Fall 2019 | Issue 1 - IWU

Fall 2019 | Issue 1

A Message from the Director and Professor

of the School of Music

Updates and Success Stories

Faculty News

Student Activities and Achievements

Connecting the Illinois Wesleyan University

School of Music to our valued alumni

September 20, 2019

Dear Alumni,

Greetings from all of us at the School of Music! I am excited to share with you this newsletter about our school and the summer activities of our faculty and students.

It is a time of change, marked by my appointment as the new Director of the School of Music. I arrived in Bloomington at the end of June, and had the privilege of working closely with last year’s leadership team (Dr. Vickie Folse, Dr. Bill Hudson, and Jane Smolen) during a month-long transition in July. One of the first items on the agenda was to finalize our becoming an all-Steinway School, thanks to a generous $3.5 million gift from the C.B. Frevert Family Trust.

We remain committed to excellence and to providing the best education to our students in an environment that is student-centered. I am proud of our distinguished faculty who enjoy a global reach, and their extraordinary contributions to composition, music education and musical performance.

I invite you to let me know when you are visiting IWU—I would like to meet you!

Franklin Larey

Director and Professor, School of Music

BLOOMINGTON, Ill. — Internationally recog-

nized music scholar and renowned concert pia-

nist Franklin Larey has been named director and

professor of the Illinois Wesleyan University

School of Music. Larey will assume the position

August 1.

“We are pleased to welcome Dr. Larey to Illinois

Wesleyan,” said Provost and Dean of the Faculty

Mark Brodl. “He is not only a visionary, but also

brings practical experience in uniting communi-

ties around music. Dr. Larey’s focus will be on

recruitment and retention as well as on increas-

ing the visibility of the School of Music and ex-

panding our commitment to excellence.”

A native of South Africa, Franklin received a Ful-

bright Scholarship to study at the University of

Cincinnati where he earned a doctorate from Cin-

cinnati's College-Conservatory of Music. After a

decade in the U.S., Larey returned to South Africa

where he taught at the University of Cape Town

and served as director of the South African Col-

lege of Music. He also served on the National Arts

Council. Most recently, Larey taught at Gustavus

Adolphus in St. Peter, Minnesota.

“I am delighted beyond words to be joining Illi-

nois Wesleyan University,” Larey said. “I am par-

ticularly excited about pursuing our common aim

of advancing the excellence and diversity of our

programs and students. I look forward to expand-

ing access to our programs to both the local and

global communities, and to joining my colleagues

as we seek to strengthen our impact on the per-

forming arts.”

Larey is hailed as

one of South Afri-

ca’s leading pia-

nists and is ac-

claimed for his

performances of

works by Brahms,

Mozart, Scriabin

and Ravel. He has

performed inter-

nationally, in-

cluding at the

Kennedy Center’s

Millennium Stage

in Washington,

D.C., and at Carnegie Hall in New York. Larey

grew up on a farm in South Africa, and under

apartheid did not have access to public piano les-

sons in the town of his birth. For Larey’s 16th

birthday, his parents began paying for him to

take private piano lessons.

As a scholar, Larey’s main research is in the area

of Brahms studies, and specifically in the theoret-

ical principles of developing variation and motiv-

ic unity which underpin Brahms’s compositional

style.

Associate Professor of Music William Hudson

will remain in his role as Interim Associate Direc-

tor through the 2019-20 academic year.

Listen to Franklin Larey Perform Brahms

Written by John Twork. Assistant Director of Com-

munications - Illinois Wesleyan University

Director and Professor of the IWU

School of Music Franklin Larey

Dr. Bradley J. Regier joined the faculty on August

1, 2019, as Assistant Professor of Music Educa-

tion. He teaches courses in music education, su-

pervises student teachers, conducts the Sym-

phonic Winds, and provides oversight to the mu-

sic education program.

About his appointment, Regier said: "I'm hon-

ored to join Illinois Wesleyan and the School of

Music. This university has a rich tradition of pro-

ducing outstanding music teachers and perform-

ers. As the head of music education, I look for-

ward to developing teachers that have a passion

for student learning, and effectively meet the mu-

sical needs of their students and communities."

Previously he taught instrumental and general

music courses in Kansas and Cairo, Egypt, and

continues to clinic bands and percussion ensem-

bles throughout the Midwest. An active music ed-

ucation researcher, Dr. Regier has presented at

state, national, and international conferences in-

cluding the Missouri Music Education Associa-

tion annual conference (2019), the International

Society for Music Education conference in Baku,

Azerbaijan (2018), and the Music Research and

Teacher Education National Conference in Atlan-

ta, Georgia (2018). His research interests include

music teacher self-efficacy, instrumental teaching

strategies, and preservice teacher preparation.

