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 News Archive from 2019-2020

                                                                                                                                                        

"The History of the Blues…Scale?" by PhD candidate Asher Tobin Chodosis a featured guest post in Ethan Iverson's blog: "Do the Math".

https://ethaniverson.com/the-history-of-the-blues-scale-gu…/

The full article may be found in Jazz Perspectives: 
https://tandfonline.com/…/full/10.1080/17494060.2019.1616872

 

 

 


 

Two new faculty members join the Music Department, King James Britt and Matthew Leslie Santana
The Music Department welcomes two new faculty members, King James Britt, and Matthew Leslie Santana.

Assistant Teaching Professor Britt is Philadelphia born, a Pew Fellowship recipient, composer and dj. He will be teaching computer music.

Read details about King Britt's background here.

Assistant Professor Santana is a violinist and ethnomusicologist broadly interested the role of performance within movements toward racial, sexual, and economic justice throughout the Americas. He will be teaching Integrative Studies.

 

Read details about Matthew Leslie Santana's background here.


 

 


 

Former UC San Diego professor George Lewis is honored with the prestigious Doris Duke Foundation Award
Music innovator George Lewis and playwright Lauren Yee receive $275,000 Doris Duke Foundation Artists Awards
Visionary composer George Lewis and noted playwright Lauren Yee are among this year’s six Doris Duke Charitable Foundation Artists honorees, one of the nation’s most exclusive and prestigious cultural awards for excellence and innovation in the arts.
Read the full article here.

 


 

 

Donald Trump, opera star? Maybe so, in Anthony Davis’
‘Central Park Five’

"The pre-presidential Trump makes for an unforgettable real-life antagonist in this gripping new work about racial injustice, which debuts June 15 at Long Beach Opera." -- George Varga

Read the full article here.

Professor Anthony Davis's work was also featured in the New York Times article, "This Summer, Opera Grapples with Race". Michael Cooper writes, "The Central Park Five” is now an opera. Other new works explore the Black Lives Matter era, identity and more issues long ignored by the art form."

Read the full article here.

 


 

Assistant Professor Sarah Hankins named one of the 2019-2020 Hellman Fellows

Congratulations to Assistant Professor Sarah Hankins who was awarded the Hellman Fellowship.
The Hellman Fellows Program makes grants to research institutions to support junior faculty research on individual campuses.

Read more about the fellowship here.

 


  

UC San Diego had a large presence at LA Phil's Noon to Midnight Event


On Saturday, June 1st, UC San Diego Alumni and current graduate students participated in LA Phil's "Noon to Midnight". a pop-up concert boasting of 1,100 performers, 53 composers, 27 ensembles, 59 works and 22 world premieres.

UC San Diego participants include:

Alumna Michelle Lou’s world premiere, “Lullaby” (commission by the LA Phil)
Alumna Chen-Hui Jen's work, “In Fading Colors of Autumn Hills"
Alumna Chaya Czernowin's work, “Manoalchadia”
Graduate Student Fernanda Aoki Navarro's work, “H”
red fish blue fish: Graduate students, James Beauton, Christopher Clarino, Fiona Digney, Sean Dowgray, Rebecca Lloyd-Jones and Michael Jones

Read about the event in the San Francisco Classical Voice here.

 


 

Distinguished Professor and Reed Family Presidential Chair Steven Schick performed at the 73rd Ojai Music Festival 


Schick performed the eight movements of John Luther Adams’ "The Mathematics of Resonant Bodies".

Works by John Luther Adams have been performed for Ojai audiences and have included "Sila", "Inuksuit" (co-commissioned by the Ojai Music Festival), and recently "Everything that Rises" performed at the 2018 Festival.  

About the Ojai Music Festival

"From its founding in 1947, the Ojai Music Festival has created a place for groundbreaking musical experiences, bringing together innovative artists and curious audiences in an intimate, idyllic setting 80 miles northwest of Los Angeles. The Festival presents broad-ranging programs in unusual ways with an eclectic mix of rarely performed music, refreshing juxtapositions of musical styles, and works by today’s composers. The four-day festival is an immersive experience with concerts, free community events, symposia, and gatherings. Considered a highlight of the international music summer season, Ojai has remained a leader in the classical music landscape for seven decades."

Read the article here.

 


 

Professor Mark Dresser has received several incredible reviews for his recent release, “Ain’t Nothing But a Cyber Coup & You”, including a NY Times Playlist Pick.

 


 

Pulitzer Prize-nominated composer and UC San Diego music professor Lei Liang had worked with poets, painters and dancers, but never with beluga whales before he came to the university’s Qualcomm Institute as its Research Artist in Residence.

On Wednesday, May 29, whale song joins the chords of string instruments in a public performance of Lei Liang’s collaborative seminar “Hearing Seascapes.”
The May 29 performance will showcase the project in a new dimension through original music scores composed by Liang’s students in the Department of Music and the Jacobs School of Engineering, and performed by the award-winning Mivos Quartet."
UC San Diego Grad Student and cellist T.J. Borden had recently joined the Mivos Quartet last year.

Read more about the event here.

 


 

Professor Shlomo Dubnov's piece, "Query-based Deep Composition" will be in the upcoming MuMe Concert at UNC Charlotte, June 18th.

Professor Dubnov writes, "The piece will be generated by a neural network that was trained on a corpus of piano works by Sergei Prokofiev. Using a combination of energy-based deep neural networks for learning of musical surface, and predictive time-based models, the proposed pieces will explore time-predictability and surface complexity trade-offs as a music composition principle.

