Orpheus Chamber Orchestra is one of the few ensembles playing today that performs without a conductor and rotates musical leadership for each work. This presents obvious challenges for the musicians but it also offers great rewards: By performing without a conductor, Orpheus conveys the intimacy of chamber music in work of orchestral proportions, changing the way we think about musicians, conductors, and orchestras in the process.
For the first half of Orpheus Chamber Orchestra featuring Jean-Yves Thibaudet, piano, Orpheus will be joined by Thibaudet, a pianist known for his poetic musicality and dazzling technical prowess, in a performance of Shostakovich's Concerto for Piano, Trumpet and Strings, op. 35, no. 2 as well as Tippett's Divertimento on "Sellingers' Round." The second half will feature the ensemble in Honegger's Pastorale d'ete and Tchaikovsky's Serenade in C for Strings, op. 48.
Learn more about the performers featured on this program in the Michelle Smith Performing Arts Library:
Books: As one of the world’s premier chamber ensembles, the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra operates according to an unusual model, an inventive structure based on shared leadership: the orchestra rehearses, performs, and records without a conductor. Harvey Seifter, executive director of the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra, along with author Peter Economy, refines the core principles behind this innovative style of management and explores the ways this ideology may be used effectively in the business world in Leadership Ensemble: Lessons in Collaborative Management from the World’s Only Conductorless Orchestra. Also, don't miss "The Invisible Leader: Lessons for Leaders from the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra", an essay in John Luban's "Leading From the Middle," and Other Contrarian Essays on Library Leadership!
"We shouldn't be looking for heroes, we should be looking for good ideas," says author and social critic Noam Chomsky.
Arguably the most influential intellectual alive today, Chomsky will share his ideas about politics, one of his greatest passions, on Friday in the Gildenhorn Recital Hall as part of the College of Arts and Humanities Dean's Lecture Series. (On Thursday, January 26 at 4:30PM, he will discuss language in the Colony Ballroom, Stamp Student Union.)
A professor of linguistics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Chomsky has done ground-breaking research into the nature of human language and communication and has earned a place in history as an activist, social critic, and unrelenting and compelling voice in the debate over American politics.
Learn more about Noam Chomsky through films, recordings, and writings by and about Chomsky held in the University of Maryland Libraries:
Kenneth Slowik leads School of Music faculty and the UMD Chamber Singers in a performance J.S. Bach�s virtuosic Brandenburg Concertos Nos. 5 and 6 and choruses from G.F. Handel�s oratorios Esther, Deborah, Hercules, and Messiah.
This UM SOM Music in Mind event, entitled Festive Baroquecelebrates the life of Dr. Paul Traver, the founding director of the University of Maryland Chorus and the artistic director of the world-famous Maryland Handel Festival. Learn more about the pieces and performers featured on this program in the Michelle Smith Performing Arts Library:
Join the UMD jazz ensembles for the Winter 2011 Big Band Showcase! The cold of winter approaches, but these jazz big bands know how to heat things up. This swingin' concert is an annual favorite featuring classic and contemporary jazz works. Learn more about the pieces on this program and music director Chris Vadala in the Michelle Smith Performing Arts Library:
As part of its ongoing exploration into new ideas about classical performance, UMSO welcomes members of the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra who have been working all semester with students for a program entitled Orpheus Sings.
Orpheus musicians will join the UMSO in a conducter-less performance of Haydn's Symphony No. 90. The second half of the program will feature Ades' Chamber Symphony and Brahms' Symphony No. 2, conducted by James Ross. Explore recordings by the Orpheus Chamber Ensemble, conductor James Ross, and learn more about the pieces featured on this program in the Michelle Smith Performing Arts Library:
Join the Gamer Symphony Orchestra for their sixth annual fall concert! This program features selections from video games such as "Pokemon", "Civilization V", "Kingdom Hearts" and others.
The student-run GSO works to establish video game music as a serious art form and to use that music as a way to bring new and younger audiences to orchestral performances. The GSO is the first collegiate ensemble exclusively devoted to performing orchestral arrangements of video game music and using that music as an educational tool. The orchestra began humbly in late 2005 with six members and now boasts a roster of more than 100 musicians, including 30 singers.
