Awards, Honors, People, Places, & Funding (posted 5/26/04)
 
On June 1, in Fletcher Opera Theater, the City of Raleigh and its Arts Commission will present Medals of Arts to those who have made extraordinary contributions in their fields. See our calendar for details. Note that this ceremony overlaps the single public hearing on the City’s proposed budget….*
Soprano Hailey Clark’s senior recital, presented at Cary Presbyterian Church on the afternoon of May 16, began with a special announcement by her voice teacher, Catherine Charlton: Clark, a National Finalist in the 2004 Arts and Talent Search sponsored by the National Foundation of Advancement in the Arts, has been named a Presidential Scholar in the Arts and will represent North Carolina in ceremonies and at a concert at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts this June. For details, see http://www.artsawards.org/ and http://www.nfaa.org/alumni/P_bio.cfm?alumni_id=27002 [inactive 8/05]. Prior NC winners include dancer Uma Tadepalli and violinist Nicholas Kitchen.
 
Clarinetist Bryan Crumpler, whose work first captured the attention of CVNC ers while he was a student at UNC-Chapel Hill, took third place and received a cash prize in the 2004 Houston Symphony Ima Hogg Young Artist Competition. Crumpler returns to NC in November for a concert with the Wilmington Symphony Orchestra.
 
Graduate Composition students at Duke University have recently received several prestigious awards. John Mayrose and Caroline Mallonée were awarded the ASCAP Foundation/Morton Gould Young Composer Awards, granted annually to encourage talented young American composers. See http://www.ascap.com/press/2004/youngcomp_041204.html for details. And Mallonée has received a Fulbright from Duke to study in the Netherlands and an International Fellowship from the Graduate School.; she will study with composer Louis Andriessen. In addition, Carl Schimmel was awarded the composition prize from the Society of Composers, Inc. for his work “Five Lies”, which brings with it a commission.
 
Two students of Chapel Hillian Victor Recondo have fared well in recent concerto competitions. Pianist Arnav Tripathy, 14, won the junior division of the NC Symphony’s contest, and pianist Nathan Heath, 11, was the reserve winner of the Tar River Philharmonic’s competition. Both artists figure in a recital by Recondo students on 5/30 – see our calendar for details.
 
The senior division of the NCS’s contest was won by flutist Philip Kim, a high school junior at the NCSA. Second place in the senior division went to pianist Andrew Tyson, whose recent performance with the Chapel Hill Philharmonia was noted in these pages. Violinist Eliza Bagg, daughter of Ciompi Quartet violist Jonathan Bagg, took second place in the junior division.
 
As noted in a recent review, the Triangle Youth Brass Band won the Youth Division of the North American Brass Band Association (NABBA) Championships during competitions in Charleston, West Virginia, in April . This is the third time the Youth Band has received the First Place Banner and Trophy. The band’s director is Tony Granados.
 
Salam Murtada of Mebane, an Environmental Engineer with the Division of Water Quality, NC Department of Environment and Natural Resources, will represent NC at the 4th Van Cliburn International Piano Competition for Outstanding Amateurs in Fort Worth, TX. The competition, which starts May 31, is designed for advanced pianists who do not earn their living as piano teachers or performers. The competitors hail from 27 states and 7 countries, including Canada, Brazil, France, Germany, South Africa, and Venezuela. Murtada, a native of Amman, Jordan, is the only performer from NC this year. His contest repertoire includes music by Beethoven, Chopin, Haydn, Schubert, Schumann, Ravel, Scriabin, Rachmaninov, and Prokofiev that he performed at Bösendorfer Hall in Raleigh on May 23. His teacher is John Ruggero. For details, see http://www.cliburn.org/page/343/1/ [inactive 7/06].
 
John V. Brown has been appointed Director of the Jazz Program at Duke University and Assistant Professor of the Practice of Music. He served as Acting Director of Duke’s jazz program during the current academic year.
 
Musicologist Tim Carter is replacing trumpeter James Ketch as Chairman of the Department of Music at UNC-Chapel Hill. Ketch is leaving his leadership post early to return to teaching and to devote more time to UNC’s jazz programs.
 
Scott Allen Jarrett, Director of Music at Boston University’s Marsh Chapel and a BU doctoral student, has been named the new Music Director and Conductor of the Oratorio Singers of Charlotte, replacing David Tang.
 
The Harrisburg (PA) Symphony Orchestra has announced a three-year extension of Stuart Malina’s contract as Music Director. The Maestro was formerly the Music Director of the Greensboro Symphony Orchestra.
 
David Pegg, Artistic Director and Conductor of Greensboro’s Bel Canto Company, will retire at the end of the 2004-5 season. He has served as the group’s leader for 19 of its 22 years. The board of directors has adopted a strategic plan that will take the Company through the transition from Pegg’s final season and the search for an Artistic Director. Applications for the position are being taken now. For details, email belcanto@triad.rr.com .
Composer J. Mark Scearce has been appointed Director of Music at NC State University, effective in August. He replaces Robert Petters.
 
United Arts Council of Raleigh and Wake County still expects to meet its $580,000 goal for the current year, according to an article in Philanthropy Journal . The drive was launched last October. UA also “plans this summer to begin working on a new long-term business plan.” The story is at http://www.philanthropyjournal.org/ . Note that the money UA hopes to raise will benefit selected arts groups throughout Wake County. Meanwhile, one arts group based in Wake – the NC Symphony – is budgeting $500,000 for marketing and PR centering on its new Music Director, who debuts in that role at a Corporate Preview Concert and Gala on September 15. The N&O has the story, at http://newsobserver.com/features/arts/story/3605228p-3206668c.html [inactive 5/29/04: see the N&O ‘s archives]..
 
An adaptation of the Gilbert and Sullivan operetta Utopia, Ltd. , by Randolph Umberger and Benjamin Keaton that was premiered here by the Durham Savoyards will receive seven performances by the Cambridge University G&S Society at the Minack Theatre in Cornwall, England, in September. For details of the revision, titled Utopia Unlimited , see http://www.minack.com/ [inactive 5/07].
 
Finally, readers who will be in New York on October 9 will have an opportunity to hear cellist Selma Gokcen, formerly of ECU and now based in London, in recital with NCSU’s Jonathan Kremer. The venue is the 92nd Street Y, the occasion is a tribute to Pablo Casals, and the guest of honor will be Bernard Greenhouse. For details, see http://www.92y.org/ [inactive 7/04] in mid-summer.
 
* Updated 5/29/04: According to Metro Magazine (June 2004), the medalists are: Betty Adcock, poet; Lope Max Diaz, visual artist; Lanette Lind, composer/pianist; Thomas H. McGuire, philanthropist; & Melissa Peden, arts advocate.