NEC Update Vol. 2, No. 16, April 5, 2006

NEC Today is here

As a subscriber to NEC Update, you already receive an "executive summary" of New England Conservatory's top news stories every two weeks. These bite-size morsels may have left you hungry for more. That's why NEC Today was launched.

NEC Today-–reached via a simple click from NEC's Web site home page–is a portal leading to a robust menu of NEC information. Now you can get timely information when and how you want it.

NEC Today includes features you may remember from the Web site's News and Highlights section: press releases, news clippings. But there's much more: breaking news, profiles of students and faculty, special events, a look at NEC in the community, and the "Quodlibet" column wrapping up quick news items. Eventually it will even include multimedia and the option of automatic delivery of fresh stories to your Web browser.

Tower speaks, Cookie conducts

photo by Noah Sheldon, courtesy G. Schirmer/AMP

Composer Joan Tower (in photo) will speak at New England Conservatory's 135th Commencement excercises on May 21. She will receive an honorary degree, along with jazz educator David Baker, Ran Blake of the faculty, and cellist Janos Starker.

Reunion weekend begins May 19 and continues through the Commencement ceremony. Come for one day or three, and participate in a choral sing with Lorna Cooke deVaron ("Cookie") and workshops with Outstanding Alumni Award recipients David Breitman '81 M.M.,Yuko Hayashi '56, '58 M.M., '62 A.D.,Lloyd McCausland '54, '56 M.M., and Johanna Hill Simpson '81 M.M., among other activities throughout the weekend.

NEC soprano wins Bach competition

photo by Andrew Hurlbut

Soprano Yulia Van Doren, a student of Luretta Bybee who will complete her bachelor's degree at NEC this spring, has won the grand prize in the 2006 International J.S. Bach Vocal Competition, held in Philadelphia on March 24. The competition is organized by the Bach Festival of Philadelphia, and Van Doren will perform in next year's festival as part of her prize.

American Academy honors NEC composers

Last month the American Academy of Arts and Letters announced 18 award winners from seven different funds for composers administered by the Academy. Among the awardees were four composers educated at NEC.

Scott Wheeler '78 M.M. shares the Benjamin H. Danks Award for an "exceptional composer of ensemble works." Philip Lasser, who came to NEC for composition studio lessons in the early 1980s while a Harvard undergraduate, received the Walter Hinrichsen Award, established by the C.F. Peters Corporation. Charles Ives Scholarships went to Robinson McClellan, who took James Hoffmann's theory courses at NEC in the 1990s in between semesters at Vassar, and to Shawn Crouch '00, who studied here with Malcolm Peyton.

Buswell takes on Beethoven

photo by Andrew Hurlbut

During a year in which James Levine has set the Boston Symphony Orchestra on an expedition through the music of Beethoven and Schoenberg, there have been numerous parallel activities at NEC. Most recently,James Buswellof the violin faculty has announced that he will perform all of Beethoven's sonatas for violin and piano, begining with a concert in NEC's Jordan Hall on April 12.

Silverstein's season finale

photo by Miro Vintoniv

Joseph Silverstein brings his NEC orchestra season to a close on April 19 with a concert that features student soloists in a violin concerto and an orchestral song cycle, as well as a pair of concert staples: Elgar's Enigma Variationsand Strauss's Don Juan. Silverstein will return with a series of concerts in 2006/2007 as NEC's principal conductor and artistic advisor of orchestras.

Higdon premiere at NEC

On April 23, the NEC Percussion Ensemble, Frank Epstein, director, will present the third new work for percussion from a commissioning program created by Bradford and Dorothea Royer Endicott '00 M.M. Splendid Wood by Jennifer Higdon (in photo), a work for marimbas, will have its world premiere on a program featuring new and recent music for percussion.

Pianos sparkle with Anderszewski, Mozart

Piotr Anderszewski (in photo) brings piano magic to NEC on April 24 with a masterclass sponsored by the Richard P. and Claire W. Morse Visiting Artist Fund. Anderszewski will be in town for performances with the Boston Symphony Orchestra.

Then on April 30, NEC's piano majors give Mozart their best in a Jordan Hall evening dedicated to exploring the entire range of the composer's works for keyboard.

NEC will honor the memory of alumna Coretta Scott King '54, '71 hon. D.M. with a choral evening in Jordan Hall on April 24. The NEC Concert Choir and Sinfonietta will perform the Brahms Requiem. The Boston Children's Choir will perform Dilworth'sTrilogy of Dreams, which premiered in Jordan Hall earlier this year at a special Martin Luther King, Jr. Day concert.

NEC has established an endowed scholarship fund in memory of Coretta Scott King.

If you've been on eBay lately, you know that tickets for the Boston run of the hit Broadway showWicked are not easy to come by. Not only does NEC have a handful of tickets left, but they come with something extra: access to one of the creative minds behind the music.

At NEC'sWicked event on April 27, you will see the show, meet award-winning orchestrator William Brohn '58 M.M., and help a worthy cause: scholarships for the musicians of tomorrow. But hurry, these tickets can't last!

Sarah Caldwell dies

Sarah Caldwell '46, '79 hon. D.M., the woman who gave Boston opera lovers an experience that has not been matched before or since, died last month at age 82.

Caldwell came to NEC in the 1940s to study violin and viola. But after an introduction to opera through another legend, NEC opera director Boris Goldovsky (in photo with Caldwell), she changed paths. With Goldovsky as her mentor, she plunged into the world of opera. By 1957 Caldwell had formed her own professional company, one that was active for more than 30 years and that brought innovative productions and remarkable singers to Boston stages.