He is published in the International Journal of

Music Education, Update: Applications of Re-

search in Music Education, Missouri Journal of

Research in Music Education, and the Missouri

School Music Magazine.

Dr. Regier re-

ceived his doctor-

ate in music edu-

cation from the

University of Mis-

souri as well as

his master’s de-

gree in music ed-

ucation with a

wind conducting

emphasis at the

University of Ok-

lahoma and his

bachelor’s degree

in music education

from Kansas State University.

Information provided by Illinois Wesleyan

University

Dr. Bradley Regier, Assistant Pro-

fessor of Music Education

We are now an all-Steinway School, thanks to a $3.5

million gift from the C.B. Frevert Family Trust. In

early September Franklin Larey, Ilia Radoslavov,

Kent Cook and David Horine went to New York City

to select new pianos at the Steinway factory

in Queens, NY. Read more.

Written by John Twork. Assistant Director of

Communications - Illinois Wesleyan University

Westbrook Auditorium, Sunday, October 6, 2019 at 1:00 p.m.

The Illinois Wesleyan University School of Music will present a faculty showcase on Sunday, October 6, 2019

at 1:00 p.m. to dedicate a concert Steinway in the memory of the late Professor C. Lawrence Campbell. He

joined the piano faculty at IWU in 1978 and was Head of the Keyboard Area for many years. Named to the

Fern Rosetta Sherff Professorship in 1998, he was a beloved and respected colleague and mentor. A memorial

fund was established in 2011 to purchase a concert piano in his honor and an instrument was purchased in the

spring of 2019. We hope you will join us for this concert as part of the 2019 Homecoming festivities.

Kent Cook served on the

faculty of the 2019 Illinois

Chamber Music Festival where

he performed Andre Previn’s

Trio (oboe, bassoon and pi-

ano), the Debussy Trio, and

the Brahms Piano Quartet in c minor.

Eva Ferguson (piano) served

a week-long residency at the

Music Conservatory in Zilina,

Slovak Republic where she

taught masterclasses.

On September 28th, Roger Garrett will begin his 27th season as Principal

Clarinetist with the Peoria Symphony Orchestra, conducted by George Stelluto.

In addition to performing with the PSO, Professor Garrett also performs with the

Heartland Festival Orchestra in Washington, IL, conducted by David Comman-

day, and with the Knoxville-Galesburg Symphony Orchestra in Galesburg, IL.

In January, 2019, IWU awarded Professor Garrett an Artistic/Scholarly Development Grant that

funded, in part, a double Compact Disc release of the Symphonic Winds entitled, 30 Years a Retro-

spective. Some of the best of the Wind repertoire is represented on this multi-year set, and it includes

a 24-page booklet with a history of the ensemble (going back to the 1940’s), the band program during

Professor Garrett’s time at IWU, and extensive program notes and dates for each work presented.

There are also pictures of various bands throughout the years.

William Hudson earned the rank of Associate Professor this past year. In July,

he taught (by invitation) at the Madison Early Music Festival, and he gave two

masterclasses at the Classical Singer Competition in Chicago with his colleagues

Ingrid Kammin and Laurel Beard. Dr Hudson continues to serve as Interim

Associate Director of the School of Music at IWU.

Franklin Larey spent part of the summer at the Adamant Music School in

Vermont, where he serves as executive Director of the school’s summer session

and masterclasses. In February he appointed as a Visiting Professor in Piano at

Gustavus Adolphus College, and he also taught at St. Joseph’s School of Music in

St. Paul, MN.

During the May term, Bob Mangialardi presented 48 performances to almost

10,000 school children as part of the Prairie Fire Theatre children’s opera tour

through central Illinois. He also produced a production of the Broadway musical,

Gypsy, at Heartland College in Normal. The cast and musicians included nine

IWU students with Mike Wallace as conductor. Additionally, he produced and

sang a lead role in HMS Pinafore, performed at the Community Players Theater in

Bloomington during the 1st week of August. Five IWU students and a number of high school

students were in the cast, with eight IWU students in the pit.

Vadim Mazo, traveled to Prague, to attend the 26th Ameropa International

Chamber music of which he is the founder and artistic director. Ameropa

collaborations include several arts organizations, such as: the Prague Chamber

Ballet, the Prague Chamber Choir, and the Ameropa Chamber Orchestra (Mazo,

conductor).

Lisa Nelson directed the Illinois Chamber Music Festival from July 7-27 at

IWU. The festival hosted 42 junior high, high school, and college musicians from

Illinois, Wisconsin, Minnesota, Oregon, and Missouri for the 17th year. The Fes-

tival presented six student concerts, six faculty concerts, and five outreach con-

certs (including a Children's Concert and a Music for Food Concert that raised

over $400 for a local food bank). Six IWU students served as counselors; in addi-

tion to supervising students and teaching electives in music theory, music history, international

dance, and Russian language. The counselors received daily chamber music coaching and per-

formed in festival concerts and masterclasses. IWU faculty who performed and/or taught at the

Festival include: Kent Cook and Nancy Pounds, piano; Nina Gordon, cello; Mike Minarcek, percus-

sion; and Lisa Nelson, viola. Alumna Maya Abboud, viola, also performed as a guest artist. Reper-

toire included: piano trios by Beethoven, Debussy, and Previn; piano quartets by Mozart and

Brahms; and, a variety of other ensembles.

