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Society for New Music gets American Music Center honor

The Society for New Music is in good company as one of the 2010 honorees of the American Music Center's Letters of Distinction. Leonard Bernstein, John Cage and Dizzy Gillespie are among the musical titans who have been honored by the American Music Center since the center started the award in 1964.
Read more at Syracuse.com

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Society for New Music's "Frida" production was a showcase for ingenuity and talent

Melinda Johnson, Post-Standard arts editor, September 14, 2009

The life of Mexican painter Frida Kahlo came alive in a musical portrait Saturday night at Carrier Theater in the Mulroy Civic Center.

The Society for New Music in collaboration with the Spanish Action League presented performances Friday and Saturday. "Frida" featured the music of Robert Xavier Rodriguez, who traveled to Syracuse for the occasion, with libretto by Hilary Blecher and Migdalia Cruz.

The production was a brilliant example of ingenuity of several fronts:

* Magnetic singers, especially Gina Manziello as Frida and Jonathan Michie as Diego Rivera, transported you with their powerful and dramatic performances. Dancer Candy Costa was very effective in the "Wounded Deer Ballet."

* A simple set, movable two-sided panels by local artist Juan Cruz, or video projections of artwork by Kahlo, Diego Rivera, and the New York City skyline captured the imagination.

* Creative staging made props unnecessary for many scenes, especially the cataclysmic bus accident.

There was a robust energy throughout the two acts. "Frida" was a treat.

Congratulations to Society for New Music and Spanish Action League.

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All elements of production combine to make 'Frida' a hit

Linda Loomis, The Post-Standard, September 13, 2009

Of all the performing arts, only opera is big enough to communicate the complex and tumultuous life of Mexican painter Frida Kahlo, an iconic character who has become increasingly alluring since her death in 1954 at age 47.

The success of Robert X. Rodriguez's "Frida" in Carrier Theater on Friday night is testament to his talent and to the significance of the Society for New Music, which produced the two-act musical biography with Eric Johnson as stage director and James O. Welsch conducting. All elements of this production work in pleasing balance and perfect union to capture the full range of Kahlo's persona. It is, in turn, fragile, rugged, ethereal and earthy.

Rodriguez conveys different phases of Kahlo's life with music from varied cultural traditions. He completed the score on commission nearly 20 years ago, incorporating elements from eclectic musical styles, weaving together elements of Mexican folk songs, American jazz, ragtime and even classical music. Welsch's elegant conducting brings forth all the color and nuances of the score, and the performers more than do justice to the composer's work.

It falls to Gina Manziello, as Frida, to establish tension and character early in the show as she creates rhythmic friction by singing a waltz tempo against the orchestra's 4/4 meter. Her voice is perfectly suited to her role, producing full, lusty quality for most of the songs, but pure and lyrical tone with a slight vibrato on the most tender phrases.

Jonathan Michie provides vocal balance for Manziello in his role as the muralist Diego Rivera. Michie's showcase solo comes in Act I: Scene 5, when he declares his intent to be a "revolutionary artist" and paint things the way he wants them to be.

Given the popularity of "multi-media" productions, it is notable to observe the finesse with which Barry Steele handles projection of Kahlo's paintings and the archival photos. There is a subtle quality to the work that never calls attention to itself, yet which enhances the visual qualities of the production. Sets, painted by local artist Juan Cruz with students from the Spanish Action League and Danforth Middle School, and choreography by Danita Emma also contribute to the overall style and balance.

There are some brilliant moments in "Frida;" one comes at the finale of Act I with the juxtaposition of Frida's miscarriage and the destruction of the mural Riviera has been commissioned to paint in the Rockefeller-financed RCA building. Another is the presence of the four Calaveras, that serve to incorporate some comic moments and to act as a faux Greek chorus.

This production of "Frida" proves that contemporary opera maintains the potential to create excitement and that it is the perfect artistic vehicle to preserve the emotional scope of life's most significant events. Friday night's audience reacted with obvious pleasure, cheering and rising for an ovation at curtain time.

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2009 Israel Award Winners Announced

The Society's $500 Israel prize goes to David Crowell for his work entitled the day after for percussion ensemble. The NY Federation of Music Club's Israel Prize goes to Samson Young for his Fracture at last. Music by both composers will be performed on the Society's winter series.

