Classic Ross Amico

Tag: Princeton University

Bora Yoon Premieres Orchestral Work at Princeton

When Bora Yoon’s “The Wind of Two Koreas” is performed at Princeton University’s Richardson Auditorium on Saturday, July 20, it will be unique among her body of works.

Yoon, a doctoral candidate at Princeton University, describes herself as an interdisciplinary composer. Typically her works assimilate classical, electronic, and cross-cultural elements and employ unconventional instruments and technologies. In this instance, however, she will be taking a more traditional approach, though not to the detriment of exploring some of her usual artistic concerns.

In her first purely orchestral piece, Yoon will continue to draw musical connections to her heritage as an American of Korean descent and all of the paradoxical tensions she finds therein. But she’ll also be measuring herself against the early works of Igor Stravinsky.

Yoon’s new piece will be heard on a concert that is the public face of this year’s New Jersey Symphony Orchestra Edward T. Cone Composition Institute, which will be held from July 15 through July 20.

The Cone Institute, now in its sixth year, brings together representatives of the New Jersey Symphony Orchestra and the Princeton University Music Department to offer four emerging composers a unique laboratory experience.

You can read more about it, Yoon, and the concert, in my article in this week’s U.S. 1 Newspaper – PrincetonInfo, out today.

https://princetoninfo.com/a-premiere-for-princeton-composers-symphonic-expression/

July 10, 2019
Peter Westergaard Princeton Composer Dies at 88

Composer Peter Westergaard has died. Westergaard was chair of the Princeton University Music Department – twice – from 1974-1978 and from 1983-1986. He also taught at Columbia University and Amherst. Among his teachers were Milton Babbitt, Edward T. Cone, Wolfgang Fortner, Darius Milhaud, Walter Piston, and Roger Sessions. Westergaard retired from Princeton in 2001. As a composer, he wrote mainly chamber music and opera, including adaptations of the “The Tempest,” “Moby Dick,” and “Alice in Wonderland.” Westergaard was 88 years-old.

You’ll find out more about Westergaard here:
http://uihistories.library.illinois.edu/TAMHistory/Talbot/rh_talbot5.html

His chamber opera, after Edward Lear, “Mr. & Mrs. Discobbolos:”

The text of Lear’s poem:
http://www.nonsenselit.org/Lear/ll/discobbolos.html
http://www.nonsenselit.org/Lear/ll/discobbolos2.html

PHOTOS: (top) Westergaard at the dress rehearsal for the premiere of “Alice in Wonderland” at Princeton in 2008; (bottom, left to right) cover design for the score and libretto of “The Tempest” by Lambertville artist Alison Carver; composer and friend enjoying some together time at the keyboard; Westergaard and his wife, Barbara, in 1994

June 28, 2019
Westminster Choir Homecoming Concert Tonight

When you’ve got a nasty cold, all you want to do is come home. It’s rather fortunate for me, then, that tonight will be WWFM’s annual broadcast of Westminster Choir’s Homecoming Concert. The program will be heard live, coming your way from Princeton University’s Richardson Auditorium, starting at 7:30 p.m.

Joe Miller will lead the world-renowned Westminster Choir of Westminster Choir College in works of Ēriks Ešenvalds, Ted Hearne, Dan Messé, and Claudio Monteverdi, as well as a selection of traditional American folk songs and spirituals. I’ll be sticking around a little later than usual to man the board and to provide the fill music, following the concert, up until 10 p.m.

You can listen to a preview of the program with Joe Miller and founding “Sounds Choral” host Marjorie Herman here:

https://www.rider.edu/events/westminster-choir-homecoming-concert-2019

Of course, I’ll be spinning the platters, as usual, beginning this afternoon at 4 p.m. I hope you’ll join me as I observe the birthday anniversaries of Johann Ernst Bach, Frederic Lamond, Vittorio Rieti, Arthur Rubinstein, Sir John Tavener, and Gregor Joseph Werner.

And I wouldn’t be the least bit surprised if we also hear music by William Alwyn, Johann Sebastian Bach, Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco, Franz Liszt, Ottorino Respighi, and Camille Saint-Saëns, with a couple of send-offs to organist Jean Guillou and composer Michel Legrand, both of whom died over the weekend.

I’ll be sure to have plenty of tissues and lozenges on hand. I invite you to come home to great music, from 4 to 10 p.m. EST, on WWFM – The Classical Network and wwfm.org.

January 28, 2019
Britten’s War Requiem Love & War on WWFM

“War is sweet to those who have no experience of it, but the experienced man trembles exceedingly at heart on its approach.” Unfortunately, little has changed since the Greek poet Pindar wrote those words 2600 years ago.

Benjamin Britten’s powerful and moving “War Requiem” was written in 1961-62 for the consecration of a rebuilt Coventry Cathedral, after the original 14th century structure was destroyed by bombs during World War II. The work interweaves poetry of Wilfred Owen with traditional texts from the Mass for the Dead. Owen was killed in action in 1918, one week before the signing of the Armistice that ended World War I. The “War Requiem” became an instant classic, embraced by audiences and critics around the world and documented on a recording that became an unlikely bestseller.

Britten’s masterpiece will be performed at Princeton University’s Richardson Auditorium, in Alexander Hall, tonight and tomorrow at 7:30 p.m. Vocal soloists Sarah Pelletier, William Burden, and Andrew Garland will join the combined forces of the Princeton University Glee Club, Princeton Pro Musica, the Princeton High School Women’s Choir, and the Princeton University Orchestra, conducted by Michael Pratt. The performances take place in a year that marks the centenary of the end of World War I, which went into effect at the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month of 1918.

Because of the work’s massive demands, seating will be even more limited than usual, with the performers spilling off the stage and into the audience. Can’t get in? Join us tonight on The Classical Network to hear a live broadcast, beginning at 7:30 p.m. EDT.

Filmmakers, and writers before them, have long realized that nothing heightens the affect of romantic passion in narrative form quite like the turbulent backdrop of war. War supplies impediments, spectacle, often tragedy – and possibly even a few Oscars.

This week on “Picture Perfect,” there will be plenty of valor, nobility, and sacrifice to tug at the heart strings, as we examine love in time of war, with music from “Casablanca” (Max Steiner), “Doctor Zhivago” (Maurice Jarre), “The English Patient” (Gabriel Yared), and “Cyrano de Bergerac” (Dimitri Tiomkin). Join me for an hour of impossible love, missed opportunities, and doomed romance, this Friday evening at 6:00 EDT.

Then stay tuned for Britten’s “War Requiem,” beginning at 7:30, on WWFM – The Classical Network and wwfm.org.

April 27, 2018
Westminster Choir Homecoming Concert Live Tonight

Owl be hanging out a little later than usual tonight on The Classical Network, as owl be manning the board for a live broadcast of Westminster Choir’s Homecoming Concert from Richardson Auditorium on the campus of Princeton University. On the program will be Frank Martin’s Mass for Double Choir, Gyorgy Ligeti’s “Lux Aeterna,” Randall Thompson’s “Alleluia,” and more. Joe Miller will direct. The concert will commence at 7:30 p.m.

Beginning at 4:00, and to take us up to the start of the simulcast, owl be presenting the usual afternoon mix, peppered with ample birthday anniversaries. Owl also do the “fill” following the concert, until 10 p.m. Sure, it will be a long shift, but all in all, I’d say it will be worthy of your interest. Owl be seeing you, between 4 and 10 p.m. EST, on WWFM – The Classical Network and wwfm.org.

January 22, 2018

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