The Catholic University of America

CUA Composition News Archives (Spring 2004-Summer 2009)

Congratulations to CUA alumni Michael Oberhauser and Gregg Martin, whose operas were both selected as "Picks of the Fringe" from DC Theatre Scene. Both of these operas were MM thesis projects in CUA's MM Composition, Stage Music Emphasis program. Click here to read the DC Theatre Scene reviews for Magnum Opus (Oberhauser) and Life in Death (Martin).

"The Comic Roach: A Roadhouse Picture Show," presented by the Snark Ensemble, was also selected as a "Pick of the Fringe" from DC Theatre Scene. This novel film-cabaret show featured new silent film scores and cabaret songs by CUA faculty composer Andrew Simpson, CUA head music librarian Maurice Saylor, and DMA Composition student Phil Carluzzo. Click here to read the DC Theatre Scene review for Comic Roach.

MM Stage Music thesis operas were reviewed by The Washington Post. Click here to read Anne Midgette's July 14 review of Gregg Martin's "Life in Death" and Michael Oberhauser's "Magnum Opus" at the Capital Fringe Festival.

CUA MM Stage Music students have works performed on the 2009 Capital Fringe Festival. John Maggi's thesis musical, "This is NOT My Life" (2009), Gregg Martin's "Life in Death" (2008), and Michael Oberhauser's "Magnum Opus" (2009) will be presented at the festival.

Congratulations to our May 2009 graduates: John Diomede, John Maggi, and Michael Oberhauser (MM Stage Music Emphasis)!!

Congratulations to Roc Lee (1st year MM Composition, Stage Music Emphasis), who has won the Benjamin Pao Performing Arts Scholarship.

We are proud to welcome our new Theory-Composition faculty member, Dr. Stephen Gorbos, who joins the School of Music this fall. Dr. Gorbos received his doctorate from Cornell University in 2008.
We are also pleased to welcome the DC-based Great Noise Ensemble as Ensemble in Residence at the School of Music during the fall 2008 semester. GNE will perform the bulk of its 2008-09 season concerts at CUA, as well as give readings and performance of works by CUA students and faculty.
CONGRATULATIONS to DMA student Kyle Gullings, who has been named a national finalist for Region III in the SCI/ASCAP Student Commission Competition!!
CONGRATULATIONS to our May 2008 graduates: Ben Bernstein, Gregg Martin (MM, Stage Music Emphasis), Robert Martinez (MM, Concert Music Emphasis), Patrick Simon (BM Composition), Jonathan Hellerman (Composition minor)!!
The new composition electronic studio opens!! On Friday, May 2, the composition program inaugurated a new center for electronic composition and sound design in the School of Music. This studio will support the creation of original electronic music, recording and editing of digital audio, and sound design.
A good day for the composition program. A glance at the calendar of events for Friday, May 2, the final day of the spring 2008 semester, offers a glimpse into the multiple activities of the CUA composition program. Click here to see the events of that day.
Guest artist Michael Cameron, double bass (faculty, University of Illinois), performed a recital with CUA faculty member Andrew Simpson, piano, on Friday, March 14, in Ward Recital Hall. The program included the American premiere of Karel Reiner's Sonata for Double Bass and Piano, as well as music by Hertzel, Frederickson, Proto, Simpson, and Sibelius.
CUA composers premiered new miniature operas and incidental music to short plays by Thornton Wilder! On Wed., Feb. 27th, the CUA President's Festival of the Arts presented "Playing, Singing, Talking Wilder", a performance of staged operas and plays with new scores by CUA student and faculty composers. A joint presentation by the Benjamin T. Rome School of Music and the CUA Department of Drama. Ward Recital Hall, free. Click here for more information.
On February 7, DMA student Phil Carluzzo, joined by Music Librarian, CUA alum, and composer Maurice Saylor, and CUA composition faculty member Andrew Simpson, as members of the Snark Ensemble, appeared on "The Kojo Nnamdi Show" on WAMU radio (NPR), 88.5 FM, in Washington, DC. Joined by clarinetist and guest artist Ben Redwine, the composers discussed their music for silent film and performed excerpts from their scores. Click here to listen to the segment in streaming audio.
DMA Composition student Kyle Gullings took second place in the Third Annual Hartke Declamation contest, sponsored by the CUA Department of Drama. Click here to see the full story on CUA's website.
