Tag Archive for: composer

Sarah Kirkland Snider Goes Forward Into Light

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As any musician, classical or otherwise, knows, it’s a difficult climb to success.  It took Sarah Kirkland Snider almost 20 years to find it with her composing career.  She’s out with a new album of ethereal, spiritual music called Forward Into Light. 

Black History Month soars with hundreds of events this month.  Here are just a few.

A Behind the Scenes Look at Treemonisha

Karen Slack sings from her Grammy winning album

Sphinx Virtuosi Performs with cellist Sterling Elliott

Neptune, New Jersey celebrates Black History Month

Apply now for the Sphinx Performance Academy

For The Love Of Samuel Coleridge Taylor

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One man, a conductor, has such love for the music of British composer Samuel Coleridge Taylor (August 15, 1875 – September 1, 1912) that he made it his mission to find his manuscripts.  The album, produced by conductor Michael Repper and performed by the National Philharmonic with violinist Curtis Stewart is a love note to Coleridge Taylor on the 150th anniversary of his birth.  Much of the music on the album titled Samuel Coleridge-Taylor are world-premiere studio recordings of his work.  Some of them have not been performed for 100 years.

Violinist Curtis Stewart and Conductor Michael Repper photo credit: Elman Studio

The La Maestra International Competition for Women Conductors

The Declaration Project

Surgical Records As Lyrics?

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We’re introducing you again to composer/singer Molly Joyce.  She’s the disabled musician who has been featured on Staccato before.  You can hear it here. 

This Julliard grad returns with a new album STATE CHANGE with an unusual lyrical content: That of her medical records regarding the near decade long treatment for her disabled left hand.   The music is all her compositions via some new technology she had to learn to use to make this album.

Molly Joyce is releasing the new album in honor of the 35th anniversary of the Americans with Disabilities Act on July 26, 1990.

Julia Perry’s Catalog of Music Is Finally Available  

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African-American composer Julia Perry died in 1979 without a will, after an illustrious career in classical music that started in the 1950’s. Then she and her works fell into obscurity. Nearly 50 decades later, Perry’s music is back in part because it is finally legally available for musicians to perform.

That’s thanks to Dr. Louise Toppin, the Director of Vidamus, a group promoting concert works by under-presented composers. Vidamus has joined with Boosey and Hawkes, to distribute Perry’s music.  Now they’re looking for more of her “lost” compositions. 

The Opera about Fannie Lou Hamer

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Photo by www.ireneyoungfoto.com

After reading numerous articles about our shorter than short attention spans, I’ve decided to split this, the August 2024 Classical Music in Color into two parts. It may be a permanent fixture. Let me know what you think.

The first part is an interview with 85 year old composer Mary D. Watkins who’s about to premiere her latest opera “Is This America” about the Mississippi Civil Rights leader Fannie Lou Hamer. 

Mary D. Watkins is a Colorado native who earned a degree in classical composition from Howard University in Washington, DC.  She started getting noticed later in life.  She won a Female Composer grant from Opera America in 2020, has previously won composer fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts, along with various other grants.  AND She received a 2021 Artist Legacy Award from the California Arts Council.  She was also recognized with a 2022 Composers Now Visionary Award. She says her composition of this opera was a long time coming.

The Second part of this, the August 2024 edition of Classical Music In Color is what I’m calling for now, the Albums, Opportunities, Events and Milestone section of the show.

Here are the links:

Sphinx – SOPA

Black Violin Foundation Grants

Castle Of Our Skins Give Black

Kellen Gray

Lara Downes

Click Here

Mount Rainier’s Composer in Residence   

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Stephen Lias always has music on his mind. He’s the Dean’s Circle Endowed Professor Of Composition at Stephen F Austin State University in Nacogdoches, Texas.  Lias is also an outdoor kind of guy.  Over the years, he’s composed music for a variety of national parks either on commission or just because.  Now he’s been named Washington State’s Mount Rainier National Park’s first-ever composer in residence. His composition will celebrate the 125th anniversary of the park but won’t premiere until 2026.

Good News About Three Black Classical Artists

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It’s been a busy and awarding season for some young emerging Black American classical musicians.  Pianist Clayton Stephenson and Violinist Njioma Chinyere Grievous were the recipients of The Avery Fisher Career Grant Award.  Another, Tyler Taylor, won the Emerging Black Composers competition from the San Francisco Symphony, and the San Francisco Conservatory of Music.

We also honor an early music musician, James Nicholson, whose career spanned more than 25 years.

The National Association of Negro Musicians Convention

Njioma Grevious – Photo credit Jiyang Chen

The Organic Result – The New York Études  

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New York City can have quite an effect on you and so can Multiple Sclerosis.  Grammy winning composer Jeff Beal (House of Cards) deals with both in his new album:  The New York Etudes.  These solo piano works are somewhat of a departure from his compositions for TV and Film and that’s the way he wanted it. Beal says The New York Etudes is like a quiet place to land and recharge after a long day or the last few years.