Joseph Willard Roosevelt Podcasts
American musician
- piano
- opera
- United States of America
- military officer, composer, music teacher, pianist
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2024-05-14
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Today we hear from cellist Jeffery Tong of Lisle. He’s joined by pianist Liang-yu Wang in music of Saint-Saëns, Beethoven, Bach, Perkinson, and Nadia Boulanger. Jeffery Tong is a cello student of Tanya Carey, on the artistic faculty at the Chicago College of Performing Arts of Roosevelt University. He was named a 2024 Classical Music Award Winner by the National YoungArts Foundation and was selected to perform for the Young Steinway concert series. He was invited to perform in Carnegie Hall as the first-place winner of the 2023 American Protégé International Piano and Strings Competition. He has also won awards at the Music Festival in Honor of Confucius, London Grand Prize Virtuoso International Competition, Society of American Musicians, DuPage Symphony Orchestra Young Artists, Elmhurst Symphony Orchestra Dr. Robert Stanger Young Artists Competition, and the Rockford Symphony Orchestra Concerto Competition. He has been a part of Chicago Youth Symphony Orchestras for three years, serving as Principal Cello of the Philharmonic Orchestra and a selected member of the Symphony Orchestra and Classical Orchestral Repertory Ensemble (CORE). He has won awards in CYSO’s concerto competitions for both the Philharmonic and Symphony Orchestras. Jeffery is a sophomore at Naperville North High School. Outside of music he enjoys cooking, skiing, collecting souvenirs, and playing card games. He plays a 1980 Gunther Reuter cello generously loaned from Bein & Fushi. The post Jeffery Tong, 16, cello appeared first on WFMT.
Carmen is maybe the most famous heroine in all of opera. She’s a woman of Romani descent living in 19th century Spain, sensual and self-confident, aware of the power she wields over men — and she enjoys it. In her signature aria, popularly known as the “Habanera,” she describes herself as a bird who can’t be captured. True to her own word, Carmen — and what she represents — is hard to pin down. When “Carmen” premiered in Paris in 1875, it was deemed wildly immoral. Carmen becomes intrigued by a soldier, Don José, who initially pays her no attention. She seduces him, Don José abandons his fiancée to run away with her, and one thing leads to another (this is opera, after all) — he winds up murdering Carmen in a fit of jealous rage. One interpretation is that this is the story of a man giving into temptation and meeting his downfall. A more modern view would position Carmen as a proto-feminist. She’s a woman who refuses to be controlled, and that puts her life in danger.But perhaps Carmen’s greatest irony is that she is both a complex character and a full-blown stereotype of Romani women. In this episode, host Rhiannon Giddens and guests unpack the myth and the magic of Georges Bizet’s "Carmen," and Clémentine Margaine brings it home with a performance of “L’amour est un oiseau rebelle” from the Met stage.THE GUESTSFrench mezzo-soprano Clémentine Margaine first performed in “Carmen” as a member of the children’s chorus. Shortly after graduating from the Paris Conservatory, she joined the ensemble of the Deutsche Oper Berlin, where she sang her first performances in the title role. Since then, she’s performed Carmen at opera houses all over the world. Susan McClary is a pioneer in feminist music criticism. She’s a musicologist at Case Western Reserve University whose research focuses on the cultural analysis of music, both the European canon and contemporary popular genres. She’s authored 11 books, including "Feminine Endings: Music, Gender, and Sexuality" and the Cambridge Opera Handbook on “Carmen.”Ioanida Costache is an assistant professor of ethnomusicology and an affiliate of the Center for Comparative Studies in Race and Ethnicity at Stanford University. She is of Romanian-Roma descent, and her work explores the legacies of historical trauma inscribed in Romani music, sound, and art. Her family likes to pass on the story of the time her great-grandfather performed the cimbalom for President Roosevelt at the 1939 New York World’s Fair. Rosamaria Kostic Cisneros wears many hats. She is a professional dancer, dance historian and critic, Romani studies scholar, Flamenco historian, as well as a sociologist, curator and peace activist. A research-artist at Coventry University’s Centre for Dance Research, she works to bring arts and culture to vulnerable groups. She was introduced to flamenco by her Spanish-Roma mother during their frequent trips to Seville.
