Nov. 4, 2020
Duo Cortona, Evan Chambers doing virtual residencies for Mizzou
While the current pandemic-related restrictions may be limiting some in-person interactions, Mizzou students still are getting opportunities to work with and learn from composers and performers from throughout the world of new music. For example, this month new music ensemble Duo Cortona and composer Evan Chambers both will take part in virtual residencies for MNMI. Chambers (pictured, top left) is a professor of composition at the University of Michigan whose works have been performed by the Cincinnati, Kansas City, Memphis, New Hampshire, and Albany Symphonies, among others. Recordings of his music have been released by labels such as Albany…
Oct. 29, 2020
Mizzou’s 2021 Creating Original Music Project (COMP)
offers awards, cash prizes for Missouri student composers
COMP winners receive personalized plaques, and they and their schools both receive cash prizes At a time when live performances have become scarce, young composers still need opportunities to present their new works, which makes the Mizzou New Music Initiative’s 2021 Creating Original Music Project (COMP) especially timely and relevant for music students from across Missouri. Now in its 16th year, COMP is an annual statewide competition sponsored by the University of Missouri School of Music and the Sinquefield Charitable Foundation. COMP showcases new, original music from Missouri student composers and songwriters in grades K-12, offering positive recognition…
Oct. 12, 2020
Santiago Beis wins 2021 Sinquefield Composition Prize
The University of Missouri School of Music and the Mizzou New Music Initiative have awarded the 2021 Sinquefield Composition Prize to Santiago Beis. Beis is a first-year graduate student working toward a master’s degree in composition at Mizzou. He submitted “La sed y el Agua” (“Thirst and Water”), a work for piano and string orchestra, to the competition and was selected for the prize by a panel of independent judges. The adjudicators for the 2021 competition were Yigit Kolat, composer and lecturer at the University of Washington; Wendy Richman, violist with the International Contemporary Ensemble and The Rhythm Method; and…
Oct. 8, 2020
Mizzou International Composers Festival set for July 26 – 31, 2021;
applications for resident composers now open
The Mizzou New Music Initiative is accepting applications for resident composers to take part in the 2021 Mizzou International Composers Festival (MICF), which will take place starting Monday, July 26 through Saturday, July 31. Reprising their roles from the online-only 2020 edition of the MICF, Chen Yi and David T. Little (pictured) will serve as the festival’s two distinguished guest composers for 2021, teaching and consulting with the resident composers and ensemble. Little also has written a new commissioned work specifically for the festival. The week-long MICF will feature concerts of music from contemporary composers, along with…
Oct. 6, 2020
American Wild Ensemble to perform in concert
on Sunday, October 18 at Sinquefield Music Center
The American Wild Ensemble will perform in a concert presented by the Mizzou New Music Initiative at 7:30 p.m. Sunday, October 18 outside the Sinquefield Music Center on the University of Missouri campus in Columbia. Titled “The American Aviatrix,” the program commemorates the centennial of the passage of the 19th Amendment by honoring the achievements of American women aviators. The concert will celebrate the lives of two of these groundbreaking women, pilots Bessie Coleman and Amelia Earhart, with world premiere performances of two new works, “Il n’y aura pas de regrets” by Mizzou assistant professor Carolina Heredia and…
Oct. 2, 2020
Feature film scored by Mizzou alumnus Grant Fonda opening Friday, October 9
A feature film with a score composed by a Mizzou alumnus will open this month in movie theaters across the country. Pray: the Story of Patrick Peyton, directed by Jonathan Cipiti and scored by Grant Fonda, is set to hit theaters nationwide on Friday, October 9. The documentary tells the story of Patrick Peyton, an Irish immigrant who in 1928 came to the US in hopes of becoming a millionaire, and instead ended up joining the priesthood, championing the idea that “the family who prays together stays together.” Fonda (pictured), who earned his master’s degree in music from…
Aug. 17, 2020
Carolina Heredia wins commission from Barlow Endowment
Mizzou assistant professor Carolina Heredia has won a commission for 2020 from the Barlow Endowment for Music Composition. Heredia was one of 15 composers selected from among 286 applications this year to the Endowment’s General and LDS commissioning programs, which will award grants totaling $83,000 to the winners. The Barlow Endowment was established in September 1983 through a gift from Milton A. and Gloria Barlow to Brigham Young University for the purpose of “engendering and supporting excellence in musical composition through the university and the BYU College of Fine Arts and Communications.” The Endowment hosts an international…
Aug. 11, 2020