In addition to performing, GSO members organize yearly video game tournaments that raise money for Children's National Medical Center in Washington, D.C. Learn more about the emerging genre of video game music and the ways in which this exciting music is conceived and composed:
Books on the history, theory, and practice of video game music composition and design
Articles - click on each item and look for the "Find It" button for online access to the full text of these articles, or check out the periodicals in the Hornbake and the Michelle Smith Performing Arts libraries!
The Bach Cantata Series is dedicated to exploring the more than 200 extant cantatas by the great master through informal performances by students and friends of the UMD Choral Activities.
Join the performing forces for Nun Komm, Der Heiden Heiland, BWV 61 by joining the rehearsal preceding the performance, held in Rm. 2201 from 12:15 - 1 pm. All singers are welcome! learn more about Johann Sebastian Bach, his sacred cantatas, and BWV 61 in the Michelle Smith Performing Arts Library:
Tuesday, November 22, 2011
8:00 pm - Gildenhorn Recital Hall
School of Music faculty pool their talents to cook up a pre-Thanksgiving feast in the manner of an eclectic nouvelle cuisine for A Holiday Send-Off. James Ross sets aside his baton and warms up his horn to join Mayron Tsong and James Stern for Brahms�s iconic trio. Tsong offers a familiar warhorse paired with a little known gem by Chopin. Evelyn Elsing joins Stern to bring forth many flavors from few ingredients in Ravel�s 1922 sonata for that spare combination. Learn more about these UMD faculty artists and the pieces featured on this program in the Michelle Smith Performing Arts Library - and don't miss the display devoted to the faculty artists of A Holiday Send-Off in MSPAL! :
Maryland Opera Studio's annual piano operas, featuring minimal props and scenery, bring the talents of the vocal program's second-year Master's degree students into sharp focus. The Fall 2011 production features two works that allow the artists of the Maryland Opera Studio to flex their creative muscles.
Giacomo Puccini's Il tabarro ("The Cloak"), directed by Leon Major, is part of a triptych of one-act operas that includes Gianni Schicchi and Suor Angelica. A moody romantic tragedy quite different in tone from the better-known Gianni Schicchi, Il Tabarro displays the composer's lyrical gifts to their fullest.
Gian Carlo Menotti's Amelia al Ballo ("Amelia at the Ball"), directed by Nick Olcott, is an opera buffa in one act. Written in 1937 when Menotti was 23 years old, it was his first critical success.
Learn more about Puccini, Menotti, opera aesthetics, and the Maryland Opera Studio in the Michelle Smith Performing Arts Library - and don't miss the display devoted to the Fall 2011 Opera Studio production in MSPAL!:
" Karl Ulrich Schnabel was a wonderful pianist and a wonderful teacher. He was most imaginative and gallant, and he was also filled with a kind of ethical integrity. He was a tremendous role model for me, and my lessons with him, which lasted for a good five years,were very meaningful. " - Leon Fleisher
In this tribute to Karl Ulrich Schnabel pianist Leon Fleisher will speak about his studies with Schnabel, describing his approach to performance and interpretation. As a tribute to Schnabel's memory, the Fleishers will play Schubert's Fantasy in F Minor for four hands. The event will also offer a showing of the documentary video Con Brio, a vivid account of Schnabel's life and career. Learn more about Leon Fleischer, Katherine Jacobson Fleisher, and Karl Ulrich Schnabel through writings, recordings, and films held in the Michelle Smith Performing Arts Library:
Leon Fleisher Recordings featuring pianist Leon Fleisher
This season, NYFOS returns to the Center with a bold new program, Manning the Canon: Songs of Gay Life, that explores the quintessential moments of a gay man�s experience. Some songs are explicitly about gay life, while others were not intended to be "gay songs." But as NYFOS founder Steven Blier says, "What I have discovered, or rediscovered, is that a great song speaks to everyone, whispering its secrets to all listeners." Learn more about the New York Festival of Song and several pieces featured on this program in the UM Libraries:
Four distinct musical personalities come together in the Tak�cs Quartet, bringing a unique blend of drama, warmth and humor to the string quartet repertoire. This program features twentieth-century masters who pushed the boundaries of classical music while retaining the lush melodic qualities of earlier compositional eras. Learn more about the Tak�cs Quartet and the composers and works featured on this program in the Michelle Smith Performing Arts Library:
The 1955 film The Night of the Hunter was largely ignored upon its release but is now widely regarded as an American masterpiece. A Child Shall Lead Them: Making The Night of the Hunter is a historical re-imagining of the making of the film, woven from the classic screenplay and accounts of the shooting from those who were there.