Two MM Stage Music composition students will present their thesis productions in the spring semester: Gregg Martin's new opera, Life in Death, will take place Jan. 18-19. Ben Bernstein's new musical adaptation of The Count of Monte Cristo will take April 12-13 (venue TBA). Click here to see the spring 2008 calendar of events.
CUA composition faculty member Andrew Simpson will perform original scores to two silent films on February at the New York Public Library. He will appear as a featured guest on the NYPL's "Meet the Music Makers" Series.
On February 27, six new works by School of Music student and faculty composers will be premiered. Two new mini-operas and four new incidental music scores to Thornton Wilder plays will be presented by the School of Music in collaboration with the CUA Department of Drama as part of the annual President's Festival of the Arts, which centers this year around the work of Thornton Wilder. This evening of operas and plays is one of the events leading up to the festival's dual productions of Wilder's play Our Town (presented by students in the Musical Theatre program) and opera (a new operatic version by Ned Rorem, with a libretto by J. D. McClatchy). Click here for more details.
Two 1st-year MM Stage Music Composition students are creating incidental music for theatrical productions in the CUA Department of Drama. Michael Oberhauser's music for a production of Aristophanes' Frogs, and John Diomede's score for Moliere's Le Medecin Malgre Lui (The Doctor in Spite of Himself) take place Dec. 6 and 7 on the Hartke Theater stage. Both productions are MFA Directing projects by students in the Department of Drama.
DMA Composition student Jason Lovelace's new choral/orchestral fanfare, Hodie Nobis Descendit, will be premiered by the CUA Symphony Orchestra and Chorus on Friday, Dec. 7, in the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception. Jason received the 2007 commission from the School of Music to compose the opening fanfare for CUA's annual Christmas Concert for Charity, an internationally-televised event. Please see Upcoming Performances and Events for a complete list of fall 2007 activities by CUA students and faculty.
CUA composition faculty member Andrew Simpson presented a paper, "Teaching Composers to Write for the Stage: A New Master's Program at The Catholic University of America" at the College Music Society National Conference in Salt Lake City, UT, on Nov. 15.
Composer William Bolcom visited CUA on Monday, Nov. 5, to discuss his opera A View from the Bridge (currently being produced by Washington National Opera) and to hold a master class with CUA student composers.
Flutist-composer Robert Dick was on campus Nov. 2-4 for a mini-residency co-sponsored by the Flute Society of Washington. Mr. Dick presented a master class for composers on Friday, Nov. 2, a master class for flutists on Saturday, Nov. 3, and gave a recital of his music on Sunday, Nov. 4.
October 12, 2007: The Sylvia Smith Percussion Duo visited CUA to speak to the Composition Seminar about writing for percussion, and to perform selected contemporary percussion works.
September 27, 2007: CUA doctoral composition students Ryan Keebaugh, Jung Yim, and Kyle Gullings presented at a master class with composer John Adams at the Music Center at Strathmore, Rockville, MD. The master class was sponsored by the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra's Education Division. Students from the Peabody Conservatory and Morgan State University also attended the master class as observers.
September 3, 2007: CUA student composer Kyle Gullings' new musical, The Eden Diaries, was presented at the Kennedy Center's Page to Stage Festival on Monday, Sept. 3. Click here to learn more, and click here to view a CUA press release.
May 12, 2007: Congratulations to our May 2007 Composition graduates, Candace Emberley (BM) and Kyle Gullings (MM Stage Music Emphasis)!
March, 2007: MM Stage Music composition major Kyle Gullings has been accepted to the John Duffy Composers Institute as part of the Virginia Arts Festival (Old Dominion University), May 14-27. While there, Kyle will participate in a series of master classes and reading sessions of stage works under the tutelage of Duffy and master artists including composers Lee Hoiby and Anthony Davis.
February 23, 2007: Faculty composer and theorist Steven Strunk presented his paper, "Structuring Time in Bill Evans' 1959 'Autumn Leaves'" at the 9th International Conference of the Dutch-Flemish Society for Music Theory in Groningen.
February 7, 2007: The CUA student chapter of the Society of Composers, Inc. (SCI) has officially been recognized as a student organization at CUA. Students plan to host a conference in the next two years, as well as hold a variety of performances and chapter-sponsored new music events.
February 1, 2007: Faculty composer Andrew Earle Simpson has been awarded an Individual Artist Award from the Maryland State Arts Council for 07-08.
