Faculty Updates
Juan Álamo
In September 2021, Professor Álamo published his solo marimba recording Ensoñación with Summit Records featuring his own composition, Bach’s first and fifth cellos suites, and Beethoven’s Eleven Bagatelles Op. 119.
During the 2021-22 academic year, Álamo maintained a busy performing and teaching schedule presenting recitals and master class at universities, conservatories and percussion festivals in Argentina, Colombia, Puerto Rico and USA. In the spring of 2022, Álamo participated in the UNC jazz faculty recording Please Only Tell Me Good News and completed the compositions and arrangements for his upcoming jazz recording. Dr. Álamo will be spending the fall 2022 semester on leave working on the completion of his second marimba method and recording his compositions for marimba and big band. Both projects are scheduled to be released in the fall of 2023.
Allen Anderson
Allen Anderson composed the electronic drone tracks for UNC Opera’s performance of Hildegard von Bingen’s Ordo Virtutum. Ordo was performed three times in April 2022 at the Contemporary Art Museum (CAM) in Raleigh. Using the voice of UNC Opera’s director Marc Callahan, he created an electronic fantasy on Hildegard’s words from Ordo, “O plangens vox, et hex maximi deloris.” Other electronic works written for online installation videos for the Horace Williams House Gallery in Chapel Hill include, Hsumei’s Lantern, In Defense of Corrosion, and cym bow lick. He wrote a set of five songs for mezzo-soprano and piano, In Your Narrowing Dark Hours, to poetry of Louise Bogan for Kenan Music Scholar Julia Holoman. He completed an a cappella choral work, “Once when the lawn was golden green”, to a poem by Mark Strand.
Stephen Anderson
At the 2022 Jazzomania Jazz Festival, Stephen Anderson was formally distinguished by the Ministra de Cultura, Señora Milagros Germán—a representative of the government of the Dominican Republic. The award states, “for his research and contributions to the national musical heritage, he has generated pieces and compositions whose contents are based on the roots of native Dominican music. In his works of fusion with jazz, our rhythms have traveled with our seal of identity.” In conjunction with the festival, Stephen Anderson and members of the Dominican Jazz Project were invited to the Palacio Nacional for the condecoración ceremony of bandmate, Guillo Carias, that was led by President Luis Rodolfo Abinader Corona, President of the Dominican Republic.
The Dominican Jazz Project Desde Lejos CD was released July 2021, representing Summit Records at the 64th Grammy® and 17th Annual Latin Grammy® Awards and remaining on the top 50 Jazz Weekly national radio charts for seven weeks. Anderson’s composition, Un Cambio de Ritmo, was listed in “Popular Jazz Songs: 2021” by All About Jazz. The recording received several feature reviews, including in JAZZIZ, Latin Jazz Network, All About Jazz, Jazz Weekly, Musical Memoirs, as well as various feature news articles in the Dominican Republic—Vivir Alegria, Arieto, and REPORTEEXTRA.
UNC Jazz Studies faculty and students recorded the 360o Jazz Initiative, Please Only Tell Me Good News CD together with guest artists Rachel Therrien, Roland Barber, and Michael Shekwoaga Ode in the days following the February 2022 Carolina Jazz Festival and performed at the national Jazz Education Network Conference in Dallas, Texas (January 2022).
Pianist, Jeffrey Jacob published Contemporary Eclectic Music for the Piano, Volume 18 (New Ariel Recordings) which featured Anderson’s composition, Drones (June 2021).
Andrea Bohlman
Andrea Bohlman was the Edward T. Cone Member of the School of Historical Studies in Princeton from September 2021-May 2022. She was able to undertake several research trips from her base in central New Jersey—to New York, D.C., and up the Hudson River Valley, while also working on a new book project on the history of tape recording, knowledge production, and social intimacy—a book that is going to take on the structure of a mixtape. She developed one piece of that project into a video essay, “Who Is A River?”, for an online festival and conference in honor of the composer Annea Lockwood. In June 2022 she participated as a faculty member in the Flying University for Ukrainian Students, organized by the Kościuszko Foundation (Warsaw). Bohlman is currently the executive editor of the online publication of the American Musicological Society, Musicology Now (musicologynow.org).
Nicholas DiEugenio
Nicholas DiEugenio (Associate Professor and Head of Strings), violinist, continues to be in-demand as a soloist, chamber musician, and ensemble leader, creating powerful shared experiences in music ranging from early baroque to contemporary commissions.
In March 2022, DiEugenio appeared as soloist in Memorial Hall with the UNCSO in Bruch’s beloved Scottish Fantasy. He also collaborated throughout the academic year with UNC violin students to create the project “When the violin,” inspired by the solo violin works of Reena Esmail, Missy Mazzoli, Errolyn Wallen, Eddie Mora, Sean Chen, and other traditionally underrepresented voices in the field.
