording Industry Blues? ArtistShare Offers Alternatives

Maria Schneider has announced her partnership with ArtistShare, a web content publishing and management system designed to help artists design creative business models tailored to their needs. Schneinder is something of a poster child for the fledgling initiative, which also boasts names like Trey Anastasio and Jim Hall.

Her entire recorded catalogue will now being sold exclusively through her website (CDs will no longer be found in stores). She is also preparing to go into the studio to record her next album, and has invited fans to participate via ArtistShare in “The Studio Recording 2004 Project.” Account holders will have access to streaming media, downloads and exclusive news. “I am documenting every step and am very excited to share everything I learn with you,” announces Schneider on her homepage. “You’ll get a taste of being in my rehearsals and conversing with my musicians. You’ll witness the entire process.” An initial 10,000 copies of the new disc will be pressed for sale with additional orders filled only by download.

Scores and parts, as well as study scores, will also be available as downloads. Schneider points out the advantage that if she should edit a part or make a correction after “publication” parts can be edited, musicians emailed, and parts reprinted.

Academy of Arts and Letters Elects Composers Robert Beaser and Bernard Rands

The Academy of Arts and Letters has elected nine new members, including two composers. Robert Beaser and Bernard Rands will be among the new members inducted at the Academy’s annual ceremony in May. The annual election fills vacancies in the Academy’s membership of 250 American artists, architects, writers, and composers. The Academy was founded in 1898 to “foster, assist, and sustain an interest in literature, music, and the fine arts.”

18th Annual Isadora Duncan Dance Awards Announce 2002-03 Season Nominees

In the Music/Sound/Text Category:

• Patrick Grant for music; Fractured Fictions (Margaret Jenkins), for Margaret Jenkins Dance Company, at the Herbst Pavilion
• Rob Bailis, Nathan Breitling, Phyllis Kamrin, Jeff Watson, Matt Ingalls, Chris Froh, Richard Worn, and Christopher Jones, for their performance at Summerfest’s Choreographers and Composers Consortium, at McKenna Theater
• Emily Fox, Nils Frykdahl, Carla Kihlstedt; Jeannie Mckenzie, Dawn McCarthy, Dan Rathbun, Sten Rudstroem, and Allen Willner for text, sound, and music; Heaven’s Radio (Shinichi Momo Koga, Tanya Calamoneri, and Alan Willner), Inkboat, at Venue 9
• Reverend Markus Hawkins for music composition and performance; ElsewhereHere (Ledoh), at Noh Space
• David Worm and SoVoSó for music; Sans Instruments (Sonya Delwaide), for AXIS Dance Company, at the Alice Arts Center Theatre

National Performing Arts Convention Online Registration Opened

The first National Performing Arts Convention has opened registration on their website: www.performingartsconvention.org.

Some 5,000 delegates are expected in Pittsburgh during the landmark event, hosted and planned by a consortium of national service organizations including the American Symphony Orchestra League, Chorus America, Dance/USA and OPERA America. The American Music Center and Meet The Composer are among the associations also hosting meetings during the marathon affair.