Unlike most other common neural music works that explore stylistic imitation by a learning machine, the impetus here is to provide a study of yet unimagined possibilities of interaction with a complex machine learning system, realized in a series of short
pieces, each with a different form, texture, and character."
MUME brings together artists, practitioners and researchers interested in developing systems that autonomously (or interactively) recognize, learn, represent, compose, complete, accompany, or interpret music. As such, we welcome contributions to the theory or practice of generative music systems and their applications in new media, digital art, and entertainment at large.

Read more about the event here.

 


 

Graduate Student Fernanda Aoki Navarro to be one of six composers in the ICECommons Artist-In-Residence program


The ICECommons Artist-In-residence program selects six composers, represented by a diversity of backgrounds and musical styles. The cohort was selected by a panel of Ensemble musicians and outside experts who, over the course of six weeks, became familiar with more than 700 composers who submitted their creative work for consideration via a new “call for scores” on the ICEcommons web portal. ICEcommons Artists-in-Residence will receive a paid commission, collaborative workshop opportunities, promotional support, and world premiere and repeat performances, as well as video and audio documentation throughout the entire creative process.

 


 


Alumna Judith Hamman will be an artist in residence at EMS Stockholm with Anthea Caddy December 2nd - 8th this year, working on a new composition for multi-channel diffusion thanks to the APRA AMCOS Art Music Fund.

In March 1st to May 30th 2020, she'll be an artist in residence for HIAP (Helsinki International Artist Program) on the island of Suomenlinna, courtesy of the Australia Council for the Arts.

Read details about the EMS residency here.

 



Graduate Student Eunjeong Koh wins the 7th annual Interdisciplinary Research Awards

"Music and emotion are strongly linked, and listeners can feel different emotions directly or indirectly through music. In her research, she proposes an interactive audio interface that sonifies emotion. The idea is to use facial gesture data to detect emotion and categorize these into several emotional states for sonification. Rather than simply detecting facial gesture data, it automatically extracts emotional states and produces sound output transition. She has implemented two approaches for her project: (1) music style transition based on the user’s emotion and (2) auditory interface based on the connection between facial components and musical metadata. The proposed model is not limited to sound only, capable to interpret also joint audio-visual features. Moreover, using machine learning, she can understand some patterns in previous audio-visual recording files, and the algorithms in the interface automatically make the decision for creative purpose. Her proposed model can generate music based on facial gestures and users emotional states. In her dissertation, she provides a practical sound generation model to users based on the components of emotion and musical metadata. The study also presents an insight that can help improve machine learning-based artificial intelligence entertainment systems."

Eunjeong Koh works in the field of artificial intelligence and music with Professor Shlomo Dubnov as her advisor.

 


  

Professor Katharina Rosenberger has been awardedthe prestigious Guggenheim Fellowship for Music Composition
Katharina Rosenberger, a composer and professor in the University of California San Diego Department of Music, was awarded a 2019 Guggenheim Fellowship for a new collaboration that will investigate the relationship of body and movement to sound.

Anthony King, Director of Communications, UC San Diego Division of Arts and Humanities
interviewed Rosenberger about here work last month.
Read the article here.

 


 

Scientific American: Machines can create art, but can they jam?

David Borgo, saxophonist, professor and Music Department Chair discusses AI-generated music in Scientific American.

“Deep learning in jazz has similarly downplayed the crucial rhythmic, timbral, and textural aspects of music,” says Professor Borgo, “Research in this area has tended to focus on getting computers to play the ‘right notes,’ but we are still a long way from designing systems capable of the micro and macro temporal, timbral and textural adjustments necessary to groove together and to develop high-level collective improvisation in an unscripted fashion with human musicians (rather than insisting that human musicians improvise with, or groove to, the computer).”

Read the full article here.

 


Grammy-winner Kamau Kenyatta and composer Joe Garrison doubly in sync

George Varga of the Union-Tribune talks to Music Faculty Member Kamau Kenyatta and Joe Garrison about their first joint concert at the Conrad Prebys Music Center’s Experimental Theater.

Varga writes, "The opportunity to hear Garrison and Kenyatta perform with their respective groups is an inviting one.
Both are steeped in a rich array of jazz traditions, although Garrison’s work draws almost equally at times from classical music of recent and distant vintages."

Read the full article here.

 


 

Congratulations Grad Student Yi-Hsien Chen!

The Copland House selected composer Yi-hsien Chen for their latest commission. Yi-hsien will compose a new work for the University City High School students.

The World Premiere of "Dancing Ink", a vibrant new instrumental work created especially for this concert.

"Dancing Ink" is a product of Copland House's award-winning, "What's the Score?" program -- a nationwide educational initiative connecting students and acclaimed professional composers in exhilarating, shared journeys of artistic exploration, creation, and discovery. Igniting the imagination, and inspiring young people to hear, see, and respond in new and dynamic ways, composers collaborate with students through multiple in-school visits to create new musical works for high school ensembles

Read more about the program and the concerthere.

 


 

Ph.D. Candidate Elisabet Curbelo has accepted a tenure track position as Assistant Professor of Electroacoustic Composition and Music Theory at the University of Utah. Alumnus Nick Demaison was hired as an Assistant Professor of Conducting and Director of Orchestral Studies at the John J. Cali School of Music at Montclair State University and graduating senior Nicole Shao has been accepted into Columbia University’s sound art program.

Both Alumna Chaya Czernowin and Graduate Student Fernanda Aoki Navarro have been awarded Radcliffe Institution fellowships for their works Fast Darkness and In Her Words, respectively.

The New York City based new music sinfonietta Ensemble Échappé, led by conductor Ben Grow, with guest soprano UC San Diego Alumna Alice Teyssier was listed in the New York Times for their performance of a set of 21st century large ensemble works programmed around Claude Vivier's 1981 masterpiece, Bouchara.

Congratulations to each of you!

 


 

European Research Council Awards UC San Diego Professor 2.5 million Euros for Music Research

Distinguished Professor Jann Pasler will conduct a five-year study of the musical dimension of the French empire to expand understanding of contemporary cultural relations

Read the article by Anthony King here.

