PEABODY MAGAZINE
JOHNS HOPKINS UNIVERSITY
Healing Measures Could music hold a key for better health? ALSO Classical music roots that nourish
Spring 2017 Vol. 11 No. 2
Third grade. A “make-or-break” year.
image: Renee FischeR
By third grade, a child who can’t read at grade level is at serious risk of academic decline. And if she doesn’t have a book-rich environment, her chances are even worse. “Children from low-income families have on average zero to two books at home, whereas children from middle-income families have an average of 54 books,” says Writing Seminars and English major, Joanne Oh. “How do we close that gap?” The Sylvia and Hans Jeans Scholar and a Hopkins Fund beneficiary, Oh volunteers at the Maryland Book Bank and Hopkins Tutorial Project. She helps ensure students have the books they need, improving their chances for success in third grade — and life.
#HopkinsRising
Together, there’s more we can do to help great students like Joanne Oh obtain a Hopkins education. Watch her video at rising.jhu.edu/promote-literacy and join us in Rising to the Challenge.
CONTENTS 14
Healing Measures by Richard Byrne Could music hold a key for more effective treatment of illnesses ranging from Alzheimer's to autism? Collaborators at the new Center for Music and Medicine aim to find out.
20 150th Anniversary of Miriam A. Friedberg Concert Hall
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Core Values by Christine Stutz
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NEWS
Bringing Music Where Life Is Headliners Guest Artists Present Master Classes at Peabody Unveiling a New Curriculum Scaring Up the Best from String Students Reaching Out Through Social Media Looking Back on Long, Rich Careers Where in the World Is Peabody? Hot Summer Offerings from the Preparatory Engaging New Audiences
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APPLAUSE
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ALUMNI
Alumni Celebration Weekend Class Notes
3 4
FANFARE
Honoring Loved Ones with Memorial Scholarships Soaring with the Help of Financial Support Peabody Scholarship Brunch
Meet four Peabody people, with disparate careers, who remain classical musicians at heart.
Cover photo by Chris Hartlove Peabody harpist Peggy Houng performs for residents at Broadmead, a Maryland retirement community, where she lives as musician-in-residence. ABOUT THE PEABODY INSTITUTE OF THE JOHNS HOPKINS UNIVERSITY Located in the heart of Baltimore’s Mount Vernon Cultural District, the Peabody Institute was founded in 1857 as “the first major intellectual and arts center in an American city” by philanthropist George Peabody. Now a division of Johns Hopkins University, the Peabody Institute trains musicians and dancers of every age and at every level, stages nearly 1,000 concerts and events each year, and extends music and musical training throughout the community. Building on its rich history of professional music training at the highest level and focused on the four pillars of excellence, interdisciplinary experiences, innovation, and community connectivity, Peabody is taking on the challenge of what it means to prepare artists for a world that is constantly changing yet still deeply in need of what music brings to the human experience.
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FROM THE DEAN Two recent events on campus demonstrate our commitment to make Peabody a convener of innovative conversations about music. Distinguished Visiting Artist Midori had her third visit in in a yearlong residency, which included a fascinating panel discussion with renowned author and mood disorders expert Dr. Kay Redfield Jamison, professor of psychiatry and behavioral sciences at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. The program offered a fascinating glimpse into the complex relationship between creativity and mental illness. In the same week, we welcomed Alex Ross, music critic of The New Yorker and author of the acclaimed best-seller The Rest Is Noise, for a wide-ranging, insightful conversation about classical music and contemporary culture. Looking forward, after many months of planning, this fall, Peabody implements our Breakthrough Curriculum, a model at the forefront of arts training in the United States. Peabody students’ training will encompass the areas of Excellence in craft, doing what Peabody has always excelled at — positioning our students to compete for high-level opportunities as performers, composers, educators, recording engineers, and scholars; Musical flexibility, or the ability to apply appropriate stylistic attributes across a wide range of performing contexts, musical styles, and ensemble configurations found today in the professional world; Leadership as a citizen artist, focused on building creative collaborations with diverse stakeholders in and beyond the
performing arts, actively cultivating existing and new audiences, and responding to the needs of communities; and Communication, marketing, and practical skills to help our students propel their careers in any direction immediately upon graduation. Key to this, and setting it apart from other programs, the Breakthrough Curriculum is fully integrated into and builds on the historical excellence of Peabody’s performance training, ensuring that every student graduates prepared for a world where musicians increasingly must play a proactive role in developing future consumers of their art. Finally, as follow-up to the fall 2016 retreat of the Peabody Diversity Pathway Task Force, we move forward with subcommittees in three areas: Pipeline and Student Recruitment, Curriculum and Programming, and Climate/Inclusion and Cultural Competency. Each group, co-chaired by a member of the administration, a faculty member, and a student, will engage members of the Peabody community as we move forward with this work. As you will see in the pages of this magazine, there is a great deal going on at Peabody now and as we plan for the future. I was recently honored to deliver a presentation to the Johns Hopkins University Board of Trustees about all that we are doing to advance Peabody, and I look forward to keeping you updated as we forge ahead.
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Liza Bailey Rheda Becker Paula Boggs Barbara Bozzuto Laifun Chung Richard Davison Larry Droppa Leon Fleisher Sandra Levi Gerstung Nancy Grasmick Taylor A. Hanex, chair Sandra Hittman * Allan D. Jensen Christopher Kovalchick Abbe Levin Jill E. McGovern
Dean Fred Bronstein
Peabody Friends, I begin this edition of our magazine with exciting news about faculty and alumni. Michael Hersch, chair of the Composition Department, was recently awarded the President’s Frontier Award. Michael’s dedication to his craft and his students, along with a unique artistic voice, is an inspiration and a wonderful example of the role that Peabody plays at Johns Hopkins University, and a true affirmation of the unique contribution of the arts to our larger community. Speaking of awards, three Peabody alumni walked away with 2017 Grammy Awards. Cellist Zuill Bailey won for Best Instrumental Solo, while the O’Connor Band, including violinist Maggie O’Connor, took away Best Bluegrass Album for 2017. Finally, Joel Watts was an assistant engineer on the recording for the Boston Symphony Orchestra’s Grammy for Best Orchestral Performance. Clearly, Peabody was very well-represented in the 2017 Grammy Awards!
Sincerely,
PEABODY MAGAZINE
Margaret Bell, Assistant Director of Marketing and Communications Lauren Crewell, Digitial Communications Specialist Sue DePasquale, Consulting Editor Ben Johnson, Design and Publications Specialist Debbie Kennison, Director of Constituent Engagement, Alumni Section Editor Will Kirk, Contributing Photographer Tiffany Lundquist, Director of Marketing and Communications Katy Pretz, Communications Coordinator Leslie Procter, Assistant Director of Constituent Engagement, Fanfare Section Editor
Peabody Magazine is published twice during the academic year. Send us your questions and comments: Peabody Magazine Communications Office 1 East Mount Vernon Place Baltimore, MD 21202 667-208-6561 magazine@peabody.jhu.edu peabody.jhu.edu/magazine
Christine Rutt Schmitz Solomon H. Snyder David Tan Shirley S.L. Yang
Emeritus Members Pilar Bradshaw Tony Deering Hilda Perl Goodwin * Benjamin H. Griswold IV Turner B. Smith * deceased
CAROL SHULMAN
News
Master’s student Ledah Finck (center, with glasses) wrote a piece that was performed by the Peabody String Sinfonia, a student-led ensemble.
Bringing Music Where Life Is A special project at Peabody is “bringing music where life is” — including to cancer patients, people facing homelessness and addiction, and children with autism. The Peabody String Sinfonia is the brainchild of faculty artist Maria Lambros, a violist who teaches chamber music at the Conservatory. “We are getting so much from these audiences and experiences, and it has been truly transformational," says Ms. Lambros of the Sinfonia, which launched last fall and is funded through a Dean's Incentive Grant. Crucial to the group's mission is the opportunity for students to learn how to play in a conductorless ensemble, says Ms. Lambros. Different principal players have learned how to share the leadership, take turns leading, and play different parts. The group mastered a core repertoire of 13 pieces — mostly standard rep, with some new compositions. Just as important: The students have learned how to present the works in an approachable way and to be responsive to audience feedback.
Their work with guest artists, including members of chamber groups Decoda and A Far Cry, helped in that learning process. Performances were held at Hope Lodge, medical facilities for cancer patients who have traveled from out of town for cancer treatments; Baltimore Station, a residential treatment program supporting veterans; Helping Up Mission, which helps men fighting addiction and homelessness; and the Maryland Correctional Institution for Women in Jessup, Maryland. Faculty artists Violaine Melançon, Michael Kannen, and Victoria Chiang also collaborated with the group. Students and faculty members alike were struck by how much the audiences loved all of the pieces they played — classics and new works. They responded most to a composition by group member Ledah Finck (BM ’16, Violin), a master’s violin student and composition minor, titled Redtail, about a peaceful, quiet road near her home in North Carolina. “There was a special element of being able to speak completely
personally about this piece and to answer questions about how I wrote it and why I wrote it,” Ms. Finck says. “The way I was able to make it relevant to every scenario was by offering that bit of personal background and then inviting the audience to participate and share their sense of a safe and tranquil space. One person told me that it reminded him of riding a bike with the wind in his hair.” Performances by the Sinfonia continue into the spring semester, with a concert for children with autism and their families, and repeat appearances at Helping Up Mission and A New Day Campaign. Senior violin and composition double major Nick Bentz, a member of the Sinfonia, says: “Every concert left me feeling happier than the last as I saw our audiences forget their differences, their situations, and their unfortunate circumstances, if only for a couple of minutes, and come together. I truly cannot overstate how much this opportunity has meant for me.” —— Margaret Bell PEABODY SPRING 2017
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HEADLINERS
Johns Hopkins University President Ronald J. Daniels (right) presented Michael Hersch (center) with the President’s Frontier Award on January 31, 2017.
PAOLO BORTOLAMEOLLI
(GPD ’15, Conducting) has been named a Dudamel Conducting Fellow with the Los Angeles Philharmonic for the 2016–17 season. He worked with Music and Artistic Director Gustavo Dudamel, conducted Los Angeles Philharmonic youth concerts at Walt Disney Concert Hall, participated as a cover conductor, and served as a mentor with programs such as Youth Orchestra Los Angeles. He conducted the Toyota Symphonies for Youth in February. Last July, Mr. Bortolameolli made his debut as an opera conductor leading Rossini’s Tancredi at Teatro Municipal de Santiago Opera in his native Chile.
Dean Fred Bronstein and alumnus ED HARSH (BM ’86, Composition), president and CEO of New Music USA, were named as two of the top 30 innovators in the performing arts industry in Musical America’s Professionals of the Year special report for 2016. The publication mentions Dean Bronstein’s emphasis on the need for change in classical music education and Mr. Harsh's merging of two long-standing organizations, Meet the Composer and American Music Center. Alumni ZUILL BAILEY (BM ’94, Cello), artistic director of El Paso Pro-Musica, and PAOLA PRESTINI (’95, Composition), executive/creative director of National Sawdust, were also named.
Composition Department Chair MICHAEL HERSCH
(BM ’95, MM ’97, Composition) was presented with the $250,000 President’s Frontier Award in January. The award was given by Johns Hopkins University President Ronald J. Daniels and Provost Sunil Kumar. It is awarded to “exceptional scholars among the Johns Hopkins faculty who are on the cusp of transforming their fields.” Mr. Hersch says that focusing such a substantial award on the arts is “a powerful message to other great institutions to take the creative and cultural power this country has and be proud of it, and support it, and allow it to flourish.”
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Watch the video about Michael Hersch's Frontier Award: goo.gl/cDpfyE
Composition faculty artist KEVIN PUTS’ new song cycle, Letters From Georgia, was premiered by Renée Fleming, Neil Varon, and the Eastman Philharmonia in Rochester and at Lincoln Center in November. The song cycle, based on the personal letters of Georgia O’Keeffe, was commissioned by Dr. Puts’ and Ms. Fleming’s alma mater, the Eastman School of Music. In September, Dr. Puts will premiere his first chamber opera, an adaptation of Peter Ackroyd’s gothic novel The Trial of Elizabeth Cree, commissioned by Opera Philadelphia with libretto by Mark Campbell, with whom Dr. Puts won the Pulitzer Prize for Silent Night in 2012.
ZUILL BAILEY (BM ’94, Cello) won the 2017 Grammy Awards for Best Classical Instrumental Solo and Best Contemporary Classical Composition for his performance of Tales of Hemingway with the Nashville Symphony and conductor Giancarlo Guerrero. JOEL WATTS (BM ’14, Horn; BM ’15, Recording Arts; MM ’15, Audio Sciences) received a Grammy for Best Orchestral Performance for his work as assistant recording engineer on the album Under Stalin's Shadow, featuring the Boston Symphony Orchestra performing three Shostakovich symphonies. MAGGIE O’CONNOR (BM ’13, MM ’14, Violin) and the O’Connor Band, with fiddler Mark O’Connor, won the Grammy Award for Best Bluegrass Album for their debut album, Coming Home.