January 31, 2007: Composers in the MM Stage Music Composition program partner with Joy of Motion Dance Company to present "Music and Movement: A Collaboration," an event sponsored by the Arts Club of Washington. Student composers were teamed with choreographers at JOM's Youth Dance Program to create new works as part of the fall 2006 Interdisciplinary Music Practicum (MUS 617) course. The October 2006 public performance of those works was so well-received that the Arts Club has invited this special encore performance, open to the public. Click here for more information.
January 30, 2007: MM Stage Music composer Kyle Gullings is awarded 3rd Prize in the Second Annual Hartke Declamation Contest, sponsored by the CUA Department of Drama. For more information, please click here to read a press release about the competition.
December 11, 2006: the Interdisciplinary Music Practicum's fourth and final performance session (operatic scenes) takes place in collaboration with students from the Voice-Opera division of the Benjamin T. Rome School of Music, joined by CUA alumni, from 2:10-4:00 in Ward Recital Hall. Prof. Sharon Christman, chair of the School of Music's Voice-Opera division, will join course instructor Andrew Simpson as faculty panelist and commentator for the final performance session of this new course (being offered for the first time in the fall 2006 semester) for MM Stage Music Composition students.
December 1, 2006: the premiere of "Hodie Christus Natus Est," a fanfare for chorus and orchestra by MM Concert Music Composition student Robert Martinez, was given by the CUA Symphony Orchestra and Chorus in the Basilica of the National Shrine. Dr. Leo Nestor, School of Music faculty, conducted the premiere. Also, DMA Composition student Jason Lovelace's new choral-orchestral arrangement of "Silent Night" was premiered on the same concert. The annual Christmas Concert, televised internationally by EWTN, is broadcast around the world each December.
November 26, 2006: Andrew Simpson, CUA Composition faculty and chair of the Theory-Composition division, performed a new live, improvised score for piano solo to accompany "He Who Gets Slapped," a 1924 film by Swedish director Victor Seastrom, on the National Gallery of Art's Film Series. This is the first of several dates in November and December during which Dr. Simpson will provide new, improvised scores to accompany silent film. Future dates are Sunday, December 10, 4:00 ("The Wind," starring Lillian Gish, preceded by a 10-minute fragment from "The Divine Woman," starring Greta Garbo), Saturday, December 16 ("Girl from Stormy Croft," 2:00, "The Scarlet Letter," 4:00), and Sunday, December 17 ("The Outlaw and his Wife" and "The Kiss of Death").
October 20, 2006: the Interdisciplinary Music Practicum's second performance session (performance of original music for dance in a collaboration between MM Stage Music Composition students and dancers from the Youth Dance Program at DC's Joy of Motion Dance Center) took place at the Joy of Motion studios in Bethesda. Dancers choreograophed and performed one-minute pieces to music composed by MM Stage Music composers. Choreographers and dancers Douglas Yeuell and Helen Hayes (Joy of Motion), along with Prof. Andrew Simpson (Music), gave feedback. This public event attracted a significant audience, which was inivited to ask questions and give commentary, as well.
October 4: Interdisciplinary Music Practicum's first performance session (performance of dramatic scenes in a collaboration between MM Stage Music Composition students and MFA Directing and Acting students) took place in Ward Recital Hall. Prof. Jeffrey Sichel (Drama) and Andrew Simpson (Music) gave critique and feedback on the four presented scenes.
August 2006: Andrew Earle Simpson's new CD of chamber music, A Fiery and Still Night, has been released on the Capstone Records label, featuring works for solo piano, guitar, double bass and piano, and string quartet with harp.
June 2006: Steven Strunk's piano work, Clones, was recently released on a new CD of piano music, Final Bell, on the North-South Recordings label (Max Lifchitz, piano).
The Great Noise Ensemble presents music by Andrew Simpson (CUA composition faculty) and Gregg Martin (MM Stage Music composition student) on Friday, Jan. 26, at 8:00 PM, at the Sitar Center for the Performing Arts in Washington, DC.
The Fall Composition Department Recital, featuring works of CUA student composition majors and minors, is scheduled for Sunday, December 3, at 5:00 PM in John Paul Rehearsal Hall.
The annual CUA Christmas Concert takes place on December 1 at 7:30 PM in the Basilica of the National Shrine, featuring the premiere of a new choral-orchestral fanfare by MM Concert Music composition student Robert Martinez, and a new choral-orchestral arrangement of "Silent Night" by DMA composition student Jason Lovelace.