Read the Times of San Diego Article here.

 


 

Alumni Jonathan and Jared Mattson win San Diego Music Awards’ 2019 Best Jazz Album

Jade Griffin of Triton Magazine writes, "The Mattson 2 is rife with colorful sounds of rhythm, improvisation, story, and of course, the ocean. As they expand the definition of jazz, they are inspiring younger generations of listeners to appreciate the beauty and depth of the genre."

 


 

Graduate Student Nathaniel Haering Wins Prestigious 2019 ASCAP/SEAMUS Award

Congratulations to Graduate Student Nathaniel Haering!

He is the first-prize winner of the 2019 ASCAP/SEAMUS Student Commission Competition.

His new work will be premiered at next years SEAMUS (The Society For Electro-Acoustic Music In the United States) National Conference at the University of Virginia.

The winning piece, "Medical Text p.57" will be released on Music from SEAMUS vol 29.
Nathaniel was one of 4 finalists and was then selected as the first prize winner at the SEAMUS Banquet, at which Gordon Mouma was being honored with the SEAMUS (lifetime achievement) award.

Award description website:

Previous winners:

 


 

Anthony Davis’ ‘Black Lives Matter’ concert to re-visit two of his operas — and preview his next

George Varga of the Union-Tribune talks about Professor Anthony Davis' earlier works and Davis' world premiere opera, "The Central Park Five."
Read the full article here.

 


 


Ben Gurion University invites Professor Shlomo Dubnov to speak at its Distinguished Scientist Visitors Program

Professor Shlomo Dubnov has been invited on behalf of the Computer Sciences Department and the Faculty of Natural Science's Distinguished Scientist Visitors Program to give this talk in Ben Gurion University, Israel.

Read details about the talk here.

 


 

Ph.D. Candidate Suzanne Thorpe is this year’s Victor E. Ferrall Artist-in-Residence

In February, as a part of Thorpe's week-long residency, she performed among sound installations created by Beloit students on in the Wright Museum.
Inspired by David Tudor's "Rainforest," which Thorpe contributed to, students were charged with collecting the sounds of Beloit. They recorded in various spaces on campus including residence halls, the Science Center, and outdoors, then they composed soundscapes using these recordings.

Thorpe also gave talks on composing nonanthropocentrically and sound as place of maintaining environmental stability, in addition to a performance with sound art made by the students of Yvonne Wu. She was joined by Stephan Moore for the performance.

Read the full description of the residency here.

 


 

Ph.D. Candidate Keir GoGwilt Heads into the Spring Season with a String of Impressive Concerts

April 10th 2019
Keir will be playing a trio recital with fellow AMOC instrumentalists Conor Hanick (piano) and Coleman Itzkoff (cello) at National Sawdust in NYC. Pieces will include Its Own Accord, a piece written for him by Matthew Aucoin, and Celeste Oram’s Sanz cuer/Amis, dolens/Dame, par vous (2016), a work that uses a medieval French ballade as a springboard to explore the fluidity between the sacred and the mundane, the virtual and the real, the performative and the everyday.
 

April 12th 2019
Keir will be playing two pieces written for him by Matthew Aucoin. Performing with Matt Aucoin and with violinist Miranda Cuckson, as part of a live WBUR broadcast concert in Boston.

 
April 24th & 25th 2019
Keir will be performing his collaboration with choreographer Bobbi Jene Smith, A Study on Effort, at UNC Chapel Hill as part of the Carolina Performing Arts initiative, featuring music by James Tenney, JS Bach, Johann Paul von Westhoff, Malcolm Goldstein, as well as his own compositions/improvisations.

 
May 16th-19th 2019
Keir will again be teaming up with Bobbi Jene for a new piece of hers at La MaMa in NYC.

 


 

Jazz trumpeter Stephanie Richards pays tribute to New York City on her sophomore album Take the Neon Lights, out now.

After her “spellbinding” (NPR) debut celebrated by the
New York Times as a “bold pronouncement” trumpeter Stephanie Richards celebrates her latest project Take The Neon Lights (Birdwatcher records). An avant/jazz expedition of grit and brilliance, this project is takes sounds of city life and explores a spontaneous prose of ugly beauty.
The album features NYC players James Carney on piano, Sam Minaie on bass and Andrew Munsey on drums, the single, titled Brooklyn Machine made the New York Times playlist for 2019, with Nate Chinen’s WBGO calling it “ingenious….Steph Richards is a trumpeter whose skillset explodes every category”.
Voted #2 record of the year by Jazz Right Now.
Read the review on "The Free Jazz Collective" here.

Listen to an interview with KBGA radio here.

Jazz Critic Kevin Whitehead Critic reviews Assistant Professor Stephanie Richards' new album "Take The Neon Lights" On NPR's Fresh Air.

Whitehead writes, "Richards is a musician who's attuned to her instrument's idiosyncrasies and pet sounds. On her new album, she's helped along by the collective sound environment created by her quartet."

Listen or read the transcript here.


Read another review on "Next Bop" here.



 


 

Cross-Wired Brings International Percussionists to UC San Diego for One Dynamic Week
Concerts, master classes will workshop and premiere new piece by Pulitzer Prize-winning composer Roger Reynolds
Director of Communications, UC San Diego Division of Arts and Humanities Anthony King interviews Distinguished Professor and Reed Family Presidential Chair Steven Schick and University Professor Roger Reynolds about their week-long event Cross-Wired.
Anthony King writes, "The UC San Diego Department of Music’s Cross-Wired series is incredibly unique, Distinguished Professor Steven Schick said. It’s a week-long set of mini-concerts, master classes and large-scale performances for seven up-and-coming percussionists, each who will be studying new work by Pulitzer Prize-winning composer and University Professor Roger Reynolds."
Read the full article here.