NEWS
Guest Artists Present Master Classes at Peabody
On December 7, Distinguished Visiting Artist and violinist Midori — in her second of four visits this academic year — led a master class with GPD candidate Kaleigh Acord (left) and senior Andrew Kwon (right) with master's student Allison Freeman accompanying. Other luminary guests leading master classes this season at Peabody include Distinguished Visiting Artist and baritone Eric Owens, mezzo-soprano Frederica von Stade, pianist Richard Goode, and the Juilliard String Quartet.
Unveiling a New Curriculum This fall, the Peabody Conservatory is no longer the sole pursuit of conserwill launch the Breakthrough Currivatory education. Today’s conservatory culum, aimed at expanding on the graduates need to be resilient, innotraditional conservatory experience vative, and intellectually curious — all to ensure Peabody graduates are key characteristics of entrepreneurs fully prepared for success as 21st — and possess strong written and oral century musicians. communication skills. In addition, “The Peabody Institute Breakthrough musicians need be effective and active Curriculum will infuse our grand advocates for the arts in their commutradition with new perspectives to nities, he says. create a model at the forefront of Training and experience in these arts training in the United States,” areas are offered at the periphery says Dean Fred Bronstein. “This of many conservatory programs — new framework will engage every including Peabody’s. But such opporstudent, undergraduate and graduate, tunities have long been optional, in meaningful training experiences Dean Bronstein says, and too few across critical skillsets, always led by students take advantage of them, the guiding goal of excellence and leaving many ill-prepared to navigate musical accomplishment.” the challenging and ever-evolving Excellence as a performing musimusical landscape of the 21st century. cian is, and always has been, at the The Breakthrough Curriculum is center of a Peabody education, Dean organized into four levels — called Bronstein notes. The studio experiExplore, Build, Implement, and ence remains essential to the core Launch — through which students training, and the academic program will progress in their years at Peabody. will continue to equip students with Through both traditional coursework a strong foundation in music and and curated, project-based learning, the humanities. students will develop competencies in Contemporary artists acknowledge, written and oral communication; culhowever, that excellence in performance tivate skills in programming, audience
development, music entrepreneurship, and citizen artistry; and develop a digital portfolio with which they can propel their careers immediately upon graduation. In addition, instrumentalists will have ensemble training that emphasizes the flexibility increasingly needed in the music world. Two task forces comprising more than 50 faculty members, students, administrators, and alumni have labored over the past year to shape the Breakthrough Curriculum. Abra Bush, senior associate dean for institute studies, expresses their excitement and optimism as the details are finalized: “As this new curriculum takes root, Peabody re-establishes itself as a leader in conservatory education,” she says, “producing musicians who emerge as trailblazers, creative innovators, and citizen-artists making a difference in today’s world.” Look for a more in-depth exploration of the Breakthrough Curriculum in the Fall 2017 issue of Peabody Magazine. —— Tiffany Lundquist
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Scaring Up the Best from String Students A goddess, an entire class from Hogwarts, and the Statue of Liberty playing cellos; several princesses, superheroes, and more wizards on violin — all perform with a crazy cat lady and a knight. These were students performing with their teachers in the Preparatory Young People’s String Program’s (YPSP) annual Halloween concert on October 30. This concert celebrated the 30th anniversary of the YPSP, started by Rebecca Henry and currently run by Andréa Picard Boecker (MM ’08, Violin). As part of its anniversary, YPSP held a composition competition and presented the premieres of the winning works at the concert: Blackberry Tale for three violins by Conservatory master’s student Ledah Finck (BM ’16, Violin) and Preparatory senior Samuel Lam’s work A Hidden Key for three violins and piano. Ms. Henry was hired 30 years ago Ms. Picard Boecker says the expeto raise the level of the Preparatory rience was really valuable for the String Department. She saw the need “students to get to work with living to start with the younger students and composers.” When first rehearsing took the best of Suzuki training and with the students, Ms. Finck, ideas from her work with Mimi Zweig who minors in composition, was at Indiana University Bloomington to impressed that they had all memobuild the YPSP. rized her piece. The youngest students need the “It was fun writing something that “most important fundamental start — harkened back to my own training a joyful and high-quality grounding” and incorporating what I’d learned to their musical training, she says. later in life,” she says. The October YPSP graduates are then able to move performance also included a special on to various ensemble options at narrated musical story presented by the Preparatory, including chamber the cellists. music, orchestra, or the Performance The YPSP is for children ages 4 to Academy for Strings. 14 or until they reach eighth grade. Ms. Henry, who serves as the Scott Ms. Picard Boecker describes the proBendann Faculty Chair in Classical gram as comprehensive — students Music, also teaches pedagogy in take both private lessons and group the Conservatory, and several of the classes — and says students are “so current teachers in the YPSP have lucky because they work with all of the come out of her pedagogy class. faculty.” All the past program directors The 30th anniversary celebration still teach in the YPSP, including Janet represents what it took to build a Melnicoff-Brown (MM '89, Music string program — a program that now Education) and Lisa Sadowski. includes the Performance Academy Ms. Henry adds that the teachers for Strings and the Pre-Conservatory meet, discuss pedagogy, and experiViolin Program. Those programs ment with new repertoire and teachcouldn’t happen without younger stuing ideas. They work with a central dents playing at a high level, and that curriculum and are “always trying to took 20 years, says Ms. Henry. improve what we do,” she says. —— Margaret Bell 6
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NEWS
For centuries, the process of becoming a top-tier musician has been opaque: A student meets with an instructor for a lesson, practices in isolation for hours, meets again with the instructor the next week, retreats to the practice room again … repeating the cycle for years, with an occasional public performance to showcase the results. Now, equipped with online technology, two Peabody faculty artists are pulling back the curtains on that learning process. Cellist Amit Peled and trumpeter Joe Burgstaller have essentially opened up their studios to the world, doing live internet broadcasts (with available replays) that are seen by audiences on virtually every continent. Mr. Peled and Mr. Burgstaller both believe that an active digital platform gives musicians a chance not only to learn from one another, but to advance their careers, as they’ve done themselves as performers. “Reaching out to your public is not about having a PR office that sits in New York, eats all of your money, and does nothing,” Mr. Peled says. That’s a relic of the old days, he says. Curiously enough, though, today’s students have trouble opening themselves up to a live audience because they’re worried that they’ll make a mistake — a side effect of modern recorded music in which all errors are edited out, Mr. Peled says. He encourages them to focus on the occasional magical moments that come only from live performances — those times when the essence of the performer as a person comes through. Mr. Burgstaller’s primary focus is on the discipline and self-control that it takes to achieve high levels of musical mastery. He live-streams his 7:00 am warmup sessions, held five days a week; his students are mandated to attend at least three of the hourlong sessions in person each week. “Healthy warmup and maintenance routines in the morning empower them to create the rest of their day consciously,” Mr. Burgstaller says.
BUDDY DESHLER
Reaching Out Through Social Media
Undergraduate trumpet students Sam Hughes, Chenguang Wang, and Jonghwan Yun prepare for morning warmups with faculty artist Joe Burgstaller. The warmups are broadcast to thousands on Facebook.
Doing so elevates their moods, as it does for professional musicians, who should put in at least three hours of practicing every day, he says. Not only are Peabody students participating in those morning warmups, so are thousands of students in geographic locales as dispersed as Brazil, Germany, and Hong Kong. A website called banddirector.com — with a membership of 31,000 band directors across the United States — carries the live streams as well. But Mr. Burgstaller extends himself personally far beyond the live streams of existing sessions. He offers a free private introductory Skype lesson to trumpet students who’ve applied to Peabody — the better to give the student a sense of what it would be like to study with him and for Mr. Burgstaller to better understand the applicant. He’s also invited young, professional trumpet players to share the secrets of their success through an online series he calls “How I Made It.” Both Mr. Peled and Mr. Burgstaller strive to make their online events fun — thinking of them as a chance to entertain as well as instruct. Mr. Peled, who offers studio sessions and other
events through the Facebook page for his studio, includes guest appearances from other faculty members. Mr. Burgstaller has developed a cast of characters among his students, complete with nicknames, as you might expect on a morning radio show. The live streams have quickly grown in popularity since their start in the fall, and the online presence has helped to bump up applications to both the trumpet and cello programs. Mr. Peled has offered free online video instruction on his own for years. Some of those lessons were seen by Julia Dover, a student in Argentina who was trying to master Elgar’s Cello Concerto. Eventually, she ended up attending Peabody. In December, Ms. Dover was part of “Cellobration,” a live online performance by Mr. Peled’s cello students. While her family couldn’t afford to fly to Baltimore to attend a concert, they could still watch her playing from afar. And so, in a living room in Buenos Aries, Ms. Dover’s parents, siblings, aunts, uncles, grandparents, and friends gathered around a computer to watch and listen — one more curtain pulled back on the mystery of music-making. —— Michael Blumfield
Watch Amit Peled's Facebook live videos: bit.ly/2mfCgLi Watch Joe Burgstaller's online trumpet warmups: bit.ly/2mMbvL6 PEABODY SPRING 2017
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NEWS
Looking Back on Long, Rich Careers She was a North Dakota farm girl who had perfect pitch and as a toddler would tell her piano-playing older sister: “Wrong note! Wrong note!” when she hit an errant key. He was a New Jersey choirboy who adults feared would topple from his perch in the church balcony as he strained to watch every movement of the organist below. Decades later, Phyllis Bryn-Julson and Donald Sutherland can look back on long, rich careers performing and teaching music. They have passed on their passion for the art to students at Peabody for a combined 70 years. The stalwarts of the Conservatory’s Voice and Organ Departments are retiring at the end of this academic year. Their paths crossed in the mid-1960s at Syracuse University. Ms. Bryn-Julson had been dazzled by Helen Boatwright’s performance of Mozart’s Mass in C minor and was eager to study with her there. Mr. Sutherland had similarly chosen Syracuse for graduate school to learn from Arthur Poister. Mr. Sutherland spied “this cute, young soprano” soon after she arrived on campus, and that was that. Their talents and skills have led to performances across the globe, but Peabody has been home to both for decades. Early on, Ms. Bryn-Julson realized how thrilling it was to help a student reach a new level of understanding or achievement — as a student moves up in range from a high A-flat to B-flat and eventually a sustained C: “Once you get your first breakthrough with somebody, you just want to go on with it; it’s addicting,” she says. They both were fortunate to realize early in their lives that music would be their main focus, and they’ve taught hundreds of students who have gone on to standout performance careers. But they’ve also encountered some students along the way who needed to take a different path, and they were honest with them. Ms. Bryn-Julson had a young student with an incredible voice 8
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who had trouble reading music and dreaded performing; she encouraged the student to find something else. Mr. Sutherland had a student who, unlike his peers, wasn’t eager to play a newly installed organ but instead was always playing the piano. “Why don’t you play the piano instead of the organ?” Mr. Sutherland asked him. “My mother doesn’t want me to,” the student said. “That is the worst reason to do so,” Mr. Sutherland told him. “You need to follow your heart.” The student did and became an accomplished pianist. Both strive to encourage each student’s unique talents. “I’m not interested in putting out a bunch of cookie-cutter students or Sutherland clones,” Mr. Sutherland says. Each of them describes a different moment when the path they chose felt resolutely right. Ms. Bryn-Julson
talks about the handful of times in which her live performance with an orchestra reached the level of perfection, which she says was only half a dozen times in her entire career. For Mr. Sutherland, he thinks of solitary moments he had — walking alone past monuments for Handel and others after a session practicing the organ in Westminster Abbey, sitting at the manual at King’s College, Cambridge just beneath its magnificent vaunted ceiling — and thinking to himself: “How lucky you are to be part of this great tradition.” During their retirement, the couple plans on spending more time with their church, the socially and musically minded Bradley Hills Presbyterian in Bethesda, which features a Holtkamp organ designed in conjunction with Mr. Sutherland when he was the church’s director of music. —— Michael Blumfield
Donald Sutherland and Phyllis Bryn-Julson will retire at the end of this academic year.
CUPFUL, CUPFUL,
Where in the World Is Peabody?
we adore thee!
Peabody students, both Conservatory and Preparatory, will travel all over the world as part of Peabody programs in 2016–17.
Marquee Brass Young Artist Development Series El Paso Pro-Musica El Paso, Texas November 8–12, 2016
Peabody Children’s Chorus Tour St. Mark’s Episcopal Cathedral Seattle, Washington June 27–28, 2017
Peabody Pre-Conservatory Violin Program
Visit us and choose
from our fresh selection of
Mesa, Arizona April 10–15, 2017
COFFEE, TEA, BAGELS, MUFFINS, PASTRIES, SANDWICHES, & MORE.