The Fall Cardinal Composers Society concert will take place on Friday, November 17, at 8:00 PM in Ward Recital Hall.
The CUA Symphony Orchestra's fall semester student composer orchestral readings is scheduled to take place on Monday, December 4, from 7:00-9:30 PM in John Paul Rehearsal Hall.
The CUA Department of Drama presented Lysistrata, the ancient Greek comedy by Aristophanes, November 2 (11:00 PM), 3 (5:00 PM), 4 (7:30 PM) and 5 (2:00 PM), in the Hartke Lab Theatre, with incidental music by MM Stage Music Composition student Gregg Martin. Also presented was Blue Monster, a fable by by Carlo Gozzi, with incidental music by 1st-year MM Stage Music Composition student Ben Bernstein.
Composer Nicholas Maw was the first guest on the 2006-07 CUA Visiting Composers Series, with a visit on Friday, October 6, from 2:10-4:00 PM, in Ward 127. He spoke to the Composition Seminar and interested music students about the US premiere of his opera Sophie's Choice, receiving its US premiere through the Washington National Opera this fall.
On Friday, September 22, at 8:00 PM, in Ward Recital Hall, flutist Nina Assimakpoulos (Assistant Professor of Flute, Bowling Green State University) performed a guest artist recital with CUA faculty composer and pianist Andrew Earle Simpson. The program, including works by Libby Larsen, Paul Schonfield, Marilyn Shrude, and others, also featured the world premiere of Andrew Earle Simpson's flute-piano work The Dead are Dancing, commissioned by Prof. Assimakopoulos. Earlier that day, Prof. Assimakpoulos also spoke to the Composition Seminar about composing new works for flute, and the commissioning process.
Pulitzer Prize-winning composer Joseph Schwantner is the next composer on the CUA Visiting Composers Series, Friday, Feb. 24, from 2-4 PM. From 2-3, Dr. Schwantner will present on his own music in Ward 127; from 3-4 PM, he will give a master class for CUA student compositions on the stage of Ward Recital Hall. The master class will feature live performances by CUA students and faculty.
The Spring Composition Department Recital will take place on Friday, March 10, at 8:00 PM in Ward Recital Hall.
The CUA Department of Drama presents The Death of Memory, an original play by Glen Mas, March 22, 23, 24 at 7:30 PM, March 25, 26 at 2:00 PM, in Hartke Theatre, with music by MM Stage Music Composition student Kyle Gullings.
The Catholic University Festival of the Arts presents the World Premiere of New Old American Songs, a joint commission of 10 pieces by 10 composers for the Catholic University of America Chorus and chamber orchestra. Created in homage to Aaron Copland's Old American Songs, the premiere features music by CUA faculty members Joseph Santo, Leo Nestor, Steven Strunk, and Andrew Earle Simpson; CUA students Jason Lovelace, Robert Martinez, and Stamos Martin; CUA alumni Maurice Saylor and Philip Carluzzo; and NYC-based composer Andrew Gerle.
The Composition Division showcase for the School of Music student body will take place on the Monday, April 10 Studio X session, from 4:10-5:30 PM in John Paul Rehearsal Hall. Student composers will discuss their works and receive performances of those works during the 90-minute session.
The Cardinal Composers Society, CUA's student composer organization, will be giving its spring concert on Thursday, April 20, at 8:00 PM in Ward Recital Hall. Admission is free and open to the public.
The CUA Symphony Orchestra's spring semester student composer orchestral readings will take place on Thursday, April 27, from 4:10-6:40 PM in John Paul Rehearsal Hall.
Andrew Earle Simpson's one-act opera The Furies received its World Premiere on Feb. 9-12 at CUA. The Washington Post gave an excellent review of the performance in its Feb. 14 issue.
The Snark Ensemble, consisting of CUA alumni and composers Maurice Saylor and Philip Carluzzo and CUA faculty member Andrew Earle Simpson, premiered a new joint composition, "Kick the Dog"/"To Flower," performed by the composers, for the Jane Franklin Dance Company, which commissioned the work, at Schlesinger Concert Hall and Arts Center in Alexandria, VA, on January 21, 2006.