The panel, Heather Buchman, Marc Mellits, and Sar Strong, also selected three Honorable Mentions: Elizabeth Lim, Evan Antonellis, and Matthew Barson. Music by those composers will be heard either on Fresh Ink or on Society programs in the future. According to Israel Prize Chair Sam Pellman, there were entries from throughout New York State.

David Crowell is a NYC-based composer and instrumentalist who has performed with the Philip Glass Ensemble since 2007, the same year he was selected for a resident fellowship at the Bang on a Can Summer Institute. A finalist for the 2008 and 2009 ASCAP Young Composer Awards, he was also a finalist for Alarm Will Sound's Alice Tully competition for NYC composers. Most recently, David was a featured composer for the 2009 MATA Festival in NYC.

David has studied with Julia Wolfe, Michael Gordon, Jonathan Dawe (Juilliard), and Pulitzer Prize-winner David Lang. David received his BM in jazz saxophone at Eastman (2003), where he studied with Walt Weiskopf and Ray Ricker.
His chamber ensemble works have been performed at numerous venues in the U.S. and Mexico. In June 2009 Innova introduced Spectrum by the David Crowell Ensemble, where he fuses strictly notated composition with jazz and ambient improvisation. David recently completed a commission for
A4TY, a project at the Bloomingdale School designed to foster learning and interaction between students (1st-12th grade) and working composers.

Described by contemporary music portal Sequenza 21 as "epic, dark, and fun," the music of Samson Young combines his training in classical music with a keen eye for moving images and installation art. Young's creative output spans a wide range from music for symphony orchestra and electronics, to amusement-ride-turned-sound-installation, to video-theatre featuring himself dressed as a teletubby. In June 2007, Young became the first Hong Kong artist to receive the Bloomberg Emerging Artist Award with his Happiest Hour, a collection of Nintendo gameboy-inspired audio-visual installations. He was Hong Kong Sinfonietta's artist associate in the 2008-09 season.

Young is a Ph.D fellow at Princeton under the auspices of a Princeton Fellowship and Naumburg Prize. His mentors in composition include Hing-yan Chan and electronic music pioneer Paul Lanksy. In addition, he has studied privately and in masterclasses with George Crumb, Toshio Hosokawa, Helmut Lachenmann, and Steve Reich.

Honorable Mentions:
Elizabeth Lim is a graduate student at Juilliard, where she studies with Samuel Adler and Robert Beaser. A winner of Juilliard's annual composers' orchestra competition, her work Paranoia was premiered by Jeff Milarksy and the Juilliard Orchestra last April in the renovated Alice Tully Hall. Her music has been widely performed throughout the U.S., Europe, and Asia, and she has received honors and recognition from ASCAP, BMI, the Society of Composers, Inc. (SCI), the National Association of Composers, USA, the New England Philharmonic, among others.

Elizabeth received her BA from Harvard, where she graduated magna cum laude with highest honors and was awarded the 2008 Louis Sudler Prize, the John Green Fellowship, and the Paine Traveling Fellowship.

Evan Antonellis was born in Hartford in 1984 and was trained as a musician at age 6, beginning as a percussionist, then as a pianist, guitarist, and composer. He holds degrees in composition summa cum laude from Boston Conservatory and Manhattan School, where his teachers included Larry Bell, Andy Vores, Dalit Warshaw, and Reiko Fueting.

He is currently a DMA Candidate on full scholarship at the Manhattan School. In 2009, he was honored with a BMI Student Composer Award, and was also a finalist for a 2009 ASCAP Morton Gould Young Composer Award. In 2008, Manhattan School recognized Mr. Antonellis with the Lloyd Gelassen Fellowship for outstanding talent and academic achievement. He is currently a student of Nils Vigeland.

Matthew Barnson has had his compositions featured at the 2007 MATA Festival and the 2006 ISCM World New Music Days. He is the youngest recipient of a Barlow Commission at age of 22, and in 2007 received his second Barlow Commission. His teachers include Joseph Schwantner, Augusta Read Thomas, Christopher Rouse, Steven Stucky, Martin Bresnick, Ezra Laderman, David Lang, Ingram Marshall, and in master classes with Wolfgang Rihm, Kaija Saariaho and Toshio Hosokawa. He studied at Eastman, the University of Pennsylvania, and Yale. A native of Salt Lake City, he resides in New York City.

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