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March 7, 2006
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WILLIAM PATERSON UNIVERSITY TO CELEBRATE LIFE AND CAREER OF COMPOSER MILTON BABBITT ON MARCH 24
The New Jersey Percussion Ensemble, a professional ensemble in residence at the University, and the William Paterson University New Music Ensemble will celebrate the life and career of award-winning New Jersey composer Milton Babbitt in honor of his 90th birthday during a special concert on campus on March 24, 2006. The concert will begin at 7:30 p.m. in Shea Center on campus. Admission is free.
The program will include a selection of Babbitt’s music spanning nearly 50 years, including All Set (1957), Phonemena (1968-1971), My Complements to Roger (1978), Homily (1987), Beaten Paths (1988), Composition for One Instrument (1999), Concert Piccolino (1999) and A Waltzer in the House (2003). Babbitt is expected to attend.
Performers include Judith Bettina, piano; Anton Vishio, piano; Jeffrey Kresky, professor of music at William Paterson, celeste; David Weisberg, assistant professor of music, piano; Thomas Kolor ’95, percussion; Peter Jarvis ’02, adjunct professor of music at William Paterson, percussion; and a number of William Paterson student musicians.
Babbitt is one of America’s most renowned contemporary composers. An extensive catalogue of works for multiple combinations of instruments and voice along with his pioneering achievements in synthesized sound have made Babbitt one of the most celebrated of 20th-century composers. He is a founder and member of the Committee of Direction for the Electronic Music Center of Columbia-Princeton Universities and a member of the Editorial Board of Perspectives of New Music.
The recipient of numerous honors, commissions, and awards, including a MacArthur Fellowship and a Pulitzer Prize Citation for his "life's work as a distinguished and seminal American composer," Babbitt is a member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters and a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. Babbitt continues to teach at Princeton University and Juilliard as professor of composition and remains active as a composer.
The New Jersey Percussion Ensemble, directed by Peter Jarvis, was founded in 1968 by former William Paterson University music professor Raymond DesRoches, who co-directed the group with Jarvis and Gary Van Dyke until 2004. The highly acclaimed ensemble is made up of professionals and students from William Paterson University, where it has been in residence since 1972. Because of an ongoing commitment to the proliferation of percussion repertoire, numerous pieces have been written for, premiered by and recorded by the ensemble. The ensemble has appeared in the United States and Europe as guests of the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, the Group for Contemporary Music, the Composers Guild of New Jersey, the San Francisco Symphony, the Gaudeamus Foundation, Radio Denmark, and countless others. The group can be heard on Nonesuch, Composer's Recording Inc., Music and Arts, Koch International, Desoto, New World, NAXOS, the Composers Guild of New Jersey and Capstone recording labels.
For additional information on the concert, call the Shea Center Box Office at 973-720-2371.
www.wpunj.edu
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