New Classical Tracks with Julie Amacher
2023-09-27 07:00:00
Duration (h:m:s): 39:49
Conspirare – Miró Quartet/Craig Hella Johnson – House of Belonging (Delos) controls src="https://play.publicradio.org/unreplaced_ua/o/minnesota/classical/programs/new_classical_tracks/2023/09/27/new_classical_tracks_20230927_20230927_128.mp3"> New Classical Tracks - Craig Hella Johnson by “It's exciting, isn't it? It's hard to believe,” says Craig Hella Johnson, the artistic director of Conspirare. “I don't know how to understand the passage of time like this because it feels like we just got started.”The vocal ensemble Conspirare was started 30 years ago in Austin, Texas, by Johnson, who was inspired by the power of music to change lives. Their anniversary celebration is underway with the release of their latest recording, House of Belonging, which features a long-awaited collaboration with the Miró Quartet.“I spoke about collaborations early on and how we can partner with musical friends, both just for the sheer joy of it and also to really learn. It's how we keep a knife-sharp edge in terms of our own creativity. “The Miró Quartet, they're just stupendous players themselves, and they come together and create this astounding magic.”Can you explain the title, House of Belonging, and the music that lives within it?“I thought, ‘What music do we need to hear at this time? What am I sensing in our audiences, the people? What are they going through in their lives? What's meant to be expressed from Conspirare at this time?’ So, I chose these pieces, and it was quite an eclectic bunch initially. And I thought, ‘Oh, well, I don't see the thread yet.’ And then suddenly it just appeared to me. It felt like what I observe culturally, just so many elements that aren't feeling a deep sense of belonging.“David White has a wonderful poem called The House of Belonging. I decided to borrow that as a working title. And then in the process, which was kind of quick, I got in touch with Alex Berko and asked if he would consider creating an anchor piece, a multimovement work.“He created a beautiful work called Sacred Place, and that's at the heart of this CD. He used a Jewish service as a model for the piece, as well as texts from a lot of different places. Wendell Berry is in the first movement. Then there’s John Muir in a letter that he wrote to Teddy Roosevelt about preserving Yosemite.”You've said commissioning new works is important as part of the mission of Conspirare, and the recording opens with one of your pieces, Reaching.“For our Christmas concerts, we always sing in Austin and often in Houston. But in December 2022, we made a decision to reach out to the people in Uvalde, Texas, where that horrible school shooting took place in May 2022, to ask if they thought it would be helpful if we brought the concert on the road to Uvalde.“The whole team wanted to do this so deeply. The piece you're referencing is called Reaching, and it is the first track on this CD, just because it speaks to the yearning, the first lines of, ‘We are far away from home. We were turning away, oh, my unknown home. I love you. I'll never return.’ It just spoke to that sense of separation in a simple way.“ Listen on YouTubeTo hear the rest of my conversation, click on the extended interview above, or download the extended podcast on iTunes or wherever you get your podcasts.ResourcesConspirare – Miró Quartet/Craig Hella Johnson – House of Belonging (Amazon)Conspirare – Miró Quartet/Craig Hella Johnson – House of Belonging (Delos)Conspirare (official site)Miró Quartet (official site)Craig Hella Johnson (official site)
This week on Introductions, members of the Chicago area’s Ukrainian community perform music of their home country for piano, violin and voice. 18-year-old pianist Myroslav Mykhailenko is joined by young friends and colleagues with selections by five different Ukrainian composers. Thank you to the Music Institute of Chicago for hosting us at Nichols Concert Hall. Myroslav Mykhailenko, 18, piano Myroslav Mykhailenko was until recently a Scholarship Fellow at the Music Institute of Chicago Academy, a training center for advanced pre-college musicians. He was born in Kyiv, Ukraine, and began playing piano at the age of 6. He studied at the Kyiv Lysenko State Music Lyceum, a high school for gifted musicians. When he was 13, he and his family immigrated to the United States of America, settling in Wood Dale, Illinois. Upon his arrival in the US, he continued his piano studies and won numerous awards from Sejong, Walgreens, and Crain-Maling Young Artists music competitions. He has performed in masterclasses with Marian Hahn, Michael Brown, Shai Wosner, and Logan Skelton. Myroslav gave a radio recital on Introductions in November 2019, and was featured on WTTW’s Chicago Tonight in May 2022. He has been accepted to the Peabody Conservatory where he will begin study with Benjamin Pasternack in the fall. Julia Perekhozhuk, 13, violin Julia Perekhozhuk started playing the violin at the age of 4½ with teacher Olga Karabinovych, and currently studies at the Music Institute of Chicago on a Merit Scholarship with Sang Mee Lee, where she also plays in the chamber music program. She is also in Chicago Youth Symphony Orchestras, currently a member of the CYSO Philharmonic Orchestra and previously concertmaster of the Debut and Concert Orchestras. Julia has had significant competition success, this year winning an Honorable Mention at the DePaul Concerto Festival and First Place in the American Protégé International Music Competition. She is set to perform in Carnegie Hall next year. She has also taken multiple prizes in the Granquist Music Competition (2015-2019) and the Sejong Music Competition (2017); took second place in the Society of American Musicians Competition; twice won cash prizes at the Marta Kravtsiv-Barabash Ukrainian Music Festival in Toronto (2017 & 2020). Julia also took first place in the talent contest of the Ukrainian Diaspora in 2019. Julia lives in Westchester, Illinois and is in 8th grade at The Avery Coonley School in Downers Grove. In her free time, Julia enjoys spending time with her older siblings; and likes drawing, singing and baking. Nazarii Mykhailenko, 21, baritone Born and raised in Kyiv, Ukraine, Nazarii Mykhailenko has been involved in music since the age of nine. He successfully joined the Kyiv Lysenko State Music Lyceum, where he studied a range of disciplines including music theory, piano, choral conducting and classical voice. Immigrating to the United States in 2017, Nazarii quickly became highly involved in his high school’s music program. He won a place in the ILMEA All-State Choir in 2018 and participated in Chicago Master Singers Choir outside of school. He lives in Wood Dale, Illinois and is currently studying at Roosevelt University, pursuing a double major in Music Education and Classical Voice Performance with Mark Crayton. Anna Knight, 18, piano Anna Knight (formerly Anna Yurchenko) was born in 2004 in Ukraine. She started to play the piano at the age of 6, and from 2018 until 2022 she studied with Svetlana Zakharova and Natalia Balycheva at the Vladimir Krainev State Music Lyceum in the eastern Ukrainian city of Kharkiv. She received her Diploma, graduating cum laude in 2022 (marked an 11 on a scale of 12). On February 24, 2022, Anna had to leave her country because the Russian army attacked her city. For two months she stayed with family friends in Frankfurt, Germany, and in May 2022, Anna moved to the United States. She is continuing her piano studies and lives in Highland Park, Illinois. The post Ukrainian Music with Myroslav Mykhailenko and friends appeared first on WFMT.
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- timeline: Composers (North America). Performers (North America).
- Indexes (by alphabetical order): R...