This multimedia stage production, written by director Derek Goldman, provides a powerful new framework for experiencing this uniquely chilling tale of corruption and evil, in which the forces of creation and destruction do battle with each other. Learn more about this classic 1955 thriller in the UM Libraries:
Books: including critical studies of The Night of the Hunter's place in the history of American cinema and the genre of Surrealism, as well as studies of the work of Hunter screenwriter and American author James Agee and director Charles Laughton
Film: watch The Night of the Hunter in the UM Libraries, and explore this film and other works of the golden age of film noir genre through a collection of pulp cinema coming attractions
Aftermath reveals the stories of Iraqi civilians driven from their country by the chaos and violence of the Iraq war.
In 2008, playwrights Jessica Blank and Erik Jensen interviewed some 35 people who had fled to the relative safety of Jordan - a cross-section of lives interrupted - and crafted their conversations to be portrayed onstage by a nine-member cast of Arab-American actors in a theatrical event that peers into the heart of darkness to find our shared humanity.
Learn more about playwrights Jessica Blank and Erik Jensen, Aftermath, and documentary theater in the Michelle Smith Performing Arts Library:
Aftermath: Read the script of this landmark docu-drama
Review: Read a review of Aftermath published in the New York Times
The UM Repertoire Orchestra opens its 2011 season with a performance of Tchaikovsky's Symphony No. 5, Op. 64, a passionate and monumental work guaranteed to keep the audience on the edge of their seats. Learn more about Pyotr Il'yich Tchaikovsky and his 5th symphony in the Michelle Smith Performing Arts Library:
Artists from the Pacific Atolls of Kiribati, Tokelau, and Tuvalu present a program entitled Water Is Rising that asks the question "what if your home and all its memories disappeared forever?" The people of the Micronesian atolls that rise only three to five feet above sea level may become permanent refugees, cut off from everything they have known, as the ocean rises and swallows their homelands due to climate change.
An ensemble of musicians, dancers and storytellers from the island nations of Kiribati, Tokelau, and Tuvalu share their cultural riches and affirm their love of village, community, family, church, the ocean and the lagoon. With joyful music and dance, illuminated by images from their homes, they express their hope for a future in the place they love. Visit the Water Is Rising homepage for more information on the performance and the countries represented and issues related to climate change, and learn more about this global issue, its effect of the Micronesian Atolls, and the music and dance of Kiribati, Tokelau, and Tuvalu in the UM Libraries:
Film: learn more about the global climate change crisis
Articles: rising waters and the future of the Micronesian Atolls
The UMWO celebrates composer Karel Husa's 90th birthday with a program entitled Apotheosis, defined as the state of divine grace and perfection. With Husa's Apotheosis Of This Earth, which he calls a "manifesto" against pollution and destruction, as its focal point, the program also includes several other works that speak to the longing for apotheosis. Learn more about the composers and works featured on this program in the Michelle Smith Performing Arts Library:
Praised by Strad Magazine for their �high-octane� performance, the Aeolus Quartet is among the finest young string quartets performing today. They are Grand Prize winners of the 2011 Plowman Chamber Music Competition and 2011 Yellow Springs Chamber Music Competition. They were also awarded First Prize at the 2009 Coleman International Chamber Music Competition, a Silver Medal at the 2011 Fischoff International Chamber Music Competition, and a Bronze Medal at the 2010 International Chamber Music Ensemble Competition in New England. The 16th Annual Austin Critics' Table named the Aeolus Quartet their 2010-2011 "Best Ensemble."
