In just a few weeks performing arts groups will unveil the first shows of the 2024 Fall season. There are many more in Central Texas than there used to be, so you have more than a few choices.
We’re starting with the Fall 2024 season for The Central Texas Philharmonic led by Music Director Stefan Sanders.
It was the age of the audience at a classical music concert that lit a fire under David Fogel.
He seems to have invented another genre of classical and orchestral music. The Symphonina. A short symphony just right for the younger set and older ears too.
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:
Black Violin Foundation Grants
Imagine what it’s like to actually be doing the job you love so much.
It’s a feeling that Sophie Mathieu knows well. She’s KMFA’s Draylen Mason Composer In Residence for 2024.
Mathieu, a cellist, with a Masters from the Butler School of Music, is also the first local composer who’s been chosen for the program. Since the announcement in January, she’s been taking part in educational events, public and private workshops of her work with Austin Unconducted and various other activities. This is in addition to working on her new piece. Sophie is pretty sure she’’ll call it “Night Poem” when it premieres on September 22nd.
It was a back to back win for Texans at this year’s Jimmy Awards. These are the National High School Musical Theatre Awards that recognize the best high school-age musical theater talents in America. It was held in June on Broadway in New York.
This year, it was Damson Chola Jr. from Cleburne, Texas, matching his win with last year’s winner Langston Lee from Leander, Texas.
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.
What a sad and joyful time it is for the friends of the late composer Matt Dibble. This English lad was only 40 when he died in 2021 from complications from a covid vaccine. He left behind 48 tracks of Preludes and Fugues that he kept secret until hours before his death.
His good friend Jon Hargreaves helped crowdfund the necessary funds to record the album with the pianist Matt Dibble loved the most. Freddie Kempf. There’s also a documentary about Matt Dibble.
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
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.
Imagine that you are a non-profit organization in need of an infusion of music or a performance of a different type in your program. The Texas Commission on the Arts has come to the rescue. They’ve released their Texas Touring Roster for the next two years. It means if you hire the performers on the list to perform, in Texas, the TCA will help you pay for it.
The Artistic Director of Montopolis, Justin Sherburn, here with his wife Sara, a cellist, says they have benefitted from this program for several years.