 


 

 

Mark Dresser Still the Ace of Bass
Wonderful write up on Professor Mark Dresser in the Houston Chronicle. Andrew Dansby writes, "Mark Dresser spent a decade playing bass in a revered quartet led by the avant-garde legend Anthony Braxton. For many that spell would be a career maker, but for Dresser it’s just part of a long, winding career as a notable bassist, composer and improviser."
Read the full article here.

 


 

 

News 8 celebrates Emeritus Professor Cecil Lytle in Throwback: San Diego icons celebrated during Black History Month
In addition to sharing his thoughts on the power of music and what it meant to be successful, Cecil also showcased some of his musical talents in the throwback reel.
Read the full article here.
Watch the throwback interview here.

 


 

Ph.D. Candidate Anahita Abbasi starts the year off strong with several touring dates of her world premiere works
The Ensemble Modern performed Anahita's work, Situation II / Dialogue this January in London at this year's Sound State festival in Southbank Centre. This concert was recorded by BBC - they will broadcast it sometime in May-June.  The work also premiered in Frankfurt. Frankfurt's concert was broadcasted in its full length on 28th February on the radio station HR2:Kultur.
Anahita's work, Intertwined Distances also premiered in the UK and was commissioned by Harpsichordist Mahan Esfahani.
Read about the program here and the review in the Guardian here.
Ensemble Schallfeld koncertje performed her work, Situation / Dialogue, as well as,
PhD Candidate Andres Gutierrez Martinez's work, IO in a Budapest music festival.
Anahita's work, Distorted Attitudes IV / Facile synthesis for string quartet (2015) premiered in
New York City by the Mivos Quartet & Nadav Lev at the Miller Theatre at Columbia University.
UC San Diego Grad Student Tyler J. Borden recently joined the Mivos Quartet last year.
The Swedish group, UME DUO is also touring with Anahita's piece, sirventès (2017) in Europe, the second concert will be in Switzerland at the Historisches Museum Baden on March 30th . 
Anahita was invited by the Iranian Female Composers Association to be a part of a festival of Iranian women composers in Washington DC on March 30th. She will present an American premiere piece at the Kennedy Center and then in New York at Roulette on April 3rd. 

 


  

University of California San Diego Division of Arts and Humanities | Department of Music presents: Cross-Wired

February 25 to March 1, 2019, at the Conrad Prebys Concert Hall
A series of percussion concerts and master classes by renowned & emerging percussionists, including a solo concert by Steven Schick and a world premiere composition by Roger Reynolds.


Cross-Wired is unique: in a week-long set of concerts and master classes, seven young percussionists from North America and Europe will be in residence at UC San Diego to study a new work for percussion solo by Pulitzer-Prize winning composer and University Professor, Roger Reynolds. The new work, for percussion with text by Samuel Beckett, will be coached by Cross-Wired host Steven Schick, along with Reynolds, Theatre and Dance faculty member Eva Barnes and two distinguished alumni of UC San Diego: Aiyun Huang(University of Toronto) and Ivan Manzanilla (University of Guanajuato).

Open to the public are afternoon masterclasses, a daily informal concert at 5:00 and two concerts in the Conrad Prebys Concert Hall. 
On Wednesday, February 27, Distinguished Professor Steven Schick will present a solo concert, including the first performance of Reynolds’ new piece, Here and ThereOn Friday, March 1, guest faculty Ivan Manzanilla and Aiyun Huang will present new solo works in a concert that will conclude a red fish blue fish performance of Iannis Xenakis’s Persephassa for six antiphonal percussionists. 

This year marks the 30th anniversary of Xenakis' work Persephassa. The seating configuration of the Conrad Prebys Concert Hall was specifically designed to accommodate and feature this masterwork. The Friday, March 1st concert will be the first time Persephassa will be performed in the Conrad Prebys Concert Hall.

 


 

Distinguished Professor Jann Pasler, President and founder of the Friends of the Museum of Black Civilizations in Senegal.


Since summer 2016, Distinguished Professor Jann Pasler has served as a member of the organizational and curatorial team of The Museum of Black Civilizations which opened in Dakar, Senegal, on 6 December 2018. Built by the Chinese at a cost of $34.5 million, this is the first such museum of its size and ambition in Africa, with close to 14,000 square m. of floor space and capacity for 18,000 exhibits. Not ethnographic or anthropological in nature, it will showcase not only both traditional and contemporary arts, media, and cultures, but also African contributions to the scientific, technical, and cultural heritage of humanity. Central to its mission is cultivating bridge-building, collaboration, and global dialogue in Africa and its diasporas. The museum also plans to house returned artefacts from France and elsewhere.

During the planning workshops in August 2016, Professor Pasler was asked by the Senegalese Minister of Culture to create a "Friends of the Museum of Black Civilizations." As its founding President, she conceived it as both private and based on volunteer work in support of another organization, the first such association in Senegal. Before it opened, she served as an international ambassador and advocate for the Museum in Senegal, Morocco, France, and the USA. In Senegal, she has focused on building a public for it—not obvious in a culture with no history of museum-attendance. To help with this, at the Friends’ first General Assembly in November 2016, she created an auxiliary group, the Young Friends of Dakar, for those from 18 to 35 years old. At its second General Assembly in December 2018, numerous local members joined committees she established to work on communication and promotion, bringing in school children, encouraging local partnerships, and organizing arts-related activities. Professor Pasler hopes eventually to raise an international endowment that would assure the museum's future independence from the inevitable flux of local politics.

Read the New York Times article about the museum here and the BBC review here.