Peabody Children’s Chorus Tour Kawaiahao Church Honolulu, Hawaii June 29–July 5, 2017
St. Mary’s Music School Edinburgh, Scotland November 23–24, 2016 The Royal Conservatoire of Scotland Glasgow, Scotland November 25–26, 2016
YPSP Kreisler Group and Performance Academy Violin Choir American String Teachers Association National Conference Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania March 2–3, 2017
Peabody Harp Students World Harp Congress 2017 Hong Kong July 7–13, 2017
5 E. CENTRE ST., BALTIMORE, MD 21202
We Proudly Serve
PEABODY SPRING 2017
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Hot Summer Offerings from the Preparatory The Peabody Preparatory will nearly double its course offerings this summer, adding six new programs to the eight it had already been offering in recent years. “We had a record-setting summer last year in terms of enrollment, so there’s been a move to offer more,” says Gavin Farrell (MM '99, Percussion; MM 1 '01, Theory), executive director of APRIL s n e p on o the Preparatory. “In the past, the istrati g e r s summer had been a time to rest Clas and recharge, with children going away on vacation. But recently, we’ve seen more families coming to Peabody.” Three of the new Preparatory offerings will include a residential option, The remaining three new offerings allowing participating students to are day programs. These include: live on campus. These include: Summer Band Splash: Created to Peabody Piano Week: Aimed at serve Baltimore City schoolchildren advanced piano students from midwho participate in the grant-funded dle school through college age, the Tuned-In program during the acaweeklong program will enroll 20 to demic year, the two-week Summer 25 students and be organized Band Splash — for woodwind, “along the lines of a college-level brass, and percussion players in piano festival,” says Mr. Farrell, middle and high school — will also with private lessons, enrichment be open to non-Tuned-In students. classes, daily master classes, and evening recitals by faculty artists. Viva Voce!: During the academic year, the popular Peabody Children’s Summer Guitar Institute: With Chorus enrolls 375 students. “Viva daily workshops, master classes, Voce!, a chorus-based program for and a guitar ensemble for all parchildren ages 9 to 15, offers a way ticipants, the weeklong institute for to connect with those kids — and players from high school through more — over the summer,” says Mr. college age will offer instruction in Farrell. classical, jazz, electric, and steelstring guitar. Allegro Strings: Based on the popularity of this program at the Towson Beyond Technique: Advanced ballet branch of the Preparatory, Peabody students in this two-week program will be adding a second week for will work with choreographer young violin and cello students in Durante Verzola and a composer Howard County. to perform a newly created work. —— Sue De Pasquale
E SUMM
R
YEA R S
SUNDAYS @7:30PM CHAMBER MUSIC BY CANDLELIGHT
Featuring members of the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra
APR 09, 2017 MAY 21, 2017
Free Post-Concert Reception
JUNE 11, 2017
SUNDAYS @3:30PM MAR 26, 2017 Moran Katz, clarinet
APR 23, 2017 Wonderlic Recital
MAY 07, 2017 Times Two: Draiblate & Johnson
For more information call 443.759.3309 or visit CommunityConcertsAtSecond.org
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2017
For more information on the Preparatory’s summer offerings, visit peabody.jhu.edu/prepsummer.
NEWS
Engaging New Audiences For decades, an unwritten code has governed audience behavior in concerts: Sit in silence. Don’t flip through the program or unwrap a cough drop during the performance. Applaud between movements? How uncouth. That code — an honoring of the concert hall as a sacred space where deference was paid to the musicians on stage — has not sat well with some people who might otherwise attend a performance. And it’s been particularly at odds with the daily living mode of a younger generation that views events as a chance to comment upon and share what they’re experiencing. With a focus on finding ways to invite in new audiences and prepare students for changing expectations, Peabody has started exploring how that concert code of behavior can be recast. “We have multiple audiences — both within the concert halls and for the programs we present externally,” says Sarah Hoover (DMA '08, Voice), special assistant to the dean for innovation, interdisciplinary partnerships, and community initiatives. “We have to ask ourselves if we’re listening and responding to the needs and desires of our audiences.” To accommodate those audiences while preserving the attentive-listening character of concerts, Peabody has tried two experiments, with a third scheduled for the spring. The first was a tweet wall in which audience reactions to a concert were posted on a digital screen in the arcade outside the hall itself. To allow tweeting to happen during the performance, a separate section in the balcony was roped off for smartphone-carrying audience members. This ensured they wouldn’t bother those who didn’t want to be distracted by people staring at and tapping on screens. The second was a low-tech version of the same: a sticky note wall. Concertgoers were given a few sticky notes and small pencils to scribble
A sticky note wall gives Peabody concertgoers a chance to share their reactions.
their reactions, which they were invited to post after the performance. The reactions from both concerts ranged from expressions of the sublime — “That piece was amazing!” (reacting to the Second Symphony by Aaron Jay Kernis) to the programmatic — “Early music and new music (together) is like a weird outfit that works” — to the ... well, somebody just drew a picture of a hamburger on the paper and scribbled, “I’m hungry.” In April, the third experiment will be trotted out: using a mobile app called Octava as an electronic addition to those crackling paper programs. Octava, developed by two faculty members at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County, provides real-time commentary on the music as it unfolds. A Peabody student, sitting backstage with the score, will release the preprogrammed note at the appropriate measure — all the better for audiences to better appreciate what they’re hearing. No word so far on a way to mute cough drop unwrapping. —— Michael Blumfield
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APPLAUSE STUDENTS Preparatory student Connor Chaikowsky, a 16-year-old violinist, has been chosen as one of three recipients of the Reinecke Youth Chamber Music Fellowship by the Chamber Music Society of Maryland and will perform on Sunday, April 30. Preparatory student Katelynn Cherry, a high school sophomore who studies voice with Alina Kozinska, won second place in the Asian American Vocal Competition, which was held in Bethesda, Md., on October 29. Zachary Gulaboff Davis, a doctoral student studying composition with Michael Hersch (BM ’95, MM ’97, Composition), won Chamber Music Amici’s 2016 Composition Competition. He received a commission for the world premiere of his new work, Piano Quintet No. 1, to be performed by Chamber Music Amici on April 17 in Oregon. Symphony Number One released a full-length album titled More, exclusively featuring emerging composers Natalie Draper, a doctoral composition candidate, and Andrew Posner (BM ’15, Composition). Sophomore Olivia Castor was awarded second prize, Peabody faculty artist Jasmine Hogan (BM ’11, AD ’16, Harp; MM '14, Harp Pedagogy) third prize, and Jordan Thomas (BM ’13, MM ’15, Harp) an honorable mention in the World Harp Congress 2017 Hong Kong’s Creative Media Competition. In addition, the entire 2016–17 harp studio was awarded an honorable mention for its “Dimensions” project.
ACCOM P LI SH M ENTS OF FACULT Y A N D ST UDENTS
International Young Artist Piano Competition in Washington, D.C. Yesse Kim (BM '15, Piano), a master’s piano student studying with Ms. Moon, won second place. Angelina Lim, a Preparatory flute student of JeeYoung Rachel Choe (MM '02, GPD '03, DMA '09, Flute), won first place at the concerto competition of the Howard County Gifted and Talented Orchestra in November. She performed Chaminade’s Concertino with the Baltimore Symphony side-by-side concert on February 7. GPD student Jia Lin (MM '16, Voice), who studies with Phyllis Bryn-Julson, performed as Papagena in Mozart’s The Magic Flute at the National Opera Center America and as Miss Silverpeal in Mozart’s opera The Impresario at Carnegie Hall with the New York Lyric Opera this fall. Tenor Zhe “Jon” Zhang, baritone Rob McGinness, and mezzosoprano Jennifer Mayer, all master’s students, and soprano Christine Lyons (MM ’16, Voice) were featured vocalists in Beethoven’s Symphony No. 9 with the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra’s Rusty Musicians on November 16, conducted by faculty artist Marin Alsop. Mezzo-soprano Jennifer Mayer, a master’s candidate in the studio of Steven Rainbolt (AD '94, Voice), and mezzo-soprano Elizabeth Sarian, a master’s candidate in the studio of Stanley Cornett, won Encouragement Awards at the Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions in the Middle Atlantic Region on November 6.
Pianist Soojung Kim (BM '15, MM '16, Piano), a GPD candidate studying with Yong Hi Moon, won first place as well as Best Performance of Ballade by Li-Ly Chang in the 2016
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Kelsey Ross (BM '16, Horn), a master’s candidate studying horn, was selected to perform with the New York String Orchestra under the direction of Jaime Laredo from December 19 to 28 at Carnegie Hall. Daniel Sabzghabaei, a master’s composition student studying with Kevin Puts, won the national composer award at Esoterics’ 2016–17 choral composition competition, Polyphonos. Mr. Sabzghabaei will receive a $1,000 commission for a five-minute new work that will premiere at the Polyphonos Concert in October 2017. DMA candidate Meng-Sheng Shen, a piano student of Boris Slutsky, won third prize in the San Marino Piano Competition in Italy in September. He competed against 261 competitors from 41 different countries.
Composition Department faculty member Judah Adashi (MM ’02, DMA ’11, Composition), in connection with a grant from the Provost’s Office of Johns Hopkins University, has launched a workshop, “Art and Activism,” focused on contemporary intersections between music and social justice. Dr. Adashi and Lavena Johanson (MM ’13, Cello) presented at the 2016 TEDxMidAtlantic conference in Washington, D.C., on October 22. Faculty artist Manuel Barrueco (BM ’75, Guitar) was featured in the fall issue of Classical Guitar. The article featured an interview with Mr. Barrueco about his experiences as a student at Peabody and his early career. Music theory faculty member Jenine Brown and Nathan Cornelius, doctoral candidate in guitar and master’s candidate in theory pedagogy, presented their research, titled “The Interaction of Repetition and Short-Term Memory in Melodic Dictation Tasks,” at the 15th annual Auditory Perception, Cognition, and Action Meeting on November 17 in Boston. Faculty artists Leon Fleisher and Katherine Jacobson Fleisher, pianos, performed with the Charleston Symphony Orchestra, Ken Lam (MM ’07, Orchestral Conducting) conducting, for the opening to its 80th anniversary season on September 10.
Artist diploma candidate Meng Su (PC ’09, GPD ’11, MM ’16, Guitar; GPD ’15, Chamber Music) had her first solo CD, Meng, released by Tonar Music. Ms. Su performed on September 23 at New York’s Symphony Space, presented by the New York City Classical Guitar Society. Taylor Tin, a GPD student studying viola with Victoria Chiang, has been invited to participate in the inaugural 2017 Youth Music Culture Guangdong.
In June, DMA piano student Marianna Prjevalskaya released an album, Marianna Prjevalskaya Plays Rachmaninoff. The album features variations on themes by Chopin and Corelli.
FACULT Y
DMA candidate Xiao-Hui Yang, a piano student of Boris Slutsky, won the gold medal at the 26th New Orleans International Piano Competition at Loyola University. Re Zhang, a graduate student of Mr. Slutsky, won the silver medal.
PETER GANNUSHKIN
Timothy Jones, a sophomore piano student of Marian Hahn, was named the winner in the Eastern Division Music Teachers National Association’s Competition for Young Artist Performance. He will compete in the national competition to be held in Baltimore, March 18–22. Mr. Jones also won first place in piano at the Wonderlic Competition last April.
The New York Youth Symphony announced the appointment of DMA conducting student Michael Repper as music director of the orchestra beginning in the 2017–18 season.
Jazz faculty artist Michael Formanek’s ensemble, Kolossus, performed songs from its second solo album, The Distance, at the Jazz Autumn Festival in BielskoBiala, Poland, on November 18. Mr. Formanek also performed with cooperative trio Thumbscrew in Pittsburgh and Santa Monica, Calif., in October.
NEWS
Voice faculty artist Denyce Graves, mezzo-soprano, performed at the opening of the National Museum of African American History and Culture in Washington, D.C., in September. Ms. Graves donated a gown worn by Marian Anderson to the museum. She also served as guest faculty at the China Conservatory of Music as a part of the Chinese government’s Advanced Innovative Grant in October. A three-day festival/retrospective of the works of Composition Department Chair Michael Hersch (BM ’95, MM ’97, Composition) was presented by Spectrum NYC in September. Peabody faculty artists soprano Ah Young Hong (BM ’98, MM ’01, Voice), saxophonist Gary Louie, and pianist Mr. Hersch performed. Another concert in November featured Mr. Hersch’s early works in Baltimore. His rarely heard Sonatas for Unaccompanied Cello were performed by Lavena Johanson (MM ’13, Cello). Mr. Hersch’s only work for a cappella choir, From Ecclesiastes, was given its world premiere by the Choir of St. David’s and the Bridge Ensemble directed by Peabody faculty member Douglas Buchanan (MM ’08, Composition, Music Theory Pedagogy; DMA ’13, Composition). The Peabody Trio — faculty artists Violaine Melançon, violin, and Seth Knopp, piano, with Natasha Brofsky, cello — returned to the Bay Area, where the group formed in the 1980s, to perform at the McKenna Theatre at San Francisco State University in December for its final concert. The group has since disbanded. The Peabody Symphony Orchestra has been selected as a semifinalist for the American Prize/Ensembles division 2016 for its performance of Mahler’s Symphony No. 9, under the direction of Hajime Teri Murai, Ruth Blaustein Rosenberg Director of Orchestral Activities.