The CUA Symphony Orchestra and Chorus, conductor by Dr. Leo Nestor, presented the World Premiere of Andrew Earle Simpson's Aurora Christi, for SATB chorus, orchestra, and organ in the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception in Washington, DC on December 2, 2005. The work, commissioned by the Benjamin T. Rome School of Music, was premiered during the annual Christmas Concert for Charity. The premiere was internationally broadcast on EWTN and locally on WHUT television during the 2005 Christmas season.
CUA alumnus Maurice Saylor received two performances of his song cycle "Alta Quies," for baritone and piano, presented by Washington Musica Viva, in October - the next performance is Sunday, Oct. 23, at the Atlas Performing Arts Center in Washington, DC.
The CUA Department of Drama presented "The Government Inspector," by Gogol, with incidental music composed by MM Stage Music Composition student Gregg Martin, Oct. 13, 14, 15 at 7:30 PM, Oct. 15 and 16 at 2:00 PM, in Hartke Theatre.
CUA faculty composer Andrew Earle Simpson's Tesserae was performed at the Mid-American Festival of Music and Art at Bowling Green State University on Oct. 28.
The Composition Department Fall Recital took place on Friday, November 11, at 8:00 PM in Ward Recital Hall.
The World Premiere of Andrew Earle Simpson's "American Gothic Suite," a musical homage to Grant Wood commissioned for the Red Cedar Tr io, will be premiered by Red Cedar June 2, 2005, in the restored Cedar Rapids loft studio in which Wood painted "American Gothic." Dr. Simpson is currently Composer-in-Residence for the Red Cedar Trio; the trio is planning to release an all-Simpson CD in 2008.
April 20, 2005: The Snark Ensemble, a new instrumental group co-founded by composers Maurice Saylor and Andrew Earle Simpson and featuring CUA composition graduate student Philip Carluzzo on percussion, gave its debut performance on the School of Music Film Series of live music to vintage silent films composed by Saylor and Simpson.
April 16, 2005: World Premiere of "Songs of the Forgotten War," featuring 19 one-minute chamber pieces by 19 composers commissioned by CUA. Each miniature piece is inspired by one of the 19 bronze statues of soldiers on patrol found at the Korean War Memorial in Washington, DC. This distinctive musical event featured new pieces by CUA students Anthony Randolph (DMA), Philip Carluzzo (MM), and Joelle Marston (BM), CUA faculty composers Steven Strunk, Joseph Santo, Leo Nestor, Maurice Saylor, and Andrew Earle Simpson, and numerous regional composers. The premiere of "Songs of the Forgotten War," organized by Dr. Simpson, took place in CUA's Pryzbyla Center as part of the School of Music's President's Concerts: "Waging Peace" Making Music in Time of War." CUA student, faculty, and alumni performers combined to bring this intriguing and diverse new work to life.
The World Premiere of CUA Composition alumnus Mark Adamo's opera Lysistrata was given by the Houston Grand Opera in March 2005.
World Premiere of MM Composition student Philip Carluzzo's "Christmas Fanfare: A Child is Born," CUA Symphony Orchestra and Chorus, Dr. Leo Nestor, conductor, Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception, Friday, December 3, 2004 (Commissioned by the Benjamin T. Rome School of Music)
Professor Anthony Stark Memorial Concert, October 30, 2004, The B. T. Rome School of Music, The Catholic University of America, Washington, DC.
Cardinal Composers Society Fall Concert: Music by CUA Student and Faculty Composers, November 3, 2004, 8:00 PM, John Paul Rehearsal Hall, The B. T. Rome School of Music,The Catholic University of America, Washington, DC.
World Premiere of Andrew Earle Simpson's "Four Views of Pompeii," Cedar Rapids Symphony Chamber Players, September 18, 2004, Cedar Rapids Museum of Art (associated with "Art in Roman Life: Villa to Grave" exhibit), Cedar Rapids, IA.
World Premiere of Andrew Earle Simpson's "Tesserae: Six Mosaics of Ancient Rome," The Red Cedar Trio, April 20-21, 2004, Cedar Rapids Museum of Art (associated with "Art in Roman Life: Villa to Grave" exhibit), Cedar Rapids, IA.
Concert Workshop Premiere of Andrew Earle Simpson's one-act opera The Libation Bearers (based on the ancient Greek tragedy by Aeschylus), March 20-21, 2004, Ward Hall, The B. T. Rome School of Music, The Catholic University of America, Washington, DC.