UMBC Music Department Building Global Reputation
UMBC’s music department continues to distinguish itself as an academically and musically talented department, and the world is listening. Faculty, staff and students in the department are building connections with renowned composers, music conservatories and other music institutions worldwide. Here are just a few programs offered by the department and performances that are bringing international recognition to UMBC:
Music of Japan Today 2007
UMBC Camerata Performs at Carnegie Hall
Italian Exchange Program
Music of Japan Today 2007
UMBC’s music department will host Music of Japan Today 2007, one of the largest events of Japanese contemporary music outside of Japan, and the only festival to combine scholarly presentations with musical performances. The three-day symposium will explore and celebrate the development and evolution of Japanese music with performances, lecture-recitals, panel discussions and paper presentations from the widest possible range of disciplines and expertise.
The symposium features performances and lectures by three world-renowned composers: Hiroyuki Itoh, Hiroyuki Yamamoto and Shirotomo Aizawa, and special guest performer Retsuzan Tanabe, master of the shakuhachi, a traditional Japanese bamboo flute. Three student groups (the Chamber Players, Percussion Ensemble and students in the American Contemporary Music certificate program) UMBC faculty and guest musicians from the region and international new music centers will also perform.
Co-directors E. Michael Richards, associate professor of music, and Kazuko Tanosaki, director of the certificate program, co-founded the event 15 years ago as faculty at Hamilton College in New York. “Japan has a long musical tradition (over 1500 years) and a variety of music,” said Tanosaki. “This symposium examines how western culture and traditional Japanese music influence the country’s contemporary music,” said Richards.
Music of Japan Today receives support under the auspices of the Embassy of Japan. It also receives funding from the Northeast Asia Council and Japan-U.S. Friendship Commission, Japan Foundation, the Japan Commerce Association of Washington DC and UMBC.
For a schedule of the events, visit www.umbc.edu/newsevents/arts/calendar/.
UMBC Camerata Performs at Carnegie Hall
The UMBC Camerata, a select chamber choir, has been invited to perform at Carnegie Hall, one of the nation’s premiere concert halls, on April 2. The group, under the direction of David Smith, will perform with famed English choral conductor and composer John Rutter.
The Camerata will perform Rutter’s “Magnificat,” a piece the Camerata performed last fall at UMBC in preparation for the prestigious opportunity. Camerata member Catherine Gerlach, a freshman mechanical engineering major, is a fan of Rutter’s work. She began singing his compositions while in high school when she performed in a female-only musical group. “Just to be seen with the man himself is a chance of a lifetime,” said Gerlach.
Smith hopes to continue providing his students the opportunities to learn and work with some of the world’s greatest musicians and conductors. Just last October, the group sang with award-winning, multi-platinum country artist Kenny Rogers at the Hippodrome Theatre in Baltimore.
Students traveling to New York are still in need of financial support. Persons interested in contributing tax-deductible donations toward the trip should contact David Smith at 410-455-2922 or smithdav@umbc.edu.
Italian Exchange Program
UMBC faculty and students now have the opportunity to participate in the music department’s newest exchange program in Italy. The program is a result of a collaborative work between faculty in the department, particularly Linda Dusman, chair and professor of music, and faculty at the Conservatorio “G. Nicolini” di Piacenza in Italy.
Last November marked the program’s beginning with the exchange of two faculty members – Dusman and Carlo Alessandro Landini, chair of composition at the Conservatorio. Due to differences in the Conservatorio’s academic semester and UMBC’s, when Landini came to campus in November, he finished Dusman’s course in instrumentation, while Dusman began Landini’s composition course in Italy. While there, Dusman worked one-on-one with Landini’s students, whose ages ranged from 16 to 40. Graduate students at the Conservatorio also had the opportunity to coach with Dusman in “Incontro con Linda Dusman” (“Encounter with Linda Dusman”), a concert of music written by Dusman. At UMBC, Ruckus, the professional contemporary music ensemble, premiered Landini’s new work, “Coming to Life. Generation, Transition, Interlocking of Phases.” Landini’s work was commissioned by Ruckus to commemorate UMBC’s 40th Anniversary.
“This program establishes a European connection for our department and especially for our student-singers,” said Dusman. “This experience will give them the opportunity to study singing in Italy, which is the source of the European operatic tradition.”
Dusman hopes the program will take place annually. The first student from the department is currently studying in Italy. Peter Kuyatt, a music education major and guitarist, started in January and will remain until June. Kuyatt is interning at a middle school in Italy where he is learning the techniques that Italian music educators use in the classroom.
(3/26/07)