Conservatory voice coach Patrick O’Donnell and Sarah Baumgarten (MM ’15, Voice Pedagogy) performed on November 10 at the Library of Congress as part of “The Jüdische Kulturbund Project.”
PAUL SIROCHMAN PHOTOGRAPHY
Musicology Department Chair Richard Giarusso published an article titled “‘The Messenger of a Faithful Heart’: Reassessing the Role of ‘Die Taubenpost’ in Schubert’s Schwanengesang.” The article is part of a volume of essays titled Rethinking Schubert, edited by Lorraine Byrne Bodley and Julian Horton, and published by Oxford University Press, that explores a comprehensive topical exploration of Schubert’s style.
Distinguished Visiting Artist Eric Owens was named Musical America’s 2017 Vocalist of the Year. Mr. Owens was recognized at a ceremony in Carnegie Hall this December, as well as a tribute article published in the annual Musical America: International Directory of the Performing Arts. Faculty artist Benjamin Pasternack and Peabody Conservatory Distinguished Alumni Award winner Carter Brey (BM ’76, Cello) performed a recital together at the Phillips Gallery in Washington, D.C., on December 4. Faculty artist Amit Peled was a featured performer alongside Itzhak Perlman and Yefim Bronfman at the America-Israel Cultural Foundation’s 77th Anniversary Gala Celebration at Jazz at Lincoln Center’s Rose Theater on November 29. Mr. Peled released a CD titled Casals Homage under Centaur records on November 11. The CD features live recordings of Mr. Peled performing the same repertoire as Pablo Casals on the same cello Casals played during his career. The 1733 Matteo Goffriller was lent to him by the wife of the late Pablo Casals, Marta Casals Istomin. Shadow of Sirius, a CD featuring music theory faculty member Joel Puckett’s flute concerto, received a Grammy nomination for Best Engineered Album, Classical category. The CD was engineered by Silas Brown, produced by David Frost, and published under Naxos Records. Another composition by Mr. Puckett titled It perched for Vespers nine was featured on the recent release of the “The President’s Own” Marine Band’s CD Picture Studies.
The new CD of works by faculty member Kevin Puts and the Peabody Symphony Orchestra, led by Director of Graduate Conducting Marin Alsop, entered the Billboard charts at No. 3 for Traditional Classical Albums and at No. 20 for overall Classical Albums, including crossover CDs. Distinguished Visiting Composer Christopher Rouse’s Organ Concerto was premiered by organist Paul Jacobs and the Philadelphia Orchestra at the Kimmel Center for the Performing Arts in Philadelphia on November 17. In December, humanities faculty member Jelena Runić gave a talk titled “Clitic Doubling with Full NPs in Non-Standard Serbian and Slovenian” at the 12th European Conference on Formal Description of Slavic Languages at Humboldt University in Berlin, Germany. She also gave an invited lecture titled “The Rhetoric of the Self and Its Implications: A Cross-Cultural Study” as part of the Linguistic Seminars of the School of Philology at the University of Banja Luka in Bosnia and Herzegovina.
Faculty artist David Smooke (MM ’95, Composition) released a CD titled Nutshell Studies of Unexplained Deaths under New Focus Recordings. The title work was recorded by the Peabody Wind Ensemble and directed by Harlan D. Parker, with Dr. Smooke on toy piano. The piece Some Details of Hell featured the Lunar Ensemble, conducted by Gemma New (MM ’11, Conducting), with soprano DMA candidate Lisa Perry (MM ’11, Voice), Stephanie Ray (MM ’12, Flute), Gleb Kanasevich (BM ’11, Clarinet), John Wilson (BM ’10, MM ’12, GPD ’14, Piano), and Peter Kibbe (BM ’12, Cello). Faculty artist Laurie Sokoloff, flute and piccolo, will receive the National Flute Association’s
Lifetime Achievement Award at the annual National Flute Association Convention on August 12 in Minneapolis. Ms. Sokoloff recently retired from the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra as a solo piccoloist and has taught at Peabody since fall 2000. Faculty member Dan Trahey (BM ’00, Tuba, Music Education) was selected as a semifinalist for Music & Arts’ Educator of the Year for his work with the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra’s OrchKids. A concert honoring faculty artist John Walker, immediate past president of the American Guild of Organists, was presented by Michael Britt (BM ’84, Organ) and other organists at Brown Memorial Presbyterian Church in Baltimore on November 6. Three choral works composed in Mr. Walker’s honor were performed. Musicology faculty member Susan Weiss gave a talk as a part of the Walters Art Museum’s "The Senses in Medieval Culture" symposium on October 16. She was accompanied by Aik Shin Tan (BM ’14, Recorder; GPD ’16, Baroque Flute), traverso and recorder; sophomore Sarah Lynn, Baroque flute; and master’s musicology student Theodore Cheek. Dr. Weiss also gave a talk on her book, A Cole Porter Companion, at the Ivy Bookshop on December 8, accompanied by Melissa Wimbish (GPD ’11, Voice; GPD ’14, Chamber Music). The Peabody Preparatory Wind Orchestra, directed by Elijah Wirth (BM '99, Tuba; MM '02, Music Education), was announced as a finalist for the American Prize in Band/Wind Ensemble Performance for the school division.
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WILL KIRK/HOMEWOOD PHOTOGRAPHY
Healing Measures Could music hold a key for more effective treatment of illnesses ranging from Alzheimer’s to autism?
Collaborators with the new Johns Hopkins Center for Music and Medicine — where musician health is also a focus — are pushing to find out. By Richard Byrne
Can singing together help ease the symptoms of
to gain new insights into how music and rhythm can Parkinson’s disease? Members of a choir in which be used to treat illnesses such as Alzheimer’s disease, some suffer from the disease help answer that ques- Parkinson’s disease, stroke, epilepsy, and autism, and tion every week at the Harry and Jeanette Weinberg to improve pain control. It also hopes to extend the Senior Center at Govans Presbyterian Church in power of music directly into health care facilities and North Baltimore. to provide members of the Peabody community with The choir performs under the direction of Leo access to specialized care for injuries that often afflict Wanenchak (BM ’79, Music Education, Piano) and professional musicians. social worker Ellen Talles. Mr. Wanenchak starts The ParkinSonics singers were recruited for a exercises for the group that warm up the body and 30-week study conducted by CMM Co-Director Alex the vocal folds. These activities increase gently in dif- Pantelyat, an assistant professor of neurology at the ficulty and prepare the group for the singing to follow. Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. One Mr. Wanenchak imbues the rehearsals with group of Parkinson’s patients sang weekly in a chorus. good-humored encouragement and comic asides. As A control group participated in a moderated weekly the group runs through “Jingle Bells” later in the session, discussion group. Then, the groups switched midway he wittily pushes the singers to experiment with dif- through the study, which aimed to survey the effects ferent endings to the piece: “You can go home and tell of singing on voice, mood, memory, and quality of life. everyone, ‘Today, I did an augmentation in my coda.’” Dr. Pantelyat is still crunching more than 2,500 This project — dubbed “ParkinSonics” — is one of data points from the study, but he says that the the first fruits of the Johns Hopkins Center for Music enthusiasm of the patients has been illuminating. and Medicine (CMM), a new interdisciplinary collabo- “Overwhelmingly,” he observes, “even before the proration between the Peabody Institute and health divi- gram was over, most participants wanted to continue. sions of Johns Hopkins University. The center aims And they have continued.”
Left to right, Alex Pantelyat, Sarah Hoover, and Serap Bastepe-Gray are key leaders of the new Center for Music and Medicine. PEABODY SPRING 2017
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Funding from the Johns Hopkins Parkinson’s Disease and Movement Disorders Center and the Maryland Association for Parkinson’s Support has allowed the project to carry on past the study. Choir members say the experience has left them feeling stronger and more willing to take on risks and challenges. Mr. Wanenchak leads a number of choirs and vocal ensembles in the region, including his work as associate conductor of the Baltimore Choral Arts Society and as director of the Junior League of Baltimore’s choral group, the Larks. “Like I told them today: ‘You’re among the most attentive of any singers I have ever conducted,’” he says of his charges. “They are sharp-eyed, and they are really invested in what they are doing.” The positive effects on the ParkinSonics singers are also abundantly clear to him. “I see very happy faces out there,” adds Mr. Wanenchak. “At the end of the session last year, one of the participants came up to me and said, ‘I never sang before in my life. I was told I was not a singer. Now I sing all the time. You’ve given me an amazing gift.’” The founders of the Center for Music and Medicine see ParkinSonics — where healthy outcomes meet rigorous science — as a model for future activities. They also see the benefits of a closer relationship between Peabody and the renowned medical community at Johns Hopkins. CMM Co-Director Sarah Hoover (DMA ’08, Voice) says the new center aligns with the four pillars of Dean Fred Bronstein’s strategic plan for Peabody. The interdisciplinary collaboration — one of the four pillars — is also designed to foster qualities of excellence, innovation, and community connection, which are at the heart of Peabody’s path forward as an institution. “It’s exciting how much enthusiasm this has been met with on the medicine side,” she observes. “With no exceptions. The overwhelming positive response has been very exciting.” Since his arrival at Johns Hopkins in 2014, Dr. Pantelyat has been a galvanizing force in creating the center. He has played violin solo in orchestras and ensembles since childhood and eagerly seeks out projects such as ParkinSonics that combine music with medicine. Initial discussions between Dean Bronstein and Dr. Pantelyat planted the seeds for the center. These conversations envisioned existing partnerships between music and medicine, including work by Peabody faculty member and occupational therapist Serap Bastepe-Gray (BM ’96, MM ’99, Guitar) and Dr. Pantelyat’s colleague Dan Drachman, a professor of neurology at the School of Medicine and a clarinetist, as models for the center’s work. 16
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“Peabody and the School of Medicine already had a history of collaboration,” says Dr. Pantelyat, “but nothing as formal as the CMM.”
“One of the participants came up to me and said, ‘I never sang before in my life. I was told I was not a singer. Now I sing all the time. You’ve given me an amazing gift.’” — Leo Wanenchak Dr. Hoover’s arrival at Peabody in 2015 as special assistant to the dean for innovation, interdisciplinary partnerships, and community initiatives helped clarify the concept. She had previously gained experience combining music and medicine while working as a singing voice specialist in a multidisciplinary voice care team. Her enthusiasm for the project led her to create a Music and Medicine Task Force within Peabody to push forward the proposed center. The task force recommended that the CMM reach beyond research and build pathways for musicians associated with Peabody to connect with the medical community. Most important for the task force was for Peabody musicians to gain access to specialized care for injuries that often befall musicians, including conditions ranging from repetitive stress disorders to focal dystonia, and for performance faculty artists to gain training in movement science in order to bring technical and musical expertise to the multidisciplinary team. Dr. Bastepe-Gray — who holds a joint appointment with the Department of Neurology at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine — says the need for such efforts is clear. “Epidemiological research within the last 20 years shows that high rates of playing-related musculoskeletal and neurological disorders prevail in musicians, from elite concert performers to amateur players,” she observes. “But musicians’ occupational health has yet to be moved from a boutique niche to a mainstream field that can support a paradigm shift with translational and clinical research in approaches to prevention and rehabilitation.” Dr. Hoover hopes the center will move this key issue into the foreground of Peabody culture. “We need to create a culture where talking about an injury or pain is embraced and where those conversations have a clear landing point within a coordinated health care system,” she says.
WILL KIRK/HOMEWOOD PHOTOGRAPHY
Peabody student guitarist Julien Xuereb performs at the Springwell Senior Living Community, where he is musician-in-residence.