 


Professor Katharina Rosenberger's world premiere work, "Folds" receives mention on the Schott Music Corporation & European American Music the Violin Channel websites


New York-based violinist Miranda Cuckson performs the world premiere performance of intermedia artist Katharina Rosenberger and projection designer John Burnett’s Folds for Solo Violin and Electronics.

Click on the links below to read the full articles:

 


 

Graduate Student Qing Qing Wang receives praise from Marcus Overton of the Union Tribune

Overton writes, "Composer Qing Qing Wang was in the audience to accept enthusiastic applause for the world première of this year’s Nee Commission, “Between Clouds and Streams.” In striking orchestral tone painting that ranged from barely audible low registers to extremely high ones, Wang evoked a world of natural beauty, as well as the long tradition of Chinese ink wash painting."

 

 


 

Celeste Oram mentioned in the Union Tribune for her opera, "He Pūtōrino Mākutu (A Magic Flute) —
A Taonga Pūoro Puppet Opera"

“Celeste has a gift for putting old music in new frames. Also, the piece is just delightful and manages to pose a lot of questions about what these traditions have to say about each other, without shoving anything down people’s throats.”says Matthew Aucoin, curator of the San Diego Symphony’s “Hearing the Future” festival.

  


Graduate Student Kevin Green will be presenting a paper/interactive demonstration this Friday, February 15th at the 6th Global Reggae Conference 2019.



This conference will be held at The University of the West Indies-Mona, in Kingston, Jamaica.

The presentation is entitled, Curricular Concepts in Children's Music Education with Jamaican Music and the Melodica.

In his paper and partial interactive presentation, Kevin disputes the notion that Jamaican music and ideas in music making are unsuitable of serious music study. He presents effective strategies used for student instruction while he was teaching at The Brooklyn Brownstone School-K628; a public school in the Bedford-Stuyvesant section of Brooklyn, New York. He intends to take attendees through his repertoire choices, methodology, processes, and general concept while using reggae music and the melodica for training students in reading music, ear training, and beginning improvisation. A sharing of the history and cultural component of his former students daily instruction will also be addressed; which entailed using reggae music, the melodica, and Afro-Brazilian samba-reggae rhythms and drums to help students make Afro-diasporic cultural connections between America, Jamaica, and Brazil.

 


 

Professor Erik Carlson and Alum Greg Stuart recorded an album of duos by Eva-Maria Houben that made the Best Contemporary Classical of 2018 at Bandcamp.

 

Peter Margasak of Bandcamp writes, "These four pieces for violinist Erik Carlson and percussionist Greg Stuart—the latter a trusted collaborator of the best known Wandelweiser figure in the U.S., Michael Pisaro—are deliriously minimal, with scores that sketch out only the most basic of precepts."

Read the full article here.

Purchase their album here.

 


 

Assistant Professor Stephanie Richards is kicking the new year off with several concerts and a debuting album called Take the Neon Lights and Wear a Crown.

FONT WEST | January 20-27, 2019
Festival of New Trumpet Music West 2019
FONT co-director Stephanie Richards and Dan Atkinson, a Grammy-nominated jazz producer and artistic director for UC San Diego Urban, have put together the first-ever West Coast edition of FONT, FONT West, for one week in January 2019.
The festival involves the collaboration of leading San Diego arts organizations including the Athenaeum Music & Arts Library, Digital Gym Cinema, UC San Diego Department of Music, Panama 66, The Loft, Fresh Sound, San Diego Symphony, Quartyard, and
UC San Diego Urban.
Details and program information can be found here.

FRESH SOUND presents Stephanie Richards + quartet | Friday, January 25, 2019
White Box Live Art at Liberty Station
Richards will be performing her new album Take the Neon Lights and Wear a Crown, with Joshua White, piano; Brian Walsh, bass clarinet; Andrew Munsey, drums and Mark Dresser, bass. This concert is part of the SD Symphony's "Hearing the Future" festival and FONT West (Festival of New Trumpet)
Details can be read here.
Tickets at the door: $20 and $10 for students

BLACK FEBRUARY | February 4, 11, 25 2019
The Loft at UC San Diego
Developed by the pioneering artist Butch Morris, Conduction can be described as a duet for conductor and ensemble. In honor of his trailblazing Black February series in 2005, The Loft is celebrating this unparalleled approach to music making by presenting three dynamic nights of Conduction each Monday of February. Stephanie Richards will be performing the series with her Winter 201.
Learn more about Butch Morris' Black February series here.
General Admission can be purchased here. Students are free with ID.

TAKE THE NEON LIGHTS AND WEAR A CROWN | March 1, 2019
Birdwatcher Records
After her "spellbinding" (NPR) debut record, new music trumpeter Stephanie Richards follows up with a premiere of works from her latest project. Using New York City as a backdrop, Richards selected poems from icons including Langston Hughes, Maya Angelou, and Allen Ginsberg to name a few, and has crafted music for quartet that explores a spontaneous prose of grit and brilliance; the ugly beauty of the city.
Watch a teaser clip the of the animated music video here.
Pre-order the album here.

  


 

UC San Diego Music will have a large presence in the San Diego Symphony Hearing the Future festival so make sure you mark your calendars!

Hearing the Future, curated by composer-conductor (and 2018 MacArthur Fellow and Genius Award recipient) Matthew Aucoin, explores and celebrates the power of music and art to give voice to the evolution and revolutions in the world at large. -- San Diego Symphony

CONVOLUTION: A TWISTED JOURNEY OF MUSIC AND MOVEMENT
January 11, 2019 | 7:30 p.m.
James Beauton, DMA Graduate Student
Justin Morrison, SDSU Professor, School of Music and Dance
Venue: Sandbox
Read details about this concert here.

A BRIEF HISTORY OF "NEW MUSIC" WITH MATTHEW AUCOIN
PhD candidate Keir GoGwilt, PhD Graduate Student, Integrative Studies
San Diego Symphony
Read details about this concert here.

