by Jarrett Hoffman
IN THIS EDITION:
•News: Applications open for Tuesday Musical Scholarship Competition
•Almanac: a pair of living American composers in Beth Anderson and Kevin Puts (pictured)
NEWS BRIEFS:
As of the first of the new year, and until January 31, Tuesday Musical is accepting applications for its 2023 Scholarship Competition, the 67th edition. Twenty-three scholarships, ranging from $1,000 to $2,000 each, will be awarded to college students majoring in music performance and/or music education, provided they are Ohio residents, or they are studying with a music teacher at an Ohio college or university. The competition will be held in-person on March 18 at The University of Akron. Winners will then be invited to the Final Round/Winners Concert on May 21. Click here for more information.
TODAY’S ALMANAC:
Today’s anniversaries in classical music history include three birthdays of musicians who are no longer with us:
•Composer Borys Lyatoshynsky (1895, Zhytomyr), who became known as the father of modern Ukrainian music
•Danish-American pianist and comedian Victor Borge (1909, Copenhagen), one of the most famous musical humorists (read more about him in last year’s Diary)
•American cellist Bernard Greenhouse (1916, Newark), a founding member of the Beaux Arts Trio
We also turn our attention to two living American composers: Lexington, KY-born Beth Anderson, who turns 73, and St. Louis-born Kevin Puts, who turns 51.
Beth Anderson’s compositional resume includes the invention of a new form of music which she calls the swale — “a meadow or marsh where a lot of wild things go together,” as she once told The New York Times. Head to YouTube to listen to her wonderfully folk-influenced Pennyroyal Swale for string quartet (Part 1, Part 2), presented here with a visual component as well: images of Kentucky landscapes and wildlife by photographer James Archambeault, compiled into a video by Dmitriy Khavin.
Kevin Puts, who grew up in Alma, MI, has been in the news of late for his operas. His fourth, The Hours, received its fully-staged premiere in November 2022 at the Metropolitan Opera. (And jumping back a little over a decade, it was his opera Silent Night that brought him a Pulitzer Prize.) A beautiful, haunting excerpt from Act II of The Hours, taken from the final dress rehearsal, is available here, featuring Renée Fleming, Kelli O’Hara, and Joyce DiDonato.
Anderson photo by Molly Sheridan.