The collaboration will also bring talents of even more Johns Hopkins physicians to the cause. “We knew that putting [our efforts] under the umbrella of a multidisciplinary center,” says Dr. Pantelyat, “and establishing a streamlined assessment, evaluation, and triage of musicians would provide a tremendous and unparalleled service.” The directors of the CMM are now busily networking within the Johns Hopkins community, recruiting partners and searching for donors. More than 70 Johns Hopkins faculty members across disciplines have endorsed and supported the center’s work — and the list keeps growing. The power of the strong parallels between the cultures of music and medicine has also been a boon for the collaboration. As one of many Johns Hopkins doctors who play music at an advanced level, Dr. Pantelyat sees “the commitment to excellence” as a strong link between the two cultures at Johns Hopkins. “There is exactitude,” he continues, “a mathematical certainty that goes along with the rhythm of music.” Dr. Hoover points to another important parallel between the two cultures. “In medicine,” she observes, “there is a creative and sometimes uncomfortable tension between perfection and precision, on the one
hand, and human connection, on the other hand. It parallels a tension between those same two things in musicians. We are actively working to build a new curriculum at Peabody that has our students straddling that tension very actively. We can be a living example of doing that.” The Center for Music and Medicine’s mission to connect musicians with health care communities is already under way. In one striking case, a Peabody guitar student’s desire to find greater audiences for his work led to a new program of musicians-in-residence at senior living facilities. Student Julien Xuereb (MM ’15, Guitar Pedagogy) became involved in Peabody’s Creative Access program as a graduate student, playing guitar at local hospitals. His experience playing at the Springwell Senior Living Community in Mount Washington led to an offer to become a musician-in-residence at the facility. Today, he plays his guitar for residents in a variety of contexts within the community in exchange for living quarters as he pursues his Graduate Performance Diploma. PEABODY SPRING 2017
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Mr. Xuereb plays pieces he’s working on for his diploma, as well as his own compositions. He’s also added some George Gershwin and ragtime to his repertoire. Performing in public spaces “gave a sense to my daily practice,” he says. “I’d wake up in the morning and say, ‘Oh, I know why I’m practicing, because next week I am going to play music for people who really need my music to make their day better.’” Mr. Xuereb found his experience so fulfilling that he applied for and received a Peabody Dean’s Incentive Grant last year to expand the program. His initiative found a positive response at Broadmead, a retirement community in Cockeysville where harpist and Graduate Performance Diploma candidate Peggy Houng (BM ’14, Harp; KSAS BA ’14, Cognitive Science) plays concerts for residents and opens up her rehearsals for elderly audiences. Ms. Houng says that her dual interests in music and in cognitive psychology have made her Broadmead experience especially satisfying. “People have known for a long time that music therapy is an
effective treatment for a number of medical conditions,” she says. “And what I’ve been doing is just confirming that. Music is such good medicine for these people.” Mr. Xuereb and Ms. Houng are at the vanguard of work that Dr. Hoover believes is vital to the new center’s success — the role of music in improving the lives of patients and caregivers. She says that the center is already planning a broad expansion of similar projects. “We’re committed to using music as a therapeutic intervention in a wide variety of circumstances and bringing music as a tool in a toolbox for patient care,” says Dr. Hoover. “How can we embed musicians in different clinical environments to do what they do for the benefit of patients, families, and caregivers — including doctors, nurses, and technicians?” Broadmead will also be the site of a study created by the Center for Music and Medicine that will focus on the effects that singing has on dementia patients
Peabody faculty guitarist Zane Foreshee aims to investigate whether guitar lessons could help Parkinson's patients. COURTESY OF ZANE FORSHEE
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and their caregivers. The “side-by-side singing” study will add more knowledge to a growing body of work on how music can heal. The research element of the CMM’s work is crucial. Scientific studies are increasingly beginning to show evidence for music’s positive effects on healing, but how those benefits are created or which illnesses are best suited for musical interventions are still open questions. “My impression is that the science [on music and healing] has lagged behind,” says David Roth, a professor of medicine at the School of Medicine and director of the Center on Aging and Health. “There are not a lot of good scientific studies that have been able to confirm the benefits with a controlled and structured research design.” Dr. Roth is a member of the research team recently awarded a Johns Hopkins Discovery Award for the upcoming study on singing and dementia patients. Dr. Hoover is a co-principal investigator on the project, along with internal medicine clinical fellow Panagis Galiatsatos, who works at Johns Hopkins Bayview Medical Center.
“How can we embed musicians in different clinical environments to do what they do for the benefit of patients, families, and caregivers — including doctors, nurses, and technicians?” — Sarah Hoover
We’re being called by what we can do in the 21st century and also recognizing that collectively, we can have more of an impact in medicine and health than we can alone.” Dr. Bastepe-Gray sees the center’s research program as an extension of her work to bring musicians into the heart of the research effort. “Involvement of expert musicians in the investigative process will facilitate the focus of research in generating new knowledge with immediate practical applications to our occupational health,” she says. Zane Forshee (MM ’01, GPD ’03, DMA ’11, Guitar), who chairs the guitar program in the Peabody Preparatory and serves on the Conservatory guitar faculty, is one of the musicians actively pursuing that course. He is devising a curriculum for a study on how weekly guitar lessons may help those who suffer from Parkinson’s disease. Dr. Forshee’s study has received a Dean’s Incentive Grant, and he says the process has inspired him to rethink the roots of his own playing. “I had to figure out how to make the guitar seem foreign to myself,” Dr. Forshee says. “The way I could do that was to flip it. Instead of holding it the standard way with the neck in my left hand, I used the right hand. I broke it down into what are the most basic movements we can do that will make a person feel good as they make a sound. I want the person who comes in the door to feel a sense of success, regardless of what’s going on.” Dr. Pantelyat sees vast possibilities for the confluence of practice and research in the projects pursued at the new center. “I think we are uniquely positioned at Johns Hopkins to develop the premier program in the United States,” he says. “[We’ve got] world-class research expertise, world-class clinical care capabilities across multiple disciplines, and, of course, Peabody, with its international reputation as a worldclass [conservatory].” The quest for a deeper understanding of how music helps heal bodies and minds excites young musicians whose careers may be shaped by that journey. Mr. Xuereb points to his experience of watching a Springwell patient who is largely silent fall into conversation with her nurses as he plays guitar for her. “The power that we have with our instrument — it’s a power that changes people,” says Mr. Xuereb. “We know it does, but we don’t yet know how.”
Forging a relationship with Dr. Galiatsatos demonstrates how the CMM will use projects to advance its mission on multiple fronts. In addition to his role at Johns Hopkins Bayview, Dr. Galiatsatos is also a founder and co-director of Medicine for the Greater Good, a Baltimore-based organization that seeks to close the distance among physicians, health care institutions, and the greater community. (Dr. Galiatsatos has already worked with Ms. Houng on a project called Beats and Breathe that married harp music and asthma education in the community.) As an organization that strives to bring care directly into communities, Medicine for the Greater Good is a perfect partner for the CMM and also for Peabody’s larger efforts to forge connections to wider audiences. “I see this as a beautiful symphony,” Dr. Galiatsatos observes, “a harmonious approach.
Watch the Live at 9:30 story on Julien Xuereb and Springwell Assisted Living: bit.ly/2mCbYCT Watch The Baltimore Sun video on Peggy Houng and Broadmead: bsun.md/2d2sgMR PEABODY SPRING 2017
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150
th
Anniversary
Miriam A. Friedberg Concert Hall, circa 1910
MIRIAM A. FRIEDBERG CONCERT HALL
Miriam A. Friedberg Concert Hall, 2016
On October 28, 2016, Peabody celebrated the 150th anniversary of the Miriam A. Friedberg Concert Hall. Marin Alsop conducted the Peabody Symphony Orchestra (below, left) in a performance of works by Brahms and Kernis for a sold-out audience. Then-Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake (above, right) was in attendance and joined Dean Fred Bronstein in giving remarks on the momentous event. In honor of the hall's founding, Charm City Cakes was commissioned to create an edible likeness of the original building (below, right).
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25 YEARS
& COUNTING
COLUMBIA PRO CANTARE - 40TH ANNIVERSARY SEASON PEABODY MAGAZINE
JOHNS HOPKINS UNIVERSITY
Spring 2016 Vol. 10 No. 2
4 Pillars, 8 Caryatids,
and the
Future of Peabody
Also:
An Action-Packed Autumn and
Fertile Ground
Frances Motyca Dawson, Conductor
MUSIC MASTERS OF EASTERN EUROPE Sunday, March 19, 2017, 3 PM Hungarian: Kodály Missa Brevis and Liszt Liebesträm no. 3 Polish: Zielenski In Monte Oliveti and Moniuszko Ecce Lignum Cruci Czech: Dvořák Biblical Songs and Songs My Mother Taught Me
Columbia Pro Cantare • Columbia Pro Cantare Chamber Singers Laura Whittenberger, soprano • Rob McGinness, baritone Donald Fries, organ • Jacqueline Pollauf, harp Generously Sponsored by Flying Cloud Money Management
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First Evangelical Lutheran Church, 3604 Chatham Road, Ellicott City, MD 21042
ANNIVERSARY CELEBRATIONS! COLUMBIA’S 50TH, COLUMBIA PRO CANTARE’S 40TH, JIM ROUSE THEATRE’S 20TH Sunday, May 14, 2017, 8 PM Columbia Pro Cantare celebrates the city of Columbia’s 50th Birthday and our long association with Jim Rouse! Aaron Copland’s Lincoln Portrait and Old American Songs and Spirituals SPECIAL PRESENTATION: The Columbia Pro Contare re-creates commissioned work by Tom Benjamin, I Build a House for orchestra, chorus and Lester Lynch honoring Jim Rouse’s vision of Columbia. Columbia Pro Cantare • Columbia Pro Cantare Chamber Singers Lester Lynch, baritone • Howard County Concert Orchestra
peabody.jhu.edu/magazinesurvey magazine@peabody.jhu.edu
Jim Rouse Theatre for the Performing Arts, 5460 Trumpeter Road, Columbia, MD Tickets & Information: www.procantare.org or 410-799-9321 PEABODY SPRING 2017
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CORE VALUES Meet four Peabody people whose careers have taken them in directions not typical of their Conservatory classmates. Yet even as these four have risen to achieve distinction in disparate fields — technology, law, hip-hop, and foreign diplomacy — their classical music roots have continued to nourish them, providing unique ways of hearing, thinking, organizing information, and relating to the world. They remain classical musicians at heart. By Christine Stutz Illustration by Traci Daberko
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THINKING MUSICALLY COURTESY OF MARK GOLDSTEIN
Mark Goldstein takes a break from his work at Google to practice on the Marimba Lumina, an instrument he co-created.
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With his inquisitive mind and boundless creative
energy, it’s no surprise that Mark Goldstein (KSAS BA ’73, Quantitative Studies; BM ’75 Percussion) has found a way to pursue his passion for music while building a career at one of the world’s most innovative companies, Google. Mr. Goldstein came to Johns Hopkins to study math and engineering in 1969, long before its official affiliation with Peabody. He took music classes at Goucher College, where several of his professors just happened to be Peabody faculty members. He also studied percussion with Peabody instructor Charles Memphis and performed with Peabody’s ensembles. Mr. Memphis encouraged him to pursue a second bachelor’s degree in music performance at Peabody, a decision Mr. Goldstein has never regretted. “It was a really, really great time to be there,” he says. One of the things he loved most was the strength of the composition program. “There was always steaming-hot new music to play,” he says. “And I was open for just about anything.” Evidently, he still is. Since moving to California, Mr. Goldstein has played in Brazilian samba bands, African marimba ensembles, with the American Gamelan alongside Lou Harrison, and on stage with Lev Theremin. In addition to the usual percussion instruments, Mr. Goldstein also plays the Buchla Lightning wands and the Marimba Lumina, an instrument he co-created with synth pioneer Don Buchla. They produce eerie, otherworldly sounds appropriate for outer-space movies. Now a senior technical writer at Google, Mr. Goldstein continues to perform with the Redwood Symphony, of which he is a founding member; as a leader of the jazz group MAGPIE (Musicians at Google Play Instruments Everywhere); and as one half of the Filmharmonia Duo, silent film accompanists. And that is just a partial list of his musical activities. “As a writer, I think quite often musically, in terms of pages that I’m writing,” Mr. Goldstein says. “I think about elements of form, repetition, meter, and rhythm. I think about how all of these quasi-musical attributes sound to my inner ear as I write.” He believes his training as a performer has helped him in his personal and professional life. “The skills you learn as a performer are ensemble skills. You learn to listen, to respond, to blend,” he says. “Working with a conductor, you see good and bad examples of leadership.” Mr. Goldstein sees no disconnect between his classical training and the experimental music he often performs. “It’s not ‘classical music,’ it’s music,” he says. “My training makes me a better player all around.”
A lawyer for LUKOIL, Clara J. Ohr enjoys singing and attending New York Philharmonic concerts.