The 2021-22 season also included the video project “Recalibrating Romantic,” in which Dr. DiEugenio teamed up with Prof. Mimi Solomon and staff members Jesse Moorefield and Jay Harper. The video series features performances by DiEugenio and Solomon using historical instruments owned by the UNC Chapel Hill Department of Music as well as from his own collection, and explores repertoire by Pauline Viardot, Teresa Carreño, and Clara Schumann.
A core member of the New York-based group The Sebastians, DiEugenio also appeared in 2021-22 as soloist and ensemble leader at venues including the Princeton Festival, Washington National Cathedral, New York’s St. Vincent Ferrer, the Charlottesville Festival, Electric Earth Concerts, Duke Chapel, and others.
Nicholas DiEugenio continues to be passionately committed to collaboration, and performed in 2021-22 alongside members of the Finnish Meta4 Quartet, violinists Johnny Gandelsman, Ingrid Matthews and Aislinn Nosky, and members of Tafelmusik, Philharmonia Baroque, Tempesta di Mare, Apollo’s Fire, the Handel and Haydn Society, and TENET.
www.nicholasdieugenio.com
IG and TikTok: @dieu_violin
Annegret Fauser
Annegret Fauser has published a book chapter on music and the Statue of Liberty and an article on Beethoven in the United States. She presented a keynote address at the Sixth Symposium in Music History: Agents and Actors: Networks in Music History at the Sibelius Academy in Helsinki as well as papers in conferences in Germany and the United States. In spring, she was elected to the Directorium of the International Musicological Society.
Evan Feldman
In January 2022 Professor Feldman made his second trip to Milan, Italy and led conducting masterclasses for graduate students at the Conservatorio di Milano. In February he led an online conducting masterclass with the Escuela Internacional De Dirección Y Composición De Banda Tutti.
He was the invited conductor for three honor bands: the NC East Central All-District 11-12 Honor Band, the Alamance High School All-County Band, and the Cabarrus 11-12 All-County Band.
This was Professor Feldman’s fifth year as Principal Guest Conductor of the Greensboro Symphony Orchestra. He helped officially open the Tanger Center for the Performing Arts with a gala concert on August 31, plus three additional pops concerts, including collaborations with Steep Canyon Rangers, Jim Curry, and BOYZ II Men.
David Garcia
David Garcia was invited by the Herb Alpert School of Music at the University of California, Los Angeles to deliver the Robert Stevenson Lecture in March 2021. The title of Garcia’s lecture was “Spain and Spanish America in Early US Entertainment Culture, 1783–1801: For Robert Stevenson.” Garcia also accepted an appointment to serve on the Scholarly Advisory Committee of the Smithsonian’s National Museum of the American Latino.
Tonu Kalam
The UNC Symphony Orchestra, under the direction of Professor Tonu Kalam, returned to performing in its full configuration of 85 musicians, with live audiences attending its four-concert season in Memorial Hall and Moeser Auditorium.
Highlights included a performance of Max Bruch’s Scottish Fantasy by UNC violin professor Nicholas DiEugenio, and a collaboration with Susan Klebanow’s Carolina Choir and UNC Chamber Singers in Francis Poulenc’s Gloria, which also featured faculty voice professor LaToya Lain as soprano soloist.
The student winners of the annual UNC Concerto Competition were violinist Hannah Lee, mezzo-soprano Mackenzie Smith, and pianist David Green. They shared the stage in the orchestra’s December concert, performing music by Coleridge-Taylor, Handel, Rossini, and Schumann.
Major orchestral works presented during the year included Sibelius’ Symphony No. 2, Vaughan Williams’ Symphony No. 5, and Dvořák’s Symphony No. 8.
Mark Katz
Mark Katz received a contract from UNC Press to write, with Alim Braxton, a book called Rap and Redemption on Death Row, which will be published in 2024. He also gave a number of invited talks and conference presentations, including virtual presentations for the University of the West Indies (Barbados), the IV Congreso de Investigación en Música, (Colombia), and the Museu de la Música de Barcelona (Spain). He developed a new course as well, Music and Incarceration in the United States, which he taught first as a graduate seminar and will teach to undergraduates in the future.
Michael Kris
In October, Michael Kris directed a four-week COIL (collaborative online international learning) module focused on music education and funding for the arts with Universität Mozarteum. In November, he performed concerts in Austria with a period instrument orchestra and then several concerts of renaissance music with the Washington Cornett and Sackbut Ensemble in Tennessee. Kris was a featured performer in January for the Distinguished Artist Concert Series at Gardner Webb University. During March, he was Artist in Residence with the Duke University Wind Ensemble. The residency included several master classes and a concerto performance. Kris served his sixth season as Low Brass Mentor of the National Music Festival in June, and his international early music collaboration ensemble performed at St. Peter’s Archabbey during the Salzburg Festival in July. Following the Salzburg event, the collaboration traveled to the US for concerts and a recording scheduled for release in 2024.