The Quartet's 2011-2012 season includes a three-week residency at the Scotia Bank Northern Lights Festival in Mexico and performances across the US, having recently returned from a concert tour of major cities in China. The Quartet has collaborated on stage with such artists as Eugenia Zukerman, Brian Lewis, DaXun Zhang, Zuill Bailey, Peter Salaff, and the Mir� Quartet.
Learn more about the pieces and composers featured on this program in the UM Libraries:
Aftermath reveals the stories of Iraqi civilians driven from their country by the chaos and violence of the Iraq war.
In 2008, playwrights Jessica Blank and Erik Jensen interviewed some 35 people who had fled to the relative safety of Jordan - a cross-section of lives interrupted - and crafted their conversations to be portrayed onstage by a nine-member cast of Arab-American actors in a theatrical event that peers into the heart of darkness to find our shared humanity.
Learn more about playwrights Jessica Blank and Erik Jensen, Aftermath, and documentary theater in the Michelle Smith Performing Arts Library:
Aftermath: Read the script of this landmark docu-drama
Review: Read a review of Aftermath published in the New York Times
Music director James Ross and the UMSO are joined by the next generation of classical artists for Last Waltz, a program featuring violinist Jonathan Richards, winner of the 2010 UMSO Concerto Competition. In addition to several symphonic warhorses, this program features the UMD Wind Orchestra for spirited performance of Toru Takemitsu's spiritual Signals from Heaven. Learn more about the pieces and composers featured on this program in the UM Libraries:
The University of Maryland Wind Ensemble presents a Fall 2011 concert that will transport listeners across centuries and through numerous musical styles in a program that has something for everyone. Contemporary works include the serene and tranquil tone poem of Eric Whitacre's October and the fast and furious pace of Adam Gorb's Adrenaline City, inspired by both the stress and vibrancy of the twenty-first century city life. In contrast, the ensemble will take you back to the Late-Renaissance brass choir music of Giovanni Gabrielli and Late-Romantic wind music of Anton DvoY�k's Serenade for Winds, punctuated with a lighter Percy Grainger piece, Molly on the Shore. Learn more about these composers and their works in the Michelle Smith Performing Arts Library through biographies, writings, recordings, and scores:
Bill T. Jones, one of America's most accomplished choreographers, is the creative force behind Broadway's Spring Awakening (2007) and Fela! (2010), which he co-conceived, co-wrote, directed, and choreographed. He has received numerous major honors, including four Tony Awards, a 1994 MacArthur "Genius" Award and the 2010 Kennedy Center Honors.
He will join Professor Leigh Smiley of the School of Theatre, Dance, and Performance Studies on the set of RENT for an installment of the ARHU Dean's lecture series to discuss his work, his life and the big questions that motivate him artistically. Learn more about the choreography of Bill T. Jones in the UM Libraries:
Film: Dances choreographed by Bill T. Jones, including the highly-acclaimed "Still/Here", in which Jones asks people facing life-threatening illnesses to remember the highs and lows of their lives and then transform these feelings into expressive movement
Books: Essays on the choreography of Bill T. Jones, as well as interviews with the artist himself; includes an essay by Jones detailing his thoughts on the relationship between dance and cameras
Book, Music and Lyrics - Jonathan Larson Musical Arrangements - Steve Skinner Original Concept/Additional Lyrics - Billy Aronson Music Supervision and Additional Arrangements - Tim Weil and Lynn Thomson Dramaturg - Lynn Thomson
Alan Mingo, director
RENT was originally produced in New York by New York Theatre Workshop and on Broadway by Jeffrey Seller, Kevin McCollum, Allan S. Gordon and New York Theatre Workshop
The University of Maryland School of Theatre, Dance, and Performance Studies is proud to present Jonathan Larson's Pulitzer Prize-winning Broadway musical, RENT. Based loosely on Puccini's La Boh�me but with a rock-inspired zest all its own, RENT follows a year in the lives of seven impoverished young artists and musicians in New York. Living the disappearing Bohemian lifestyle in the East Village, they struggle to survive and create while dealing with the physical and emotional complications of the AIDS epidemic.
UMD's student performers, who themselves anticipate a life in the arts, will draw on their own hopes, dreams and creative energies to bring RENT to raucous life on our stage. UMD alumnus Alan Mingo, who played Tom Collins in the Broadway production of RENT, returns to Maryland to direct.