Jessica Pearce (French Horn) attended the 2019 International Women's Brass

Conference at ASU in Tempe, Arizona where she presented a recital that featured

unaccompanied solo works for horn.

In July, Adriana Ponce co-presented a paper with Dr Irina Capriles at the In-

ternational Musicological Society Intercongressional Symposium “Agency and

Identity in Music” in Lucerne. The title of the paper reads: Simón Díaz and the

'Tonada llanera': the forging of a modern Venezuelan identity.

Judy Meyer Hays spent the week of June 17 at Northern Illinois University on

staff for the Illinois Comprehensive Musicianship through Performance work-

shop. She led sessions including Analysis: Getting to Know Your Music and Start

with a Strategy: Playing the Harmonica, and she was the coordinator of housing

and meals for the week.

Nancy Pounds joined the faculty (for a third season) as Coordinator of Piano

for the Poco a Poco Summer Music Fest in Streator, IL, a festival founded and

directed by IWU Alumna, Kate Tombaugh. Poco a Poco is a week-long intensive

outreach vocal music training institute, created to bring top quality instruction

and concert opportunities to high school students and the greater community.

College students and young professionals serve as Junior Faculty, singing as

section leaders in the Festival Choir while gaining performance, instructional,

and work experience during the festival week. On June 30, she presented a recital with Laurel

Beard in Bloomington, IL in celebration of Laurel’s upcoming role with the Jerusalem International

Opera Masterclass. In July, she joined the team of faculty pianists for another season of the Illinois

Chamber Music Festival.

IWU faculty Ilia Radoslavov, piano, and Nina Gordon, cello, presented a

chamber music concert with violinist Stoika Milanova at the International

Chamber Music Academy in Kyustendil, Bulgaria.

This summer Robert Sears was active as both a performer and educator. He

was hired to compose horns parts and play trumpet for a promotional video

and studio recording session of all new original music by Julius Adams. He rec-

orded alongside Chicago-based gospel artists Sharay Reed and Calvin Rodgers.

He also performed with Sycamore Brass in the annual Choral Choir Concert in

Champaign, IL. One of the selections performed on that concert was Robert’s

arrangement of My Romance for Brass Quintet. Robert played 2nd trumpet in

an all Tchaikovsky concert with the Heartland Festival Orchestra performing Symphony No. 2, Ro-

meo and Juliet Fantasy Overture and Piano Concerto No. 1. He was a faculty member at Illinois

Summer Youth Music’s Pre-College trumpet camp teaching alongside Professor Tito Carrillo and

Dr. Jennifer Brown. He additionally performed with the Afro Caribbean Jazz Collective, performed

with his group Transit Brass as a featured guest artist with the Urbana Pops Orchestra, and his com-

position “Riverbend Fanfare” was performed by the Fredericksburg Brass Institute's Faculty Brass

Ensemble in Virginia.

In January, as part of the US Navy International Saxophone Symposium at

George Mason University, the Ohio-based Altered Sound Duo premiered Shades

of Play for soprano saxophone and percussion by Fern Rosetta Sherff Professor

of Composition and Theory, David Vayo. Two months later, they included the

piece on the program of their Southeastern tour, which included concerts in At-

lanta, Memphis, and at the universities of South Carolina and Tennessee, among

others. In late March, Vayo was at the University of New Mexico for the national conference of the

Society of Composers, Inc., an event co-coordinated by UNM composition professor—and Vayo's

former student—Peter Gilbert '95. Vayo's Chambers for viola, percussion, electronic keyboard, con-

ductor and audience was performed at the conference by Sound Icon, a Boston-based new-music

group. Vayo is currently on a year's sabbatical, composing a symphonic work for the ZhongHua

Chinese Orchestra of Taipei, Taiwan; this will be the most ambitious composition to date in Vayo's

growing catalog of music for Chinese and Japanese traditional instruments.

This past summer, Mike Wallace worked with Bob Mangialardi and the Prairie

Fire Theatre to present a rollicking version of "Gypsy". In July, Mike completed

his 31st year as director of the Bloomington/Normal Community Concert Band

as they continued their tradition of bringing live concert band music to the com-

munity through evening concerts in local parks. The series is sponsored by City

of Bloomington Parks, Recreation, and Cultural District. In July, Mike attended

the International Trombone Festival at Ball State University in Muncie, IN. The festival included

performances by several of the top trombonists in the world, world premieres of several new trom-

bone concerti, and presentations of research on topics as diverse as health trends in trombone per-

formance, to the use of trombones in the Praise Band Tradition of the southeast United States. Per-

formances included works that used the sackbut, alto trombone, the contra-bass trombone, as well

as the tenor and bass trombones.