Jessica Kunttu
Jessica Kunttu joined the music department faculty in Fall 2022 as the new Bassoon Instructor, following the retirement of her former teacher, John Pederson. The 2021-2022 season was a whirlwind of the return of performances with orchestras throughout NC and VA as a freelance bassoonist and contrabassoonist, and in October 2021, she gave a faculty recital at Duke University.
One highlight of the past year was performing the world premiere of Korean-American composer Seong Ae Kim’s new work for solo bassoon, titled “Gravity-Levity,” at the International Double Reed Society (IDRS) Conference in Boulder, Colorado. Kunttu and Kim enjoy a long friendship and working relationship bringing light to social justice issues of the present day through music.
Stefan Litwin
The concert season 2021/22 began with the world premiere of Stefan Litwin’s monodrama »Flegeljahre«, based on the 19th century novel by Jean Paul. The 3-hour work was written for renowned German actor Ulrich Noethen and the GrauSchumacher Piano Duo, who presented it twice at the Musikfestspiele Saar, Germany. The work will be recorded for CD in July 2023.
Three other compositions by Litwin were completed this past season: »…in dürftiger Zeit« for voice and piano (on a text by Hölderlin); »An die Römer« for voice and piano (on a text by Horace); and a new Epilogue to Brecht/Eisler’s »Kriegsfibel« (War Primer) for solo-baritone, mixed choir and chamber orchestra (on a text by Volker Braun.)
The season’s highlight was the world premiere of Litwin’s second music-theatre on a play by Peter Weiss —»Wie dem Herrn Mockinpott das Leiden ausgetrieben wird« — a Chaplinesque opera, commissioned and staged by the Staatstheater Braunschweig, Germany, where it was performed 10 times.
Litwin also gave several piano recitals and lecture-recitals in Germany, Switzerland, and Italy, with a variety of repertoire including Schubert’s Sonata in B-flat Major D 960 and the Concord-Sonata by Charles Ives. Chamber music and Lieder performances featured appearances with tenor Christoph Prégardien; oboist Heinz Holliger; and bass-clarinetist Michael Riessler.
Stefan Litwin has signed a contract with Verlag Neue Musik Berlin, where all his compositions will be published.
Timothy Sparks
Timothy Sparks served as a faculty member and opera director for the International Young Artists Project July 30 – August 5, 2022, hosted by the Department of Music.
This summer, IYAP brought their international faculty stateside instead of traveling to the Tuscany region of Italy. Along with 35 participants (high school, undergraduate, graduate/young professional), IYAP welcomed Italian Master Teachers Stella Peruzzi, soprano and Andrea Sari, baritone, Maestro Romolo Gessi, Professore Conservatorio Tartini, Triesti, Italy, and Michael Dixon, Professor of Music Theater, Universität der Künste, Berlin, Germany. This week-long intensive workshop included faculty recitals, voice lessons, and Italian coaching sessions, as well as culminating performances by the participants of Mozart’s Le nozze di Figaro, a Stephen Sondheim Musical Revue, and an Italian Art Song recital.
Lee Weisert
Lee Weisert’s composition Gol Gumbaz or: The Echo King for orchestra and electronics was commissioned and performed by the Greensboro Symphony Orchestra as part of their 2022 educational concerts series at the Steven Tanger Performing Arts center in Greensboro, NC. The piece applies electronic echo effects to the full orchestra and is inspired by the striking acoustic effects of the Gol Gumbaz temple in Karnataka, India. In April 2021, Weisert received a grant from New Music USA to fund the completion of a large-scale sound installation in collaboration with Jonathon Kirk. The installation, titled Murmuration, consists of 100 computer-controlled robotic woodblock instruments spread throughout a forest. Recesses, a new album of original compositions, will be released in April 2023 on the New Focus Recordings label. The album features performances by fellow UNC faculty Allen Anderson, Nicholas DiEugenio, Melissa Martin, and Matthew McClure.
Brent Wissick
Brent Wissick is enjoying the return to live concerts, both in NC and away. The UNC Baroque Ensemble and Consort of Viols presented concerts on campus in both December 2021 and April 2022; and the UNC Cello Choir performed in February 2022, premiering a work by Allen Anderson. During June 2022, he played both cello and viola da gamba with the Charlotte Bach Academie in several concerts of Bach Cantatas. Bach was featured again in concerts at Duke Chapel with Mallarme Chamber Players in September 2022. The summer months saw performances at the Mountain Collegium workshop at Western Carolina University, and a concert at the National Conclave of the Viola da Gamba Society of America in Ohio, in music of Coprario about which he had recently published an article in the Society’s journal. During August, he joined faculty colleague Mike Kris in performing and recording 17th-century music at Duke Chapel. Later in the month, he and colleague Nick DiEugenio finally presented a Beethoven chamber music concert with two faculty members from UNC-Greensboro (on both campuses) that had been attempted many times during the pandemic.