Learn more about Larson's life and music, and about the blockbuster musical RENT in the Michelle Smith Performing Arts Library through writings, recordings, scores, accessible through our RENT Libguide:
Sunday, October 16, 2011
3:00 pm - Gildenhorn Recital Hall
Faculty artists Mark Hill and Katherine Murdock perform works by 20th and 21st century composers that honor earlier masters through quotation and reference on a program entitled Remembrance of Things Past. Learn more about the performers and pieces featured on this program in the UM Libraries:
Henri Dutlilleux - Les Citations: for oboe, double bass, harpsichord, percussion, this piece employs music of Britten, Janequin and Jehan Alain in a fascinating and endlessly colorful musical conversation Dutilleux Recordings Dutilleux Scores
Sunday, October 9, 2011
4:00 pm - Gildenhorn Recital Hall
Pianist Larissa Dedova joins the members of the Left Bank Quartet for the performance of Masters of the Evocative. The Left Bank Concert Society, composed of faculty and friends of the UMD School of Music, celebrates the music of composers inspired by the ethereal quality of Impressionism. Learn more about the performers and pieces featured on this program in the UM Libraries:
Claude Debussy - Estampes (1903) Recordings Scores Books: including essays on Debussy's piano music, Estampes, and more
Henri Dutilleux - String Quartet: Ainsi la Nuit (1976) Recordings Scores
Gabriel Faur� - Piano Quintet No. 2 in C Minor, Op. 115 (1921) Recordings Books: including an listening guide to Faur� second piano quintet
The University of Maryland School of Music is proud to sponsor the Bach Cantata Series in a performance of BWV 27, "Wer wei�, wie nahe mir mein Ende". The Bach Cantata Series is dedicated to exploring the more than 200 extant cantatas by the great master through informal performances by students and friends of the UM Choral Activities. Learn more about Johann Sebastian Bach's life and music, and listen to and explore BWV 27 in the UM Libraries:
Composer Morton Subotnick is an artist-in-residence at the UMD School of Music during the 2011-2012 season. On Tuesday, October 4th, several performances and lectures featuring the music of this American composer of electronic music, including:
Subotnick: Music as Studio Art 3:00 pm - Leah M. Smith Lecture Hall (Rm 2200):
Mr. Subotnick will present a lecture/demo on his ideas of music as studio art, covering his experience in music technology from Buchla sound modules of the early '60s to the current technology using Ableton. The lecture is appropriate for technology-oriented students, but is open to anyone.
Take Five: Morton Subotnick and Steve Antosca 5:30 pm - Gildenhorn Recital Hall:
Composers Morton Subotnick and Steve Antosca will discuss Subotnick's pioneering role in the birth of electronic music and the development of the Buchla synthesizer, with audio examples and projected historical photographs.
Learn more about Morton Subotnick and his music in the Michelle Smith Performing Arts Library:
Recordings: including a recording of Morton Subotnick's landmark piece, Silver Apples of the Moon
Books: on the topic of music and sound in the electronic age, these publications include essays on and interviews with the composer
The Reflections from the Keyboard series, presented by the International Piano Archives at Maryland, returns with an installment entitled Liszt Connection. This program will feature five pianists associated with the International Piano Archives, who will present a selection of Franz Liszt's piano works in celebration of his bicentennial. Learn more about composer Franz Liszt, the works featured on this program, and the pianists who bring them to life in the collections of the Michelle Smith Performing Arts Library:
The University of Maryland Wind Orchestra presents a program entitled Music from Prague that explores the music of Czech-born composer Karel Husa. In addition to his prize-winning works for string ensemble and symphony, Husa has made significant and extensive contributions to the wind repertoire - one of the few composers of his generation to do so. In addition, the program of Music from Prague features works by Robert Kurka and Lubos Fiser. Learn more about these composers and their works in the Michelle Smith Performing Arts Library through writings, recordings, and scores:
Karel Husa - Music for Prague
Books: this collection of essays on conducting the wind orchestra by Eric L. Hinton includes thoughts on the Introduction and Fanfare from Music for Prague 1968 by Karel Husa Recordings Scores
Robert Kurka - Suite from The Good Soldier Schweik
An excerpt from 'Toccata and Chorale: Vivace', the fourth movement of Karl Husa's Music for Prague, performed by the Eastman Wind Ensemble, under the direction of Donald Hunsberger (1989); this recording is held in the MSPAL collections, call number MCD11131
Joshua Redman has a restless musical intelligence that continually pushes the boundaries of the jazz idiom. He brings that creative fire to his newest band, James Farm, as he returns to the quartet format.