Glenn Wilson (saxophone and Director of Jazz Ensembles) completed his 12th

season of jazz concerts at the Illinois Shakespeare Festival. In addition to con-

certs at Ravinia with the Chicago Philharmonic, Glenn was busy in Chicago per-

forming with the Chicago Jazz Orchestra at various concerts this past summer.

Glenn’s new CD, Sadness and Soul, with pianist Chip Stephens, will be released

on October 18, 2019 on the Capri label.

Crystal Muro ’19 won first place and Kelly Riordan ’19 took second

place in the Upper College/Independent Studio Women category at the

2019 National Student Auditions, sponsored by the National Association

of Teachers of Singing (NATS), at St. Olaf College in Northfield, Minne-

sota. Both Muro and Riordan are former students of IWU Instructor of

Music Ingrid Kammin, who was present at the competition.

Alexa Letourneau ‘20, a composition student of David Vayo, attended the composition program

at the Curtis Summerfest Young Artists Program. At the festival, she worked closely with the 14 oth-

er composition students, from diverse backgrounds. Of her experience, she writes that “the compo-

sition program at YASP afforded me a multitude of musically enriching opportunities, ranging from

conservatory level theory seminars to guest presentations and individual lessons with some of the

top composers and new music ensembles in the world, but even with all that, the most astounding

part was the connections and friendships I made. Overall, it was absolutely the most fulfilling, most

fun, most educational, and overall best three weeks of my entire life."

Eight IWU students accepted internship positions in music at the International Chamber Music

Academy in Kyustendil, Bulgaria in June -- Daria Dodonova ‘21, Julia Hilt ‘22, Maribeth

Johnson, Alexa Letourneau ‘20, Rob Reinbrecht ‘20, Ethan Schuller ‘21, Ari Scott ‘20,

and Daria Van De Loo ‘21. The IWU students were part of a group of 14 musicians from 3 coun-

tries, in addition to a number of local instrumentalists, singers, and dancers. Violin students re-

ceived lessons from international soloist Stoika Milanova and masterclass with Yosif Radionov; re-

nowned cellists Anatoli Krastev and Atanas Krastev also gave masterclasses and lessons. The in-

terns had opportunities to perform in Kyustendil, Sofia, and Pernik and traveled throughout the

country studying Bulgarian language, culture, history, folk singing, and folk dance.

Lindsay Ring ‘21, a sophomore BME Euphonium student, attended the Inter-

national Women’s Brass Conference held at Arizona State University in May. She

placed second in the Susan Slaughter Solo Competition - Euphonium Category of

23 years old and younger.

Instructor of Music Ingrid Kammin poses with Crystal Muro '19 and Kelly Riordan '19 at the 2019 National Student Auditions

IWU senior Rob Reinbrecht ‘20 participated in the Alion Baltic International

Music Festival and Academy in Riga, Latvia. He performed Haydn Cello Concerto

in C Major with the festival orchestra, as well as numerous chamber performanc-

es. He was also part of the festival’s concert tour that took them to Lithuania, Lat-

via, Estonia, and Finland.

Six IWU students served as counselors at the Illinois Chamber Music Festival this year: Daria Van

De Loo ‘21, Ethan Schuller ‘21, Monique Isom ‘22, Daria Dodonova ‘21, Collin Halihan,

and Isaiah Crews ‘23. In addition to supervising students and teaching electives in music theory,

music history, international dance, and Russian language, the counselors received daily chamber

music coachings and performed in festival concerts and masterclasses.

Sam Villano ‘20, a composition student of David Vayo, participated in the NYU

Scoring for Film Workshop, which featured critiques from film and television

composers Mark Snow (The X-Files, Blue Bloods) and Michael Levine (Siren, Star

Wars: Detours). They also received critiques from several of NYC’s top orchestra-

tors and sound mixers as well as NYU faculty. His experience included working in

a recording session with members of the City of Prague Philharmonic Orchestra

and networking with other composers. The NYU/BMI Scoring for Television Workshop, led by Sean

Callery (24, Homeland), David Schwartz (Arrested Development, The Good Place), and Ben Decter

(Lucifer, Lethal Weapon), focused on working within short production schedules and with limited

resources. Using what he learned at the workshops, Sam launched his business,

www.suremusicservices.com, which provides professional music services, including copying, or-

chestration and transposition. Partial funding for him to attend both workshops was generously

provided by the Office of the Provost.