Connecticut Composers, Inc. is a not-for-profit organization supporting composers living and working Connecticut. We present concerts, assist in collaborative CD compilations, and provide companionship and feedback through composer salons. Please visit our concert calendar page often for updates about upcoming events, or 'friend' us on facebook!
CCI welcomes new members, Becroft and Rose
Welcome to Stephen Becroft and John Rose. Stephen is a Ridgefield resident and his work, Breezes, for solo flute, was performed by CCI president Meg Collins Stoop at an Adesso concert on May 1, 2011. John Rose just returned from Lugansk Ukraine, where he gave the world premiere performance of his piano concerto, with Miran Vaupotich conducting.
Collaboration between CCI and LICA; Adesso to sing new works in Georgetown, CT
On
May 1, 2011 the Adesso Choral Society will perform works by composers
from both CCI and the Long Island Composers Alliance at a concert at the G&B Cultural Community Center in Georgetown, CT (see concert calendar). This concert is a
special collaboration with composers writing works specifically for the
forces of Adesso, a tight blend of eight women choristers. Adesso is a
select vocal ensemble founded and directed by CCI president, Margaret
Collins Stoop. The group places special emphasis on performing music by
living composers. CCI composers include John Mucci, Eugenie Rocherolle, Frank Vasi and Margaret Collins Stoop.
Fairfield County Chorale performs work by woman composer
When on March 12, 7:30, Margaret Collins Stoop steps onto the stage to conduct the Fairfield County Chorale performing her work, Gnosis, it will be the first time the group has performed a work by a woman composer. The 120 voice chorus is now in its 48th season. Gnosis, an eight minute work for mixed chorus, vibraphone and marimba, will be part of a program which includes Durufle's Requiem. Concerts are Saturday, March 12, 7:30 at St. John's Episcopal Church in Stamford, CT and Sunday March 13, 3 p.m. at First Congregational Church of Fairfield, CT.
Connecticut Composer's work performed in Brazil
Thom McFaul had a Brazilian premiere of his string quartet--st qt-- on Jan. 14,
2011 at Festival Internacional de Musica de Curitiba, in Curitiba, Brazil. It
was performed by The Fry Street Quartet as part of a series of concerts
sponsored by The American Consulate.
Brings's performances
Allen Brings’s Concertino in D was performed by the University of South Carolina Symphony Orchestra under Donald Portnoy at the national conference of the Society of Composers in Columbia, SC, on November 12. On November 14 the Shoreline Community Chorale under Noah Glynn sang Brings’s Getting Around, a set of four rounds for chorus with piano accompaniment, in Clinton, CT. The same work had been performed without piano in May, 2010, in Ridgefield, CT, by the Adesso Choral Society under the direction of Margaret Collins Stoop. Mountain Song, set to a text by Leonard Cochran, was sung on February 11 in Melville, NY, on a program entitled “Love of the Art Song; Art of the Love Song” presented by the Long Island Composers Alliance.
CCI's Michael Slayton has edited a book about women in music, in which he profiles CCI composer Elizabeth Austin
Taken from the Scarecrow Press website:
DESCRIPTION
In Women of Influence in
Contemporary Music: Nine American Composers, Michael K. Slayton has
collected essays, which focus on women who have made significant contributions
to American music: Elizabeth Austin, Susan Botti, Gabriela Lena Frank, Jennifer
Higdon, Libby Larsen, Tania León, Cindy McTee, Marga Richter, and Judith Shatin.
While these composers have much in common, not least of all dedication to their
art, their individual stories reveal different impulses in American music. Their
works reflect the shifting societal landscapes in the United States over the
last seven decades, as well as different stylistic approaches to writing music.
Each chapter includes a biography of the composer, an interview, and a
detailed analysis of one major composition. The composers openly reflect on
their individual journeys, in which they have discovered respective musical
languages and have found success during different times in history. Because few
music books focus solely on female composers,
Women of Influence in
Contemporary Music
offers a rare glimpse into the styles and attitudes of
gifted women and their work.
ABOUT THE EDITOR Michael K.
Slayton is associate professor and chair of the Department of Music
Composition and Theory at Vanderbilt University's Blair School of Music.
Michael Slayton has also an article about Elizabeth Austin published in this quarter's Scope Magazine. See www.scope-mag.com, p.22 for the article.
Turner Movies to celebrate
Dave Brubeck's 90th birthday with Dec.
6 premiere of "In His Own Sweet Way"
On Monday, Dec. 6, Turner
Classic Movies (TCM) will celebrate Brubeck's 90th birthday with the
premiere of Dave Brubeck: In His Own Sweet Way, a new documentary
executive-produced by Clint Eastwood. The documentary takes its name
from one of Brubeck's most famous tunes, "In Your Own Sweet Way." Dave
Brubeck: In His Own Sweet Way was produced and directed by filmmaker and
longtime Eastwood collaborator Bruce Ricker. The documentary tells Brubeck's personal story, including his
early musical training; studies with Darius Milhaud, the Dave Brubeck
Quartet, featuring Paul Desmond; and the musical revolution caused by
his introduction of new time signatures in jazz, such as in the jazz
standard Take Five.
CCI now has a Facebook page
CCI can now be found on Facebook! Members can easily let fans of CCI know of their concert schedules via this page.