January 16 & 17, 2019 | 8:00 p.m.
Celeste Oram, PhD Candidate
Assistant Professors Amy Cimini and Wilfrido Terrazas,
Alumni Kyle Motl and Judith Hamann,
Graduate Students Barbara Byers, Keir GoGwilt, Madison Greenstone, and Alexandria Smith
San Diego Guild of Puppetry
Radio Tautitotito
San Diego Symphony
Venue: Sandbox
Read details about this concert here.

January 17, 2019 | 5:00 p.m.
Professor Susan Narucki and kallisti
San Diego Symphony
Read details about this concert here.

January 25, 2019 | 7:30 p.m.
Assistant Professor Stephanie Richards
Fresh Sound
Read details about this concert here.

January 26, 2019 | 7:00 p.m.
Distinguished Professor and Reed Family Presidential Chair Steven Schick
Claude Debussy - Jeux (arranged, Cliff Colnot) 
Arnold Schoenberg - Phantasy for Violin (arranged, Tobin Chodos) Keir GoGwilt, violin Gustav Mahler -Das Lied von der Erde (arranged, Schoenberg) Jessica Aszodi and John Russell, soloists
Read details about this concert here.

  


 

RETAKING THE STAGE:
WHAT ARTISTS CAN BE IN OUR SOCIETY

A comprehensive article about Inheritance by James Chute of
New Music USA discussing the role of art in society:
 
Read the full article here.

  


 

Appointment of Professor Susan Narucki as Inaugural
Director of Arts and Community Engagement

Congratulations to Professor Susan Narucki on her appointment as Inaugural Director of Arts and Community Engagement, a new initiative from the Division of Arts and Humanities.
Arts and Community Engagement is housed within the Institute of Arts and Humanities, and its goal is to connect students, faculty, alumni, staff and the greater community in a variety of performance, program and academic activities that highlight art as a means of fostering broader cultural dialogue and civic engagement.
Selected after an open call for faculty nominations within the Division of Arts and Humanities, Narucki began in the position December 1st, 2018 and has been appointed for two years.

Read more about the initiative here.

  


 

Music Critic Alex Ross highlights several projects by UC San Diego's current faculty members and recent alumni in the New Yorker’s list of Notable Performances and Recordings of 2018.

Ross was "shaken" by Alum Tina Tallon’s “. . . for we who keep our lives in our throats . . .,” a response to sexual abuse which premiered on the LA Phil’s Green Umbrella Series in October. Tina is a recent PhD composition graduate who is now Assistant Professor at Boston Conservatory.
Distinguished Professor Steven Schick’s performance of “Inuksuit” at the U.S.-Mexico border in January, with dozens of percussionists participating on both sides of the wall, gets special mention and a featured video. This was only one facet of Schick’s ambitious month-long festival titled “It’s About Time.”
Under notable recordings, Ross highlights the work of UC San Diego alum Anna Thorvaldsdottir, whose composition “Aequa” is featured on a recording by the International Contemporary Ensemble (Sono Luminus), and the work of Professor Charles Curtis, who performed Cassandra Miller’s “Duet for Cello and Orchestra" with the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra.

Read the full article here.

 


 

UC San Diego Music Department has a large presence in the Night of 100 Solos: A Centennial Event

On April 16, 2019-the late, legendary American choreographer Merce Cunningham's 100th birthday-the largest Cunningham event ever staged will take place in London, New York City, and Los Angeles.
Assistant Professor Stephanie Richards, Ph.D. Candidates Suzanne Thorpe, and Madison Greenstone will create the live score for the event at UCLA's Center for the Arts of Performance.

Read details about the festival here.

 

 

 


 

He Pūtōrino Mākutu' - a taonga pūoro puppet opera

He Pūtōrino Mākutu (Eine Zauberflöte/A Magic Flute) is a chamber opera that combines two musical traditions from antipodes of the globe: Viennese classicism and taonga pūoro.

With the support of the San Diego Symphony's 'Hearing the Future' festival, this opera will be presented here in San Diego on January 16th and 17th 2019, at Sandbox.
The company is comprised of UC San Diego Music Department faculty members Amy Cimini, Wilfrido Terrazas, current graduate students Madison Greenstone, Alexandria Smith and Alumni Barbara Byers, Kyle Motl, Judith Hamann, Celeste Oram, Keir GoGwilt along with collaborators from all over the world.

To purchase tickets and read more about the opera go here.

 

 


 

Congratulations to grad student Nathan Haering for winning third prize in the WOCMAT 2018, The International Phil Winsor Computer Music Competition.
 
His piece "Medical Text p.57" was recently performed at The 14th International Workshop of Computer Music and Audio Technology (WOCMAT 2018) in Taiwan.
 
Read more about the competition here.

  


 

Professor Mark Dresser featured in the San Diego Troubadour

Robert Bush of San Diego Troubadour wrote a rich and historical article about Professor Mark Dresser.

Bush writes, "(Mark Dresser's) aesthetic is complex (though never for the sake of complexity), organic, and most of all, joyful."
He continues, "Dresser is most vividly experienced live in concert where one can truly marvel at the brilliance of his considerable technical prowess"
Read the full article here.

   


 

Professor Katharina Rosenberger will be participating the National Sawdust's 2019 FERUS Festival

National Sawdust's annual FERUS Festival is a four-day celebration
dedicated to presenting the latest in cutting-edge new music, with an emphasis on performances that push the envelope. 
Miranda Cuckson, an original National Sawdust Curator, returns with collaborator Katherine Rosenberger to present Folds, an innovative program that explores the duality of materiality versus immateriality. 
Read details about the festival here.

