NEC Update

Give a "Wicked" Valentine

How did those witches get to sound that way? Find out by attending a one-of-a-kind evening when Broadway sensation Wicked comes to Boston this spring. On April 27, at NEC's exclusive Wicked event, NEC alumnus William Brohn '58 M.M. will tell how he created the award-winning orchestrations for the show. There will also be an exclusive audience "talk-back" for event attendees after the curtain comes down.

If you're looking for a unique gift to slip inside a Valentine card, you won't find anything more Wicked than this! Act now, while tickets are still available. Proceeds from this exclusive event go towards scholarship support for New England Conservatory students.

Reserve tickets for NEC's Wicked event.

NEC pianist joins Perlman on tour

photo by Miro Vintoniv

Vincent Planes (in photo) is a doctoral student in NEC's collaborative piano program studying with Irma Vallecillo. Lately he has been doing some fast footwork to reschedule performances, and is spending time in the practice room learning a stack of new music. It's all for the best of reasons: violin legend Itzhak Perlman has engaged Planes to accompany him for a Florida concert tour, as a last-minute replacement after Perlman's regular accompanist became ill.

From February 11 to 15, Perlman and Planes will perform works by Bach, Faure, Foss, and Kreisler, in Clearwater, Naples, and West Palm Beach.

Explore NEC's collaborative piano major.

String sizzle: visiting quartet, cellist

The Elias Quartet (in photo), a British string quartet that has studied in France, is currently in residence at NEC through an exchange program with the European Center for Chamber Music/Pro-Quartet. The quartet is being coached by NEC's Paul Katz, participates in a masterclass on February 7 alongside some of NEC's own star quartets, and will give a concert in NEC's Jordan Hall on February 9.

Cellist Ralph Kirshbaum, here in Boston for Boston Symphony Orchestra performances of Beethoven's Triple Concerto, will visit NEC this week as well for two masterclasses. Kirshbaum will hear NEC College students on February 10, under the sponsorship of the Richard P. and Claire W. Morse Visiting Artist Fund, and will hear NEC Preparatory School students on February 11, under the sponsorship of the Benjamin Patrick Hermann Fund.

Explore NEC concerts and programs day by day.

Grammy-nominated jazz bassist at NEC

photo by Andrew Hurlbut

With funding from NEC Board of Visitors member Jimmy Earl '81, Grammy-nominated jazz bassist/composer/bandleader Dave Holland is an NEC visiting artist-in-residence, with a one-week teaching residency each semester. The week of February 13, Holland will work privately with NEC students and offer public masterclasses February 14 and 15. On February 16, students will perform a concert of Holland's music.

Explore NEC's faculty, beginning with Dave Holland.

BSO/NEC explore Beethoven/Schoenberg

© Arnold Schoenberg Center, Vienna

As the Boston Symphony Orchestra and conductor James Levine commence a two-year journey this spring examining the orchestral music of visionary composers Arnold Schoenberg and Ludwig van Beethoven, NEC will offer supporting concerts that allow listeners to experience additional dimensions of these composers.

In the sort of programming that can happen only in an academic environment, audiences can hear back-to-back performances of Beethoven's Symphony No. 6 ("Pastoral") in Lizst's piano transcription and in its full orchestral form, at NEC February 12 and 13. And performances of Schoenberg's complete piano music by NEC students take place in February both at NEC's Jordan Hall and as part of a weekly series of concert/lectures at the Goethe-Institut Boston.

Find details of NEC's Beethoven/Schoenberg programming.

Nobel Prize winner speaks at NEC

NOTE CHANGE OF DATE
Dudley Herschbach, 1986 co-recipient of the Nobel Prize in Chemistry, will give a free public lecture at NEC on February 14 at 4:30pm (note: previously scheduled for Feb. 15). For the past four years, NEC President Daniel Steiner has invited some of today's greatest minds in a wide range of disciplines to visit NEC for these afternoon lectures.

Herschbach, who is currently engaged in efforts to improve K-12 science education and public understanding of science, will explore the relation of science literacy to other aspects of human culture, including music, under the title "The Impossible Takes a Little Longer."

Find out more about Dudley Herschbach's lecture.

27th annual Gospel Jubilee

photo by Jeff Thiebauth

NEC will present its 27th Annual Thomas A. Dorsey Gospel Jubilee on February 19. The Boston Globe has called it "a rousing tribute to the vitality of modern gospel." We call it a chance to bring together music of spirit, praise, and worship within a context of learning; and a celebration of the diversity of gospel's spiritual, cultural, and musical traditions. Participants include the NEC Millennium Gospel Choir (in photo), which filled Remis Auditorium at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, back in December.

NEC Summer School

photo by Andrew Hurlbut

NEC's Summer School is a wonderful opportunity to explore special topics in an intensive institute, or simply fill in gaps in your education or appreciation of music at a more leisurely time of year. Some of NEC's top faculty teach summer courses, along with special guests. This is your chance to get their undivided attention as they focus on topics for which they have a particular passion, whether it's the world of guitars, chamber music, or Shostakovich.

Coretta Scott King dies

photo by Jeff Thiebauth

Civil rights leader Coretta Scott King '54 died in her sleep on Monday night, January 30.

Coretta Scott was a voice student at NEC when she met her future husband, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., who at the time was a graduate student at Boston University. Legend has it that Coretta did not have a Baptist minister in mind for her future husband, and that after she reluctantly agreed to meet Martin she was unimpressed when he arrived to meet her at Jordan Hall. But the young minister won her over, and they were married the summer before her senior year at NEC.

Marriage to a man who was to become a world leader in his quest for peace and justice inevitably transformed her life, although her love for music shaped the dozens of Freedom Concerts she led through the 1950s. When she addressed NEC's graduating class of 2004, at her 50th reunion (in photo), she spoke of how she had been inspired by the music of the civil rights movement: "I have learned a lot about the power of music and song to fill the hearts of millions with hope and courage."

After Dr. King's assassination in 1968, Coretta Scott King continued his work as her life-long mission, founding the Martin Luther King Jr. Center for Non-Violent Social Change in Atlanta, Georgia, and acting as an important public figure in the civil rights movement as it evolved from Dr. King's original dream. Her own vision began to emerge weeks after Dr. King's death, when she exhorted a gathering at the Lincoln Memorial "to unite and form a solid block of women power to fight the three great evils of racism, poverty, and war."

One indicator of change in American society is that Mrs. King's body lay in state last week in the Georgia state capital building in Atlanta, a measure of respect that was denied her husband after his own death. President George W. Bush expects to attend her funeral at the New Birth Missionary Baptist Church in Atlanta on Tuesday, February 7.

Presidential search update

In an update from NEC Presidential Search Committee Chair Jack Vernon, the committee announces an "encouraging" response to advertising and outreach, and that it has begun interviewing selected candidates.

The committee continues to review ideas submitted through the e-mail window posted on the Presidential Search Web page.