Composer of the Week

Composer of the Week, Vol. I, Issue V – February 18, 2008
Name:  Elliot Carter
Born:  1908, New York
Current post:  Full-time composer
Previous post:  N/A
Publisher:  Boosey & Hawkes | G. Schirmer
Suggested listening:  Eight Pieces for Four Timpani
Quote:
Talking about a materialistic thing, I get about 13 times more royalties from Europe than I do from America.
-Elliot Carter

Elliot Carter’s “Canaries” [...]

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Composer of the Week, Vol. I, Issue IV – February 4, 2008
Name:  Michael Colgrass
Born:  1932, Chicago area
Current post:  Composer and lecturer
Previous post:  N/A
Publisher:  Carl Fischer
Suggested listening:  Winds of Nagual
Quote:
I’m not trying to pull any tricks or dazzle anybody. I’m trying to make a music which convinces me, and which is interesting to me. It’s as [...]

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In February 2008, I changed the format of the newsletter out of a desire to have something more eye-catching on my office door.
No cause for alarm! There was a reason it changed all of the sudden, and I hope you like it
-Vinnie

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Composer of the Week, Vol. I, Issue III – January 28, 2008
Name:  Christopher Rouse
Born:  1949, Baltimore, MD
Current post:  Professor of Composition, The Juilliard School
Previous post:  Professor of Music, Eastman School of Music
Publisher:  Boosey & Hawkes | Schott-Helicon
Suggested listening:  Flute Concerto
Quote:
I got the opportunity to know Mr. Bernstein only in the summer of 1989, although I [...]

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Composer of the Week, Vol. I, Issue II – January 21, 2008
Name:  Tan Dun
Born:  1957, China
Current post:  Full-time composer
Previous post:  N/A
Publisher:  G. Schirmer
Suggested listening:  Symphony 1997
Quote:
“Organic music” concerns both matters of everyday life and matters of the heart.
These ideas find their origin in the animistic notion that material objects have spirits residing in them, an [...]

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Composer of the Week, Vol. I, Issue I – January 14, 2008
Name:  Augusta Read Thomas
Born:  1964, New York
Current post:  Full-time composer
Previous post:  Composer-In-Residence, Chicago Symphony Orchestra
Publisher:  G. Schirmer
Suggested listening:  Silhouettes
Quote: 

Don’t assume that someone else has the only “authentic” understanding of a work and that you “don’t know enough about it” to be engaged [...]

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In order to get all of the information out to you, I will post the five or six back-issues of the Composer of the Week newsletter as PDF files.  If you are running Windows, you will need Adobe Acrobat Reader or another PDF reader of your choice. (Mac users can use Preview as a default.)
I [...]

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