Eastman School of Music Posts and Musings
George Walker was the first African American composer to win the Pulitzer Prize in Music, in 1996 for his vocal-orchestral work Lilacs. One of America’s most distinguished composers, Walker was born in 1922. He was trained as a pianist and as a composer at the Eastman School of Music, where he received doctoral degrees in…
This weekend, Eastman hosts two of the music world’s most famous performers: pianist Leon Fleisher (pictured above), who will perform the Brahms Piano Quintet with the Ying Quartet on Sunday afternoon’s Kilbourn Series chamber music concert; and violinist Itzhak Perlman (pictured below), who appears with conductor Neil Varon and the Eastman Philharmonia in Max…
The Breaking Winds is an Eastman alumni success story — and a very unusual one, since they are a bassoon quartet. Brittany Harrington (BM ’10), Yuki Katayama (BM ’11), Kara La Moure (BM ’10), and Lauren Yu (BM ’11) are building a name for themselves in the music business, including YouTube videos (see the latest…
February 14 is not only Valentine’s Day, it is the birthday of one of America’s great singers, soprano — and Eastman graduate — Renee Fleming (MM ’83). Anybody who follows classical music is well aware of Renee’s busy international career, but we thought it was worth noting that this month alone — in fact,…
… to celebrate the 80th anniversary of Howard Hanson’s Merry Mount, which premiered at the Metropolitan Opera on February 10, 1934. A great success at its premiere – the cast and creators received 50 curtain calls, which is still a house record – Merry Mount was performed eight more times that season but then dropped…
During Black History Month, we’ll remember some of the African American composers and musicians who are part of Eastman history. One of the most prominent and respected was William Grant Still (1895-1978), often called “The Dean of African American Composers”; among his many accomplishments, he was the first black American composer to have a…
Tonight the Eastman Rochester Chorus presents one of the most inspired and best-loved works in the choral literature, Joseph Haydn’s oratorio The Creation. The performance brings together not only the chorus, whose members are drawn from Eastman, the University of Rochester, and the Rochester community, but also five student soloists performing the solo parts,…
Next weekend, Eastman double bass professor and string department co-chair James Van Demark can be heard in an unusual venue: playing his bass onstage with members of the Rochester City Ballet in the premiere of InCantation, a dance piece choreographed by Jamey Leverett to music by Adrienne Elisha. All three artists will discuss their…
Eastman evenings are always filled with music, but we offer concerts during the daytime too. Tomorrow morning at 11, our Morning Chamber Music Series offers piano trios by Haydn and Mozart with a difference — they’ll be performed on “period” piano (known as a fortepiano), violin, and cello. The term “period” denotes instruments constructed and…
“Low strings” are in the spotlight this week at Eastman, performing old music and up-to-the-minute music. Eastman’s Viol Consort, which plays string instruments that are the Renaissance and Baroque forerunners of the viola, cello, and bass, performs a concert of 18th-century music on Thursday, January 16 at the Memorial Art Gallery, joined by the Italian…