AN EYE TOWARD DETAIL COURTESY OF CLARA J. OHR
G rowing up, Clara J. Ohr (MM ’95, Piano) found it easy to balance her dedication to her studies with her piano practice. “For most of my life, that’s how I was training. School was my most important priority, with music just a hair under that,” says Ms. Ohr, who is currently legal counsel and compliance officer for LUKOIL Pan Americas LLC, which trades crude oil petroleum products in the Western Hemisphere as a subsidiary of the second-largest Russian oil company, PJSC LUKOIL. She was able to focus on her music during summer programs at Aspen and Tanglewood, but once she started her undergraduate work in East Asian studies at Harvard, she found the balancing act more difficult to achieve. In choosing to pursue a master’s in music at Peabody, she was hoping to answer the nagging question of whether music would become her vocation or remain an avocation. When she shared her doubts with pianist Robert McDonald, her first instructor at Peabody, who is now at the Curtis Institute, he told her that if music isn’t something you think of the moment you wake up and throughout the day, you shouldn’t make it your career. Because it’s so challenging to make a good living as a music professional, she recalls him saying, “it has to be something you need, like your morning orange juice.” Today, Ms. Ohr has an extremely busy professional life that has included leadership roles in the Asian American Bar Association of New York, the largest minority bar association in the state. Nevertheless, she’s made a point of subscribing to the New York Philharmonic, where she enjoys seeing performers
such as Yefim Bronfman, Joshua Bell, and Alisa Weilerstein. “Listening to New York Philharmonic concerts, as well as any number of jazz concerts around New York City, is one of my favorite ways to unwind in the midst of what is often a stressful career,” she says. She also sings in the Choral Society of Grace Church in New York. The leader of the choral group, John Maclay, is a pianist who studied at Peabody Preparatory, she says, and attended Harvard Law School. “I have heard of other musicians who end up going into law, and I understand it,” says Ms. Ohr, who earned her JD in 1998 from the University of Minnesota Law School. “Music gives you an eye toward detail. This is helpful, especially if you’re a transactional lawyer. “If you think about studying a piece of music, right down to the smallest rest, there are so many layers of complexity,” she continues. “It’s not unlike the analysis required in studying a legal document, such as a contract. Music teaches you to see how the small details fit into the big picture.” Hear the Choral Society of Grace Church perform: bit.ly/2majRzo PEABODY SPRING 2017
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CLASSICAL PIANO MEETS HIP-HOP E ven while Wendel Patrick was studying classical piano on full scholarship at Northwestern University, the hip-hop music of his childhood was “always present,” he says. After earning his master’s degree, he performed as a classical and jazz pianist, but he also began experimenting with hip-hop production, collecting keyboards and other sound equipment. Soon, he says, “it became clear that this could be an alternate path.” Thus far, that path has included five solo albums, all produced without the use of samples. Mr. Patrick plays every note of every instrument — all created electronically. He also performs in experimental and improvisational jazz groups under his given name, Kevin Gift — Wendel Patrick is an alter ego he adopted for his hip-hop career; it’s the name of his twin brother who did not survive their birth — and he has performed with spoken-word artist Ursula Rucker. This year, Mr. Patrick began teaching hip-hop classes at Peabody, and he will offer an advanced class in 2017.
KEVIN GIFT
Wendel Patrick brought hip-hop to the Peabody classroom this year.
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Mr. Patrick sees no disconnect between the hip-hop composing he does now and his classical music training, which began at age 4 and included a year at the Peabody Preparatory at age 7. “You’re dealing with all the same musical attributes, whether it’s manipulating musical pitch or rhythm,” he says. Because he uses a keyboard to mimic an array of instruments, including many percussion instruments, it’s important to know how each of those instruments ought to sound, to ensure their authenticity. “There’s a lot of manipulation of sound that goes into this kind of production,” he says, “and it’s important to have the ability to understand, harmonically, music from different cultures.” As a pianist, Mr. Patrick is more than comfortable with the multiple keyboards he uses — along with sound modules, effects processors, and virtual instruments — to produce a variety of sounds for his recordings. “You still have to have the technical knowledge of the electronic instrument,” he says, “but being able to play the piano is an immeasurable benefit.”
Watch Wendel Patrick perform on his YouTube page: bit.ly/2lsKprA
A foreign service officer, Braphus Kaalund says music remains an almost constant companion.
CONNECTING THROUGH MUSIC B raphus Kaalund (BM ’02, Trumpet) enrolled at Peabody to study the trumpet, with the hope of one day becoming a conductor. As a high school student, he played in band and orchestra, and was involved with the Young Artist Program at the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C. After enrolling at Peabody, he became intrigued by the business side of music. He ended up earning two law degrees, one in the United States and one in England, and practicing international law in Europe before returning to the U.S. to become a diplomat. Through it all, he says, he relied on his musical training to succeed. “The training I received at Peabody was really invaluable, the most beneficial of my three degrees,” he says. “A lot of times when you’re studying academic subjects, you can be disconnected from the material and cram for exams. You can sit passively in lectures and regurgitate what is said later. “But in music school, you have to practice every day,” says Mr. Kaalund. “Ear training must be done regularly; there’s no way to cram for it. You have to be dedicated and disciplined or you won’t succeed.” Now a foreign service officer at the U.S. Department of State, he says he still enjoys attending concerts at the Kennedy Center. And, he says, “I still practice.” Throughout his life, Mr. Kaalund says, classical music remains an almost constant companion. “When I really need to focus and write in-depth pieces, I sometimes close my office door and put on Brahms’ Symphony No. 4, or even Penderecki’s Symphony No. 3. For some reason, longer and more sorrowful-sounding works really help me when I need to do longer written pieces,” he says. As he travels the world for work, music has been a bridge that has sparked interesting conversations
COURTESY OF BRAPHUS KAALUND
and experiences. He turned a friend into a classical music fan by playing for him countertenor Phillippe Jaroussky’s recordings of Farinelli’s music. During a night visit to a Jordanian desert, where the movie The Martian was filmed because of its stark landscape, he says, “Mars, from Holst’s The Planets, kept running through my head. I pulled out my phone and started playing a recording of it. It was a surreal experience, and I ended up sharing my whole classical playlist with my friends after that, since they had never heard Western classical music. “I have really found that for nearly every moment, there is a fitting classical piece, and I listen to it, and I often end up remembering various events because I connect them with a piece of music.” Conversant in Arabic and German, and proficient in Hindi, Mr. Kaalund says his musical training aided his language study. The finely tuned ear and appreciation for nuance that he gained from musical study makes it easier for him to acquire new languages. Listening to songs in foreign languages helps him more quickly grasp accents and cadences, he adds. “Music was really what gave me the ability to do that,” he says.
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Alumni
Alumni and friends gathered to share memories of Gustav Meier after the Peabody Symphony Orchestra concert on February 4. Pictured left to right: Michael Sheppard, Brian Stone, Matthew Brown, Michelle Rofrano, Michael Repper, Simeone Tartaglione, Benjamin Loeb, Alexander Kahn, Danail Rachev, Mark Shapiro, Lance Friedel, Marin Alsop, Oscar Bustillo, Julien Benichou, Gabriel Drossart, Jordan Randall Smith, Petko Dimitrov, Joshua Hong
Alumni Celebration Weekend The Society of Peabody Alumni will hold its annual Alumni Celebration Weekend from Thursday, April 20, to Sunday, April 23. The weekend is filled with activities and concerts, including the following award presentations. Invitations have been mailed and detailed information is available on the website. All alumni are encouraged to attend!
PEABODY DISTINGUISHED ALUMNI AWARD For distinguished work in their professions To be presented Saturday, April 22, at the Reunion Lunch
s
se Honored Clas n 50th Reunio 1966 & 1967 n 40th Reunio 77 1976 & 19
n 25th Reunio 92 19 & 1991
Alumni Celebration Weekend April 20 – 23,
2017
For more information and to register for Alumni Weekend events, please visit peabody.jhu.edu/alumni or call the Alumni Office at 667-208-6558. 28
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James Scott
JAMES SCOTT (MM ’66, Flute; MM ’66, Piano; DMA ’73, Flute), whose accomplishments include: • Dean of the College of Music and professor of music, University of North Texas • Positions as director and associate dean at the universities of Illinois and Indiana, respectively • Faculty member and head of the music program, Rutgers University • Member and chairman of the Commission on Accreditation, National Association of Schools of Music
In addition, Dr. Scott was a flutist in the Atlanta Symphony and was one of the youngest musicians in the history of the orchestra. He continues to perform at recitals across the United States, in Canada, in East Asia, and in numerous chamber ensembles. He also gives master classes in the U.S. and abroad.
JOHNS HOPKINS ALUMNI ASSOCIATION HERITAGE AWARDS For exceptional service to the University To be presented Friday, April 21, at the Peabody Concert Orchestra, Peabody Singers, and Peabody-Hopkins Chorus concert PHYLLIS BRYN-JULSON and DONALD SUTHERLAND, for their collectively devoted 75 years of teaching at Peabody. Though it is unusual for faculty members to be nominated or chosen for this award, these two are extraordinary. They have each received the JHU Excellence in Teaching Award, demonstrating their dedication to current students, and their continued dedication to alumni is evident by the support for their nomination for this award. Phyllis Bryn-Julson and Donald Sutherland To be presented Saturday, April 22, at the Reunion Lunch CAROL CANNON (BM ’67, Voice), honoring her work with the: • Peabody Admissions Office as alumni representative in Texas, 1986–91 • Society of Peabody Alumni, serving four terms as an officer, and continuous service on the Executive Committee since 1992 • Johns Hopkins Alumni Association, serving as the Peabody representative on the Alumni Council, 2004–10; and as an active member of the Johns Hopkins University alumni chapters in both Texas and South Carolina
Carol Cannon
Dr. Cannon’s extraordinary dedication in giving her time and energy to support the efforts of the Alumni Association, particularly in assisting current students, is even more notable because she has always lived at a distance, while maintaining a full-time career as an artist/ teacher in Texas until 2008, and as an active artist on the South Carolina Arts Commission roster since then.
PEABODY ALUMNI ACHIEVEMENT AWARDS Recognizing Outstanding Contributions to Music in Maryland To be presented Sunday, April 23, at the Reunion Brunch JASON LOVE (BM ’92, Cello; MM ’94, Conducting), who has been contributing to the musical life of Maryland since he arrived in the late 1980s. His positions and accolades include: • Music director of the Columbia Orchestra for 18 years • Winner of the American Prize for Orchestral Programming and winner of the Howie Award, recognizing achievement in the arts in Howard County • Artistic director of the Greater Baltimore Youth Orchestras for 13 years • Music director of the New Horizons Chamber Ensemble, a new-music group in Baltimore, for five years In addition to these, he has performed as a cellist in a wide array of concertos with orchestras and many chamber ensembles, and has a studio of cello students.
Jason Love
To be presented Sunday, April 23, at the Reunion Brunch RON GRETZ (BM ’66, Voice; MM ’68, Choral Conducting), who is well-known throughout Maryland both as a teacher and a performer. His contributions run deep in several musical arenas, including: • 34 seasons as artistic director and conductor of the Annapolis Opera • Professor emeritus at the Community College of Baltimore County, where he taught music theory for 41 years • His theory textbook Music Language and Fundamentals, published by McGraw-Hill, is used throughout the U.S. and Canada • Peabody opera coach, 1995–2000 • Returned to Peabody in 2012 and remains a part-time faculty member • Organist and choir director at the University Baptist Church in Baltimore for over 25 years
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CL A SS N OTES 1800
198 0
On December 1, The Baltimore Sun ran “The origin of the Navy’s ‘Anchors Aweigh’” by Paul McCardell featuring the famous rally song by U.S. Naval Academy bandmaster
In November, Elizabeth Moak (BM ’83, MM ’85, DMA ’03, Piano) performed at Loyola University New Orleans as a part of a visiting faculty member recital. Dr. Moak is currently on the faculty of the University of Southern Mississippi.
1950
In the style of early 20th century silent film accompaniment, Michael Britt (BM ’84, Organ) improvised alongside a screening of the silent film Steamboat Bill Jr. at Brown Memorial Church in Baltimore in November.
Lt. Charles A. “Zimmy” Zimmermann (1878, Piano).
Orchestra music by Vivian Adelberg Rudow (TC ’57, BM ’60, Piano; MM ’79, Composition), titled GO GREEN TOO!, was performed by the Hong Kong Community Philharmonic Orchestra on October 1.
1960 In September, Defiant Requiem: Verdi at Terezín, a concert/drama created by Murry Sidlin (BM ’62, Music Education; MM ’68, Conducting), was performed by Orchester Wiener Akademie and Czech Philharmonic Choir Brno at Konzerthaus Vienna.
1 9 70 Arno Drucker (DMA ’70,
Piano) accompanied Frederica von Stade as a part of the Steinway Series at Silo Hill in October. The event was a fundraiser for the therapeutic music program ParkinSonics. Otherworld, a contemporary jazz group with Jeffrey Chappell (MM ’76, Piano; MM ’82, Composition), performed in August in Kensington, Md., playing highlights from its Global Music Award–winning debut album, Otherworld.
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Organist and composer Trent Johnson (BM ’89, GPD ’91, Organ) was commissioned by Trilogy: An Opera Company to write the opera Kenyatta, based upon the life of Jomo Kenyatta, freedom fighter and the first president of Kenya. The world premiere is scheduled for fall 2017 at the New Jersey Performing Arts Center.
199 0 This fall, bass-baritone Robert Cantrell (MM ’90, GPD ’92, Voice) sang a premiere of selections from Songs of Love and Loss by James Lee lll at Morgan State University, Fauré’s Requiem with the Loudon Symphony, Mozart’s Requiem with the Bay Atlantic Symphony, Brahms’ Requiem with Baltimore School for the Arts/Johns Hopkins University Choral Society,and Bartók’s Bluebeard’s Castle with Columbia Symphony. Former Peabody music theory and composition faculty member Tom Benjamin has been interviewed by Peter Princiotto (MM ’90, Composition) in a new DVD titled An Interview With Thomas Benjamin on His Life With Music. To purchase, visit na-east.com.