Since the group's debut at the Montreux Jazz Festival in 2009, Redman and his James Farm collaborators Aaron Parks, Matt Penman and Eric Harland have fully explored a song-based approach to improvisation in performances that are rhythmically complex, harmonically rich and emotionally compelling. Learn more about Joshua Redman and the members of James Farm through books, films, and recordings held in the collections of the Michelle Smith Performing Arts Library:
Recordings: Joshua Redman in collaboration with various jazz musicians and ensembles from the early 1990s through today
Books: Learn more about Joshua Redman's approach to his music through interviews and biographical information
Film: Redman, as heard on film scores and live in concert
In a production entitled Remembering September 11, UMD students and faculty commemorate the 10th Anniversary of 9/11 in a performance of Mozart's Requiem Mass in D minor (K. 626). This work, Mozart's last before his tragically early death, summons momentous events of loss and remembrance of the departed. "It's an unfinished masterpiece that evokes the tragedy of loss," says conductor Edward Maclary. "What more appropriate memorial for September 11?" Learn more about Mozart and his Requiem in the Michelle Smith Performing Arts Library:
Books: biographies of Mozart, analysis of the Requiem, and information on its development and composition
An excerpt from the Lacrimosa dies illa of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart's Requiem, K. 626, performed by the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra and Chorus and featuring UMD faculty artist Delores Ziegler; this recording is held in the MSPAL collections, call number MCD6281
Tony and Olivier Award-winning actress and singer Patti LuPone kicks off the Clarice Smith Performing Arts Center's 10th season with her witty, candid autobiographical review, Coulda, Woulda, Shoulda.
With self-deprecating humor and larger-than-life warmth that radiates to every seat in the house, she bares it all in songs and stories � the roles she has played and wishes she could have played; the mass "cattle-call" auditions at the beginning of her career; her unlikely entrance to Juilliard; and her numerous career ups and downs. Learn more about Patti LuPone in the Michelle Smith Performing Arts Library:
Recordings: cast recordings of Broadway shows featuring Patti LuPone, including Pal Joey, Anything Goes, and more
Films: recordings of productions and feature films starring Patti LuPone
Scot Hanna-Weir, conductor
Katelyn Aungst, soprano
Patrick Cook, tenor
Steven Combs, baritone
Theodore Guerrant and Cindy Bauchspies, piano
Sunday, August 7, 2011
7:30 pm - Dekelboum Concert Hall
Latin for �Songs of Beuron�, Carmina burana is the title given by 19th-century musicologist J.A. Schmeller to his edition of a 13th-century manuscript containing over two hundred Latin secular poems. Twenty-four of these poems form the basis of Carl Orff�s scenic cantata for soprano, tenor, and baritone soloists, boys' choir, chorus, and organ (1937). This manuscript, currently held at the Bavarian State Library in Munich, Germany, features delicate medieval illuminations, and some poems include music in neumatic notation. Visit the exhibition in MSPAL to see a facsimile of this manuscript and to learn more about this ancient work of art.
Join conductor Scot Hanna-Weir for a rehearsal and public performance of Orff's Carmina burana. The UMD Summer Sings performance series provides an opportunity for students and community members to sing beloved masterworks under the direction of a UMD graduate student conductor. Rehearsal for this performance begins at 6:00pm in Dekelboum Concert Hall, with complete read-throughs for the public beginning at 7:30pm. If you wish to sing with the UMD Summer Sings group, please visit UMD Choirs to register. Learn more about Orff and the scenic cantata featured on this concert in the Michelle Smith Performing Arts Library:
Writings