   


 

A Glowing review for Distinguished Professor Steven Schick

Christian Hertzog of the Union Tribune writes, "Passionate and intense, Steven Schick makes dramatic music with water in 
Tan Dun’s marvelous work Water Concerto".
Also mentioned is UC San Diego Grad Student, percussionist 
Read the full article here.

  


 

Professor Lei Liang appointed to to serve as the Artist Director and Chair of the Advisory Board of the Chou Wen-Chung Music Research Center. 

The Chou Wen-Chung Center is due to open later this month in Guangzhou, China. Chou Wen-Chung is the most respected senior Chinese composer who served as Dean at Columbia University, and was mentor to three generations of younger composers, including our own Professor Chinary Ung.

Professor Liang was personally invited by Professor Chou Wen-Chung to serve as the Artist Director and Chair of the Advisory Board of the Chou Wen-Chung Music Research Center. The Center will preserve Wen-Chung's legacy, and promote new music in China. Professor Liang will head to China later this month to moderate the Center's opening, with guests from around the world at a two day conference, as well as two concerts dedicated to Wen-Chung's music.
Read Chou Wen-Chung's prestigious biography here.

 

 

 

 

Chamber Opera Addressing Gun Violence to Receive World Premiere at UC San Diego.

Produced by Grammy Award-winning soprano Susan Narucki, “Inheritance” uses legendary story of Sarah Winchester to spark discussion about guns in today’s culture.

Read the full article here.

 

 

"Inheritance" was the subject of an in-depth article in the Fall Arts Preview issue of City Beat. Read the full article here.

Jeff Terich writes, "The creators of Inheritance promise a multimedia experience that steps outside of what can be expected of an operatic production. But Narucki has her own specific hopes for what kind of impression the work leaves on the audience."

“If one person sees this and is moved to rethink possibilities of how we experience and interact with the world, then I think we’ve succeeded.” 

 The chamber opera was also listed as one of the San Diego Union-Tribune's top ten picks for Classical Music this Fall. See the the full list here.

 

 

Professor Roger Reynolds discusses his "Bridging Chasms" project with John Wilkens of the Union Tribune.

Wilkens writes, 'Bridging Chasms' will bring small groups of recognized experts from different disciplines together over the course of a weekend to talk about the things they care about the most. And to listen.

Read more about the project on the website below.

http://www.bridgingchasms.org/

The first event will be held at UC San Diego September 21st-23rd.

http://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/…/sd-me-chasm-project-2…

 

Professor Lei Liang was mentioned in a few articles recently:
His solo orchestral music CD is coming out next month, on BMOP/sound labelThis record was 4 years in the making and includes three of his works, includingXiaoxiang - the saxophone concerto that was named a Pulitzer finalist. This will be Liang's seventh solo album, and the first of his orchestral music collection. The last piece on the album is a thirty-minute long orchestral work that was inspired by his residency at Calit2.

 

Professor Chinary Ung composed music and environmental sounds for the upcoming performance of Letters From Home. 
Letters From Home is written and performed byKalean Ung and premieres on this October 26, 2018. Letters From Home weaves together storytelling, music, and Shakespeare, in a powerful exploration of generational trauma and the ability of art to transform pain into unexpected moments of grace. 
Watch the trailer for the performance hereKalean is fundraising to bring her vision to a broader audience. You can help by donating here.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

PhD Candidate Caroline Louise Miller won the grand prize in the David Walter Composition Competition of the International Society of Bassists for her unaccompanied solo piece, Hydra Nightingale.

The work was created in collaboration with Alumni Kyle Motl.

https://www.isbworldoffice.com/competitions.asp

 

Distinguished Professor and Conrad Prebys Presidential Chair
Rand Steiger's world premiere composition Tropes received ecstatic praise in the Union Tribune, Times of San Diego and
Christian Hertzog from the Union Tribune writes, "The real power of Steiger’s work was in hearing how each string quartet member influenced the other’s musical material. The melodies transformed before us in a mystical evocation of a forgotten ancestral theme evolving into the local variants that exist today."
The work was performed by the Flux Quartet at the La Jolla Music Society SummerFest.

  

Alumni Michelle Lou was awarded the
Elliot Carter Rome Prize for Musical Composition.

Michelle plans to develop a hybrid analog/digital feedback live performance system.

Learn more about her project and see the other fellows here.

 

Mivos Quartet welcomes new cellist Graduate Student Tyler J. Borden!
After six years with the Mivos Quartet, Mariel Roberts will be stepping down as their cellist. In October of this year, Graduate Student/Cellist Tyler J. Borden will be picking up her mantle.  
Congratulations TJ and best of luck on the east coast!
Click on the image to the left to watch TJ perform, Ferneyhough - Time and Motion Study II (1973-1976).

 

Integrative Studies PhD Alumni Jeff Kaiser has published an article, "Improvising Technology, Constructing Virtuosity" in the tri-lingual journal, Cuadernos De Música, Artes Visuales Y Artes Escénicas.

Read the full article here.

Click Idioma in the sidebar to select your language.

 

Graduate Student Tina Tallon was granted the Morton Gould Young Composer Award for her composition, luscinia.

Read the press release here and and the announcement on New Music USA here.

Tina holds a Visiting Assistant Professorship at Clark University in the Visual and Performing Arts Department, and was also just recently named Assistant Professor of Composition at the Boston Conservatory.

Congratulations Tina!
Click on the image to the right to listen to luscinia.

 

Newsletters from 2019-2020

The following newsletters were sent via e-mail:

August 10, 2020

UPDATE - In the News: UC San Diego Music
In the News: UC San Diego Music

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August 07, 2020

In the News: UC San Diego Music

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July 01, 2020

Academic Achievement & Service Awards 2019-2020
UC San Diego’s Department of Music is proud to announce the 2019-2020 Undergraduate and Graduate Student award recipients.