The Place Where You Started, an opera by Mark Lanz Weiser (BM ’91, Piano; MM ’93, Composition), was premiered by Portland State University Opera in November. The opera features a major character who is an undocumented immigrant. The Columbia Orchestra Piano Trio, featuring Jason Love (BM ’92, Cello; MM ’94, Conducting) and Brenda Anna (’83, Violin), performed in the Columbia Orchestra’s chamber series in October. The program included Veil of Ignorance by Scott Pender (MM ’85, Composition). The Monument Piano Trio, featuring Dariusz Skoraczewski (BM ’94, GPD ’96, Cello) and Michael Sheppard (BM ’98, MM ’00, GPD ’03, Piano), kicked off a duo series on December 31 at An Die Musik Live! The Chamber Music Society of Maryland, with DMA conducting student Michael Repper as managing director, presented Alon Goldstein (GPD ’95, MM ’96, Piano) in October and will present Greg Luce (BM ’07, Viola) with the Aeolus String Quartet in May. The Poulenc Trio — Preparatory faculty artist Irina Kaplan Lande, piano; Bryan Young (BM ’96, Bassoon); and Liang Wang, oboe — collaborated on an animated film titled Trains of Thought: Animated, set to a kinetic new work by Viet Cuong (BM ’11, MM ’12, Composition) with animators Elizabeth and Alden Phelps. The film will premiere in May 2017 at the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C. The group also released a new CD under the Delos label that climbed to No. 4 on Apple Music’s classical playlist.
Matthew Bengtson (MM
’97, DMA ’01, Piano) has been named assistant professor of piano literature at the University of Michigan School of Music, Theatre, and Dance.
In April, Jennifer Blades (MM ’97, GPD ’98, Voice) will perform the U.S. premiere of Love Songs, a one-woman, unaccompanied monodrama by Ana Sokolovic, at the Baltimore Theatre Project. The production team includes stage director Frances Pollock (MM ’15, Voice) and music director JoAnn Kulesza, interim chair of the Opera Department.
Julian Gargiulo (MM ’97,
Piano) performed at Carnegie Hall on January 11 as the culmination of his competition Getting to Carnegie Hall. Mr. Gargiulo accompanied the finalists and premiered his song cycle Songs from the Fork. Conductor Jun Kim (BM ’97, Violin) won the American Prize in Conducting: Opera Division 2015 for his performance of Puccini’s Suor Angelica with the University of WisconsinMilwaukee Symphony and Opera. In October, Jenny Lin (KSAS BA ’94, German; AD ’98, Piano) performed at the Castleton Festival in Castleton, Va.
Alexander Mickelthwate (GPD ’98, Conducting) served as a guest conductor on the Oklahoma City Philharmonic’s 2016–17 season.
Hood College Professor Kuei-I Wu (MM ’99, Piano) was interviewed by the Frederick News-Post about her art and teaching. She notes that she was heavily influenced by her teacher at Peabody, Boris Slutsky.
20 0 0 The seventh Baltimore Lieder Weekend, founded and directed by Daniel Schlosberg (BM ’00, MM ’01, Piano; KSAS BA ’00, History), took place at An die Musik with the theme of “Schubert 1828.” Performers
ALUMNI
included Mr. Schlosberg, baritone Ryan De Ryke (MM ’02, AD ’04, Voice), faculty artist Ah Young Hong (BM ’98, MM ’01, Voice), and Michael Sheppard (BM ’98, MM ’00, GPD ’03, Piano).
leads both the orchestral and operatic seasons. Mr. Abdullah has twice won the prestigious Solti Foundation U.S. Career Assistance Award, in 2010 and 2015. An interview with him was posted on the GMC website.
Soprano Sara Beth Pearson (GPD ’02, Voice) was awarded third prize in the Concurso Internacional de Canto Lirico in Trujillo, Peru, performing at the gala concert last November.
In November, A Far Cry, a chamber orchestra featuring Jason Fisher (BM ’05, Viola) and Jesse Irons (BM ’04, Violin; GPD ’06, Chamber Music), performed at the National Gallery of Art.
In July, Matthew Odell (MM ’03, GPD ’05, Piano) gave a recital in Paris for the European American Musical Alliance at the Schola Cantorum. He also received a grant from the Marion and Jasper Whiting Foundation to conduct research on Messiaen, Boulez, and Tippett.
In October, Emily Noël (MM ’06, Voice) worked with the Folger Consort in scenes from Measure for Measure and music from Dido and Aeneas at the Kennedy Center. Ms. Noël and Brian Kay (BM ’13, MM, ’15, Lute) were featured performers in the Folger Consort’s Second Shepherd’s Play at the Folger Shakespeare Library in November and December.
Jessica Satava (MM ’04,
Voice) won second place in the 2016 American Prize in Vocal Performance — Friedrich and Virginia Schorr Memorial Award.
Kazem Abdullah (’05,
Conducting) conducts a small orchestra in a new television spot for the 2017 GMC Acadia. Since 2012, he has been generalmusikdirektor of the City of Aachen, Germany, where he
Toni Marie Palmertree
(BM ’06, Voice) performed the role of Cio-Cio-San in San Francisco Opera’s production of Puccini’s Madama Butterfly after the artist she was covering fell ill. She is one of 12 recipients of the San Francisco Opera Center’s 2017 Adler Fellowship.
Ryan Dorsey (BM ’07,
Composition) was recently elected as Baltimore’s 3rd District city councilman. He was endorsed by The Baltimore Sun. In July, Patchwork Project of American Song premiered Your Absence by Pamela Stein Lynde (MM ’07, Voice) with Ms. Lynde as soloist at the National Opera Center in New York City. Also in July, Guided Imagery Opera premiered one of Ms. Lynde’s compositions in its inaugural New York performance. In October, Anastasia Pike (MM ’07, Harp) was the event director and lead panelist for “The End of the Conservatory,” a workshop sponsored by the College Music Society’s National Conference in Santa Fe, N.M. She also performed chamber music on the Kennedy Center’s Millennium Stage on September 2. In September, Ana Vidovic (AD ’07, Guitar), who was a student of Manuel Barrueco, performed a recital at An Die Musik. In August, Annie Gill (GPD ’08, Voice), Jessica Satava (MM ’04, Voice), Jason Widney (MM ’05, Voice),
Joseph Satava (BM ’97,
DMA ’06, Piano), and current master’s candidate Rob McGinness, baritone, performed art songs, arias, and musical theater pieces as part of Baltimore Musicales. In December, members of Rhymes With Opera — Ruby Fulton (DMA ’09, Composition), Elisabeth Halliday-Quan (’07, Voice; KSAS BA ’07, German), George Lam (MM ’05, Music Theory, Composition), and Robert Maril (MM ’04, Voice) — showed a screening of a video opera, Adam’s Run, created by the organization at the Charles Theatre in Baltimore.
Ruby Fulton (DMA ’09,
Composition) served as co-music director and on the writing team of the Baltimore Rock Opera Society’s Brides of Tortuga in November at Chesapeake Arts Center in Brooklyn Park, Md.
Vladimir Kulenovic (GPD
’09, Conducting) conducted the opening of the Illinois Symphony Orchestra’s 2016–17 season.
Liz Ramirez (BM ’09,
Clarinet) was accepted to Youth Orchestra of the Americas’ Global Leadership Program.
In Memoriam Jack Thames (MM ’58, Piano; former Preparatory faculty member) James W. Eaton (BM ’78, Viola) Tom Falcone (’78, Clarinet) Arthur D. Rhea Jr. (former Conservatory faculty member) SPA President Elizabeth Berman makes a toast to the graduating class 100 days before commencement. PEABODY SPRING 2017
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CL A SS N OTES National Philharmonic concertmaster Colin Sorgi (BM ’09, GPD ’13, Violin) directed the newly formed National Philharmonic Chamber Players in its debut last fall in Takoma Park, Md.
20 1 0 Nola Richardson (MM
'10, Voice Pedagogy; MM ’11, Early Music Voice) won third prize and was voted audience favorite at the fourth annual Handel Aria Competition at the Madison Early Music Festival last summer.
John Wilson (BM ’10, MM ’12, GPD ’14, Piano) was a featured soloist with the New World Symphony on September 30. Mr. Wilson performed the premiere of Timo Andres’ Tides and Currents for two pianos and percussion alongside the composer and the premiere of Michael Tilson Thomas’ Four Preludes on Playthings of the Wind.
Jonathan Zwi (MM ’10,
Guitar) was appointed to the Music Department’s faculty at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County. Sandbox Percussion — Victor Caccese (BM ’11, Percussion), Terry Sweeney (BM ’13, Percussion), Ian Rosenbaum (BM ’08, Percussion), and Jonathan Allen — performed on October 28 in the DMA recital of Thomas Kotcheff (BM ’10, Piano) at the University of Southern California. The program included the world premiere of Mr. Kotcheff’s newest percussion quartet, not only that one but that one & that too. They premiered a new eveninglength theatrical work titled Quixote at Montclair State University with the HOWL ensemble in collaboration with Amy Beth Kirsten (DMA ’10, Composition) in March. Doctoral candidate John Ehrenburg (BM ’11, Trumpet, Music Education) will be on the trumpet faculty at Frostburg State University.
Peter Kwon (BM ’11, MM
’13, Violin) has joined the Orange County School of the Arts as conductor of the string orchestra and faculty of chamber music coaching.
Mark Meadows (KSAS BA
’11, Psychology; BM '11, GPD ’13, Jazz Piano) played the lead role in Signature Theatre’s summer production of Jelly’s Last Jam. This fall, he also performed at the Mansion at Strathmore in Bethesda, Md.; the Atlas Performing Arts Center in Washington, D.C.; the South Kitchen and Jazz Parlor in Philadelphia; and at Dizzy’s Club in New York City. In November, Dreams of the Fallen by Jake Runestad (MM ’11, Composition; MM '12, Music Theory Pedagogy) made its Carnegie Hall premiere, and his composition I Will Lift Mine Eyes was performed for Pope Francis at the Sistine Chapel. His work The Hope of Loving was recorded by the Master of Chorale of Tampa Bay and debuted at No. 6 on the iTunes Classical charts. Mr. Runestad also served as
composer-in-residence with the Santa Fe Desert Chorale, which premiered his new work, Reflections. There, he worked with Creativity for Peace, a training program for Palestinian and Israeli women. Assistant Professor of Trumpet Demarr Woods (GPD ’11, Trumpet) received the University of Arkansas, Pine Bluff’s Chancellor’s Distinguished Teaching Award. Soprano Danielle Buonaiuto (MM ’12, Voice, Musicology) was featured in the Buffalo Philharmonic’s commissioned work, Vox Humana, in November. The piece was recorded for the second volume of the CD Built for Buffalo. Contralto Diana Cantrelle (MM ’12, Voice Pedagogy) sang the role of Zia Principessa and Mother Abbess in Puccini’s Suor Angelica with Capital Opera in Albany, N.Y., in August.
Peter Drackley (’12, Voice) performed Macduff in Verdi’s Macbeth with New York City’s LoftOpera in December
CDs Released by Peabody Alumni Piazzolla Here and Now, featuring Nancy Roldán (MM ’76, DMA ’89, Piano), celebrates Argentinian composer Astor Piazzolla on Centaur Records.
Sunset at Noon by Sergio Cervetti (BM ’67, Composition) on Navona Records includes six works spanning two decades from 1995 to 2015 as diverse by genre as the men, women, and children whose untimely deaths inspired the works.
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arrangements of Schubert lieder for voice and guitar.
Music for Two Guitars features Tracy Anne Smith (DMA ’12, Guitar) and Rob MacDonald (GPD ’03, MM ’04, Guitar) as a part of the guitar duo ChromaDuo. The recording is the first to feature a complete program of French Impressionist composers arranged for guitar duo, including their arrangements of several works.
20th Century Duos is Yuriy Bekker’s (GPD ’06, Violin) first CD, on Navona Records. He was recently appointed the Charleston Symphony’s principal Pops conductor and remains its concertmaster. He is also a faculty member at the College of Charleston School of the Arts. Schubert Sessions features John Britton (BM ’09, Guitar) and bass-baritone Phillippe Sly on the Analekta label, with original
positive reviews from The Viol, Opera Now, and Review Graveyard.
Love & Lust, featuring
Elizabeth Hungerford (BM ’10, Voice) and Andrew Arceci (BM ’08, Double Bass, Viola da Gamba), received
Moonsong is Brian Kay’s (BM ’13, MM, ’15, Lute) debut of his original music.
ALUMNI
In December, the Melodica Men — Joe Buono (BM ’13, MM ’15, Bass Trombone) and
Tristan Lane Clarke
(’12, Trumpet) — released several videos with over 1 million views online, including “Nutcracker Mini Suite.” They also performed both solo and orchestral repertoire in a holiday show with Jacksonville Symphony Orchestra, where Mr. Clarke serves as principal trumpet.
