University of Delaware
Office of Public Relations
UpDate - Vol. 16, No. 22, March 6


                              'New Music'
            Several concerts in contemporary music festival
     
     New Music Delaware: A Festival of Contemporary Music,
sponsored by the Department of Music, will be held Monday
and Tuesday, March 10 and 11, in Loudis Recital Hall of the
Amy E. du Pont Music Building.
     The first event, an evening of music written by the
four winners in the music department's 1996-97 Regional
Composers Competition, will begin at 7:30 p.m., Monday. The
winners were selected from 80 entries in an eight-state
region.
     The program will feature a composers' roundtable
discussion with winners talking about their compositions and
about life as a composer in contemporary society as well as
performances of the winning compositions by UD faculty and
student artists.
     The featured works are:
     Fantasy Variations on a Theme of Bela Bartok for oboe
and string quartet by Stephen Gryc, a faculty member of the
Hartt School of the University of Hartford, Conn., performed
by oboist Lloyd Shorter and the Mendelssohn String Quartet;
     Autumn Music for Woodwind Quintet by Jennifer Higdon, a
faculty member of the Curtis Institute of Music, who is a
composer, flutist and conductor and whose works have
performed extensively around the country and are available
on recordings, performed by the Del'Arte Woodwind Quintet;
     Capriccio Settembre for Musica for Violin and Jazz
Ensemble by Bernard Hoffer, a freelance pianist, composer,
conductor and arranger who has written for films, television
and commercials and been nominated for several Emmy awards,
conducted by Harvey Price and performed by Nick Eanet
(violin), Julie Nishimura (piano), Vernon James and Charles
Salinger (saxophone), Alan Hamant and Heidi Sarver
(trumpet), Jay Hildebrandt (trombone), Christiaan Taggart
(guitar), Doug Mapp (bass), Tom Palmer (drums) and James
Ancona (percussion); and
     Varnum by Robert Morris, a faculty member at the
Eastman School of Music, for five melody instruments, finger
cymbals, tabla and drone, performed by faculty artists
Eileen Grycky, Lloyd Shorter, Charles Salinger, Harvey Price
and students Elizabeth Ecklund, Barbara Benedett and Tim
Miller.
     New Music Delaware will continue at 8 p.m., Tuesday,
with an end-of-the-century concert (the second in a four-
year series), featuring works by 20th-century groundbreaking
composers.
     This year the featured works are Stravinsky's Mass,
performed by the University of Delaware Chorale with a
chamber orchestra of faculty and students;
     Dover Beach by Samuel Barber, performed by baritone
Patrick Evans and the Mendelssohn String Quartet;
     Music for Brass Instruments by Ingolf Dahl, performed
by the Delaware Brass and trombonist Paul Arbogast; and
     In C by Terry Riley, with Eileen Grycky (flute), Lloyd
Shorter (oboe) and Nick Eanet and Nicholas Mann (violin).
     Admission to the concerts is free. The festival is
partially funded by Meet the Composer, the Faculty Senate
Committee on Cultural Activities and Public Events and the
Office of Women's Affairs.