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June 29, 2020

UC San Diego Music New Faculty: Marcos Balter and Kamau Kenyatta
The UC San Diego Department of Music is proud to announce new faculty members Marcos Balter and Kamau Kenyatta.

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June 26, 2020

UC San Diego Distinguished Professor of Music Steven Schick Wins 2020 Ditson Conductor's Award
UC San Diego Distinguished Professor of Music Steven Schick Wins 2020 Ditson Conductor's Award for the advancement of American music, Columbia University has announced.

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May 29, 2020

Upcoming Virtual Events & News at UC San Diego Music
Stay connected digitally with UC San Diego Music for the latest happenings!

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April 24, 2020

Upcoming Virtual Events & News: The Latest Happenings at UC San Diego Music
Stay connected digitally with UC San Diego Music for the latest news and upcoming virtual events!

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April 21, 2020

Camera Lucida Update for the 2019-2020 Season
Camera Lucida concerts on April 20th and May 18th are cancelled due to COVID-19. Refunds will be issued by the UC San Diego Box Office.

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February 21, 2020

In the News: UC San Diego Music

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March 13, 2020

Announcement from UC San Diego Department of Music

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March 09, 2020

UC San Diego Music
This Week's Featured Concerts: March 9 - 15, 2020

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March 04, 2020

CANCELLATION: Future of Experiential Technology Symposium
Future of Experiential Technology Symposium has been postponed.

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March 02, 2020

UC San Diego Music
This Week's Featured Concerts: March 2 - 8, 2020

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February 27, 2020

Distinguished Lecture Series: Professor and Author Deborah Wong to Present Her Research on Taiko in Southern California - Tuesday, March 3 at 4:00 p.m.
Wong will reflect on the process of researching taiko in Southern California, read short passages from her book Louder and Faster, and consider how and why Japanese American activism matters.

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February 25, 2020

For Immediate Release: The Future of Experiential Technology Symposium - Friday, March 13th 8:30 a.m. - 6:30 p.m.
How data-driven technology is shaping content creation and user engagement

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February 24, 2020

UC San Diego Music - This Week's Featured Concerts: February 24 - March 1, 2020

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February 17, 2020

UC San Diego Music - This Week's Featured Concerts: February 17 - 23, 2020

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February 11, 2020

For Immediate Release: Music for Flute and Harp written by Mexican Composers - WEDS@7 February 12th
Mexican Music (Mostly Not) for flute and harp featuring Tasha Smith Godinez, harp and Wilfrido Terrazas, flute with special guest Mariana Flores Bucio.

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February 10, 2020

UC San Diego Music
This Week's Featured Concerts: February 10 - 16, 2020

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February 07, 2020

Camera Lucida - Monday, February 10th - Ravel, Beethoven, Brahms
At UC San Diego's Conrad Prebys Concert Hall - Monday, February 10th at 7:30 p.m.

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February 06, 2020

For Immediate Release: An Intercultural Collaborative Concert featuring Musicians in San Diego and Seoul - Thursday, February 13th 7:30 p.m.
Changing Tides II, an intercultural music collaboration responding to the climate crisis, featuring renowned improvisers in Seoul and San Diego performing together via cutting-edge technologies.

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February 04, 2020

For Immediate Release: WEDS@7 Susan Narucki, soprano - *NEW DATE* - March 4th
Soprano Susan Narucki will present an evening of music that celebrates the human voice in its most intimate, lyrical and exuberant form.

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February 03, 2020

UC San Diego Music - This Week's Featured Concerts: February 3 - 9, 2020

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February 01, 2020

A Special Invitation to Arts Patrons from STEVEN SCHICK: Beethoven Interpolations
Free ticket offer!

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January 27, 2020

UC San Diego Music - This Week's Featured Concerts: January 27 - February 2, 2020

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January 24, 2020

For Immediate Release: Beethoven Interpolations: An Evening of Music and Conversation - Saturday, February 1st
Steven Schick curates the Reed Family Concert in celebration of Beethoven's 250th birthday - Saturday, February 1st at 7 p.m.

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January 22, 2020

For Immediate Release: A Concert Honoring Conrad Prebys - WEDS@7, January 29th
Rand Steiger curates a concert honoring the philanthropic gifts of Conrad Prebys - Wednesday, January 29th at 7 p.m.

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January 20, 2020

UC San Diego Music - This Week's Featured Concerts: January 20 - 26, 2020

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January 13, 2020

UC San Diego Music - This Week's Featured Concerts: January 13 - 19, 2020

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January 06, 2020

UC San Diego Music - This Week's Featured Concerts: January 6 - 12, 2020

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December 16, 2019

In the News: UC San Diego Music

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December 18, 2019

UC San Diego Music Featured Concerts - Winter Preview
LIVE from the Conrad Prebys Music Center at UC San Diego!

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December 09, 2019

UC San Diego Music - This Week's Featured Concerts: December 9 - 15, 2019

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December 06, 2019

Camera Lucida - Monday, December 9th - Schumann, Kurtag, Milhaud & Strauss
At UC San Diego's Conrad Prebys Concert Hall - Monday, December 9th at 7:30 p.m.

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December 02, 2019

UC San Diego Music - This Week's Featured Concerts: December 2 - 8, 2019

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November 25, 2019

UC San Diego Music - This Week's Featured Concerts: November 25 - December 1, 2019

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November 19, 2019

UC San Diego Music - This Week's Featured Concerts: November 19 - 24, 2019

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November 15, 2019

UC San Diego Music Featured Concerts - Fall Preview


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September 16, 2019

Camera Lucida 2019-2020 Single Tickets On Sale Now
Season Tickets On Sale Now!

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September 05, 2019

Camera Lucida 2019-2020 Season Announcement
Season Tickets On Sale Now!

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