On January 26, composition faculty member John Corigliano’s Conjurer, a concerto for percussion and string orchestra (2007), won a 2014 Grammy Award for best classical instrumental solo. The Naxos recording features Dame Evelyn Glennie as soloist. Also on the album is soprano Hila Plitmann (B.M. ’95, M.M. ’97, voice) in Corigliano’s Vocalise (1999).

In December, Historical Performance faculty member Arthur Haas’s recording of the complete solo harpsichord works of Jean-Philippe Rameau came out on Plectra Music. He recorded it playing two fully restored antique harpsichords: 1627 Ruckers and 1707 Dumont instruments from the Flintwoods Collection in Delaware. In October, Haas toured South Korea, giving concerts and classes in Seoul and Busan with the group Aula Harmoniae, which also includes Sang Joon Park (traverso) and Martha McGaughey (viola da gamba).  

The Oregon Bach Festival announced the appointment of organ department chair Paul Jacobs to lead its new organ institute, which will take place from June 30 to July 5 in several Oregon cities.

“The Desert Smells Like Rain: Spiritual Ecology at the U.S.-Mexico Border,” an essay by Liberal Arts faculty member Anthony Lioi, has been translated into Italian and appeared in Acoma: A European Journal of American Studies this fall.

In December, piano faculty member Seymour Lipkin performed, taught, and gave master classes in Taipei, Taiwan; Beijing; and Shanghai. 

In November, Columbia University gave conducting faculty member Jeffrey Milarsky (BM ’88, MM ’90, percussion) the Ditson Conductor’s Award for distinguished contributions to American music. Milarsky is also on the Columbia faculty.

Graduate Studies faculty member Michael Musgrave gave a paper called The Folksong Background to Brahms’s Lieder and participated in a roundtable discussion at the Baltimore Lieder Weekend, which was held in October at An die Musik Live! Baltimore.

Ballet faculty member François Perron, who’s also the artistic director of the French Academie of Ballet, choreographed excerpts from The Nutcracker to be used for a potential ballet reality show. Perron is also on the faculty of the Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis School at American Ballet Theater, and he was recently appointed to the company’s artistic board of examiners for its national training curriculum. 

STUDENTS

In November, fourth-year violist Andrew Gonzalez and fourth-year pianist Christine Wu performed a recital at the Houlihan-McLean Center in Scranton, Pa. 

First-year violinist Annika Jenkins (Pre-College ’13) was named a U.S. Presidential Scholar in the Arts and as such gave solo and chamber debut performances at the Kennedy Center in June. In June and July, she performed with the new National Youth Orchestra. In August, she appeared in recital and served as concertmaster of the InterHarmony International Music Festival Orchestra in Sulzbach-Rosenberg, Germany.

In November, third-year pianist Yunqing Zhou became one of three first-prize winners in the Young Concert Artists auditions competition, which was held at Merkin Concert Hall in New York City. Among the eight second-prize winners were second year master’s student Jun Sun (BM ’12, piano), third-year harpist Emily Levin, and Artist Diploma candidate Elizabeth Fayette (Pre-College ’06; MM ’13, violin).