News from Allen Brings
Since the beginning of the 2010-2011 season Allen Brings has seen the release on the Navona Records label of a recording of his Quintet for clarinet and strings. The recording, entitled “harmonious dissonance,” is shared with three other composers and consists of an enhanced disc that also includes the complete score of the quintet. Although just released it has already been performed on a German FM radio station. At a conference organized by region V of the Society of Composers at Augustana College in Rock Island, IL, he heard the first performance on October 1 of his To an Unborn Pauper Child for men’s chorus and piano, four-hands, setting a poem by Thomas Hardy. His Digressions for guitar quartet was performed at the Warebrook Contemporary Music Festival in Vermont in July, his setting of the Lord’s Prayer for chorus conducted by Leonard Lehrman was sung at a concert presented by the Long Island Composers Alliance in Huntington, LI, on June 13, and he and soprano Jennifer Foster performed his Five Poems of Gerard Manley Hopkins at a concert presented by the National Association of Composers/USA in New York City on June 7. On May 23 in Ridgefield the Adesso Choral Society under the direction of CCI president Margaret Collins Stoop gave the first known complete performance of the suite of rounds he calls Getting Around. To his surprise the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers reported that his five-part madrigal The Apparition, setting a poem by John Donne, had been performed in South Korea between January, 2008, and October, 2009.
Gryc's String Quartet on recently released CD
The Avalon String Quartet has released a recording of four twenty-first century works that feature Connecticut composers Stephen Gryc and David Macbride. The CD, Albany Records' Troy1160, is titled Avalon String Quartet. Gryc's work is simply titled String Quartet, and Macbride's piece is titled A Muse. Other works on the recording are by Hayes Biggs and Ethan Wickman. Look for a review of the CD in the July issue of The American Record Guide.
Steen's music in Dublin, Ireland
and New Haven, CT
This winter and spring Ken Steen has been composer-in-residence at the Education Center for Arts in New Haven. On April 7 students will premiere two works of his: Silent Moon, a choral work, and soundsaround. Soundsaround is a work in two complementary components: a sound installation, in the front gallery, and an electroacoustic concert performance piece. Each part informs the other through shared materials presented in distinct ways that are idiomatic to each medium. The entire work was composed as a collaboration between the students and Steen. It features melodic fragments composed by the students along with sounds and noises that they collected from around the ECA building and neighborhood that were edited and digitally processed by Steen.
In addition to having an active concert calendar in Connecticut, Steen's work, Driving Me Crazy, will be performed by pianist Isabelle O'Connell on April 20 at the National Concert Hall, Dublin, Ireland, as part of a program of American piano music including works by Henry cowell, George Crumb, James Mobberley and Terry Winter Owens.
Lauer's piano work wins first prize
Elizabeth Lauer's Carousel: Dance-Variations on All the Pretty Little Horses, for solo piano has won first prize in the PenWomen Biennial Composition Competition. The piece was composed in 2002, on commission from the Connecticut Music Teachers Association; she received the commission after a competition that the organization held.
Additionally, Lauer presented a lecture/recital entitled A Century of Waltzes for the local branch of PenWomen (called the Yucca Branch; yucca is the NM state flower) on Friday, March 19, 2010.
Rocherolle featured on
publisher's showcase
Eugenie Rocherolle was featured on the Hal Leonard Publishers Showcase at the MTNA Convention in Albuquerque on March 23 where she will present her latest publications for piano: original solo collection, On the Jazzy Side; arrangements of Rodgers & Hammerstein: Selected Favorites; original duets, Two's Company and two pieces in a compilation entitled Romantic Inspirations featuring the works of four Hal Leonard composers.
Provincetown, MA radio station airs works
by Slayton and Brings
Canary Burton of WOMR in Provincetown, Ma. played Michael Stayton's Le soir tombe and Allen Brings Three Sonnets after the Portugese on February 23, 2010.
Hot Off the Press: A new Spectra CD
A
new CD, the fifth in a series, has been released. The Spectra CD
is a collection of vocal music by CCI composers Michael Slayton, Howard
Rovics, Allen Brings, Dave Brubeck and Elizabeth R. Austin.
Brubeck Honored at the
Kennedy Center
By now our country and possibly the world knows that Dave Brubeck was honored on December 5, 2009, with a Kennedy Center Award for “exemplary lifetime achievement in the performing arts.” What they may not know is that Dave has for many years been a member of Connecticut Composers and that several of his songs have been included in the just-released CD, “A Concert of Vocal Music by Connecticut Composers, Inc.,” volume 5 of Spectra, the compact disc series that CCI has been releasing since 1997.
Three Brass Quintets by Lew Buckley on a new holiday CD
The
brass quintet known as Mainstreet Brass released a new CD, Christmas
Spirit, in December 2009. Mainstreet Brass commissioned three of the
works on the CD written by CCI's Lewis Buckley.
CCI Composer takes first place in a competition for symphonic works
Albert Hurwit was awarded first place out of 124 entrants in the 2009
American Composer Competition sponsored by the Columbia (MD) Orchestra
and the symphony has been performed by philharmonic orchestras in
Connecticut, Maryland and Texas.
The symphony, based on the composer's family history of
persecution and immigration, has been recorded by the Bulgarian
National Radio Symphony Orchestra (with Klezmer Band) conducted by
Michael Lankester.
If you are a composer wishing to join CCI, please visit our contact page and request more information.