Joe Buono (BM ’13, MM
’15, Bass Trombone) was commissioned to write a piece for solo trombone and piano by a consortium which includes members of the New York Philharmonic, the Metropolitan Opera, and the Atlanta Symphony. Tenor Joshua Diaz (MM ’13, Voice; GPD ’15, Opera) and mezzo-soprano Taylor Hillary Boykins (MM ’14, Voice) made their debut with Symphony Number One in November in Baltimore. The performances featured a world premiere of doctoral composition candidate Natalie Draper’s Timelapse Variations.
Ivan Moshchuk (BM ’13,
Piano) teamed with other artists for a two-day celebration of the life and work of musician and humanist Yehudi Menuhin as a part of the Detroit installments at the Detroit Institute of the Arts.
Stephen Mulligan (MM
’13, Conducting) was named as the new assistant conductor of the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra and the music director of its youth orchestra.
Young-Ah Tak (DMA ’13,
Piano) has been appointed assistant professor of piano at the Crane School of Music at SUNY Potsdam. Her engagements this season included solo recitals and concerto performances in New York, Philadelphia, and Florida.
I-Wen Wang (GPD ’13, Piano; GPD ’14, Chamber Music) joined the piano faculty at the Extension Division of Mason Gross School of the Arts at Rutgers University. Pianist and composer
Jennifer Nicole Campbell (BM ’14, MM ’15, Piano) was featured on Hugh Sung’s podcast, A Musical Life. In November, the Newark Symphony Orchestra premiered her Embers of Memory.
Alan Choo (MM ’14, Violin,
Early Music; GPD ’16, Violin) performed at the Tafelmusik Winter Institute in Toronto in January.
A retirement party was held on December 12 for James Dobson, who served as the Conservatory registrar for more than 28 years.
Peabody alumni Kerry Holahan (MM ’14, Early Music, Voice), Jessica Renfro (MM ’03, Voice; GPD ’05, Opera),
Christopher Rhodovi (BM ’01, Voice), and Jessica Satava (MM ’04, Voice) were
featured performers in several performances this fall with Bach in Baltimore, under the direction of T. Herbert Dimmock (MM ’76, Organ).
Alyssa Spratta John (MM
’14, Trumpet) won a job as a member of the Navy Fleet Band In November, soprano
Alexandra Razskazoff
(BM ’14, Voice) made her professional debut at Minnesota Opera as Wellgunde in Wagner’s Das Rheingold. Triage, featuring Jarrett Gilgore (BM ’15, Jazz Saxophone), did a CD release tour in November traveling throughout New England. A new work by Frances Pollock (MM ’15, Voice) was selected for the Washington National Opera’s 2017 American Opera Initiative Festival. Ms. Pollock’s opera, What Gets Kept, explores medically assisted suicide as a family struggles with terminal illness.
Society of Peabody Alumni Executive Committee members with this year’s poinsettia tree. Tree builders, left to right: Rebecca Polgar (GPD ’95, MM ’97, Trumpet); Kara Koppanyi (BM ’67, Oboe); Debbie Kennison; Leslie Procter (MM ’13, Voice) and Zoe Fried (BM ’15, MM ’16, Oboe)
Niccolo Seligmann (BM
’15, Viola da Gamba) is now coaching the viol consort of UCLA’s Early Music Ensemble in Los Angeles.
Tyrone Page (BM ’16,
Saxophone, Music Education) was a featured performer in the Thrive Music Series at Jordan Faye Contemporary in September. His performance included Fluorescent Skeleton Reassembled by James Young (DMA ’14, Composition).
Please send us your news. Alumni Office 1 E. Mount Vernon Place Baltimore, MD 21202 news@lists.peabody.jhu.edu
PEABODY SPRING 2017
33
Fanfare
Jeremy Huber
Dmitry Volkov
Stephen Kates
Honoring Loved Ones with Memorial Scholarships In January 2015, Jeremy Huber, 18, a freshman in the Johns Hopkins Krieger School of Arts and Sciences and a defenseman for the Johns Hopkins men’s lacrosse team, died suddenly due to complications from pneumonia and flu. His teammates struggled with his death. Although lacrosse season had just started, “these guys are together so much,” says head coach Dave Pietramala. Members of the team had trouble sleeping or finding a way to move on. The team didn’t want Mr. Huber to be forgotten. That’s when Mr. Pietramala had the idea to establish an endowed scholarship in Mr. Huber’s name. But the scholarship wouldn’t be for a lacrosse player. Instead, the team wanted to show that Mr. Huber, who had played piano since the second grade, was a well-rounded young man. They chose to establish the scholarship at the Peabody Conservatory. The lacrosse team started a fundraising campaign, and the Jeremy Huber #19 Memorial Endowed Scholarship Fund in Piano was established in 2016. When Mr. Huber’s family learned about the scholarship, “they were knocked off their feet,” Mr. Pietramala says. “This is a way for us to keep Jeremy and his spirit alive.” 34
PEABODY SPRING 2017
The first recipient of the scholarship is freshman pianist Yunhan Gu. In a similar fashion, friends of Dmitry Volkov (AD '13, Cello), a Russian-born cellist who died in his sleep in 2014, wanted others to remember him as a talented performer with a gift for communicating with the public. When Mr. Volkov played, “classical music became exciting to everyone in the room,” says Peabody cello faculty artist Amit Peled, who taught Mr. Volkov when he was completing his artist diploma at Peabody in 2013. Wanting to honor him, Mr. Peled talked to Pennie and Gary Abramson, who grew close to Mr. Volkov after meeting him at the Heifetz International Music Institute, where Mr. Volkov studied for three summers. The Abramsons have since pledged to establish the Dmitry Volkov Memorial Scholarship in Cello, which will benefit a graduate student studying with Mr. Peled who has the same gift for communication that Mr. Volkov had. “It’s such a great opportunity to help someone who ordinarily wouldn’t be
able to have such wonderful training,” says Mrs. Abramson, adding that Mr. Volkov, who spent holidays and weekends at the Abramsons’ house, was like a second son to her. “Dmitry would have loved it.” Mr. Volkov’s own studies at Peabody were supported by a scholarship: the Stephen Kates Memorial Endowed Scholarship Fund in Cello. Mr. Kates was a cellist who was a longtime instructor at Peabody. His wife, Mary Louise Kates, knew her husband felt students should be able to focus on mastering their instrument without financial burden. She established the Kates scholarship in 2003. Over the years, Mrs. Kates has received many cards from students who told her they wouldn’t have been able to complete their education without the Kates scholarship. These cards helped her through the “darkest days of my grieving period,” she says. Scholarship giving, she adds, “is a beautiful tradition, allowing graduates and young professionals to lend a helping hand to the next generation of musicians.” —— Jennifer Walker
Watch Dmitry Volkov's video for the Stephen Kates Memorial Endowed Scholarship Fund in Cello: bit.ly/2lABkxC
Peabody student Mary Burke (center) with Claire and Allan Jensen, who helped make her undergraduate studies possible.
Soaring with the Help of Financial Support Student Mary Burke (BM '16, Voice), a mezzo-soprano, says the scholarships she has received during her time at the Peabody Conservatory push her to be the best singer she can be. “People are rooting for me,” she says. “I want to live up to that.” Ms. Burke, who grew up singing in church choirs in Centreville, Virginia, has certainly done that in the last five years. While working on her bachelor's degree, she studied with Phyllis Bryn-Julson, chair of the Voice Department. Ms. Burke remembers being a high school senior and taking her first lesson with Ms. Bryn-Julson. “The energy that Phyllis and I had was something I really wanted to work with,” she says. Ms. Burke also participated in the Singapore Joint Degree Program, spending five semesters at Peabody and three semesters in Singapore at the Yong Siew Toh Conservatory of Music at the National University of Singapore. Both countries offered different performance opportunities, she says, which provided her a well-rounded musical education. To support her undergraduate studies, Ms. Burke received the Singapore Joint Degree Scholarship, an annual scholarship established by Tony Deering and Turner Smith. She also received the Claire and Allan Jensen
Endowed Scholarship. Dr. Jensen is on the Peabody Institute Advisory Board (formerly the Peabody National Advisory Council), which is increasing its focus on scholarship support. Today, Ms. Burke is pursuing her Master of Music degree, studying in the studio of Denyce Graves. About working with Ms. Graves, Ms. Burke says: “You’ll think you’re doing something really well, but then she’ll get into a piece, and somehow you put even more energy into it. It’s so great to have someone who is pushing you forward like that, really wanting you to dive so deep into the music.” Last fall, Ms. Burke also starred as Hänsel in the Peabody Opera Theatre’s production of Engelbert Humperdinck’s Hänsel and Gretel. It was a challenging opera to learn, she says, because the tempo and key changes every few bars. “But it ended up being the greatest experience.” Dr. and Mrs. Jensen, who sat next to Ms. Burke’s parents during a Hänsel and Gretel performance, were very impressed by her. “We’ve fallen in love with Peabody,” Dr. Jensen adds. “It’s good to see young kids who are working hard and to help them on
their way to doing good work.” Ms. Burke is currently the recipient of the C. Albert Kuper III Scholarship, an annual scholarship established by Al Kuper to benefit a student in Ms. Graves’ studio. “The human voice and what it can do with a melody is something absolutely delightful to hear,” Mr. Kuper says. But, he adds, “I’m also well aware of the need for extra money to help singers go those long final steps to reach performance standards. I would hope the recipients of my largesse would be able to get to that peak somehow.” Ms. Burke says the scholarship helped her decide to pursue additional training immediately after completing her bachelor’s degree because it eased the financial burden for her and her family. Last spring at Peabody’s Leadership Lunch, Ms. Burke, who will be performing next in American Opera Scenes in May, met some of the donors who’ve made her scholarships possible. “I’m very grateful for all the scholarships I received,” she says. At the lunch, “we tried to give a little bit back to those who supported us.” —— Jennifer Walker
See photos of Mary Burke in Peabody's production of Hänsel und Gretel: bit.ly/2maflAD PEABODY SPRING 2017
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FANFARE
PEABODY SCHOLARSHIP BRUNCH
In Memoriam
Peabody held its third annual scholarship brunch on Saturday, February 4, at Ware House 518. This special event brings together the donors who have given named scholarships at Peabody and the students who benefit from their generous support. Dean Fred Bronstein shared his joy in seeing all those gathered and thanked them for the many ways that they contribute to the success of the Peabody Institute and to each other's lives.
The Hilda and Douglas Goodwin Recital Hall was reopened in 2002 with this new name after renovations funded by Mr. and Mrs. Goodwin. Hilda and her husband have had a lasting philanthropic impact at Peabody, funding a faculty endowment at the Preparatory, endowed scholarships for piano and opera students at the Conservatory, and the Conservatory’s career development grants.
Hilda Perl Goodwin (TC ’54, Piano; MM ’67, Piano Pedagogy)
Sandra Hittman (’60, ’82, Violin; former Conservatory faculty member)
Lauren VandenBroeck and Stephen Wright
Robert Huber, Yunhan Gu, and Nancy Huber
Angela Che and Laifun Chung Kotcheff
Tavifa Cojocari and Jill McGovern
Sandra Hittman’s philanthropic legacy at Peabody includes the establishment of the Sandra Hittman Visiting Chamber Ensembles Fund, which has been bringing visiting chamber ensembles to Peabody each year to work with students. In more recent years, this fund has also supported the honors chamber ensembles at Peabody, providing assistance for their professional development. Ms. Goodwin and Ms. Hittman were members of the Peabody National Advisory Council (now the Peabody Institute Advisory Board).
Rising to the Challenge Campaign Update for Peabody Goals TOTAL RAISED BY PEABODY THROUGH FEBRUARY 28, 2017: $43.7 MILLION
PROGRAM SUPPORT (39%)
SCHOLARSHIP SUPPORT (59%)
ALLOCATION OF $43.7 MILLION RAISED TO DATE
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PEABODY SPRING 2017
FACULTY SUPPORT (2%)
Mr. George Peabody believed in the power of the arts to open minds and enrich lives. His vision inspired Mr. Johns Hopkins to establish the Johns Hopkins University, and in 1977 the Peabody Institute became part of the University. What Will Your Legacy Be? As George Peabody and Johns Hopkins did more than a century ago when they founded world-renowned institutions, you can help future generations of aspiring musicians by making a gift to support Peabody’s future. Consider these opportunities to leave a meaningful legacy while taking into account your personal goals.
From Your Will or TrusT Gifts that cost nothing in your lifetime. reTiremenT Plan DesignaTion Avoid the double taxation incurred if designated to heirs. liFe income giFT Receive annual income and an immediate tax deduction with a charitable gift annuity or charitable remainder trust. To learn more about these and other creative ways to support the Peabody Institute, contact:
Office of Gift Planning giftplanning@jhu.edu 800-548-1268 rising.jhu.edu/giftplanning Seek advice from a tax professional before entering into a gift annuity agreement. Johns Hopkins gift annuities are not available in all states. Photo: Michael Dersin
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