by Daniel Hathaway
NEWS BRIEFS:
Baldwin-Wallace Establishes Kiteley Memorial Scholarship Fund
In an email, BW writes: “The Strongsville Community Band and the Baldwin Wallace Conservatory of the Performing Arts celebrated the life and career of musician George Kiteley at a Sunday, November 9 concert that featured the announcement of a new Baldwin Wallace University scholarship in his name. Created by an anonymous donor, The George L. Kiteley Memorial Scholarship will assist percussion students at BW with demonstrated financial need in perpetuity.
“Kiteley, who passed away on September 10, became the first full-time professor of percussion at Baldwin-Wallace College in 1971 and remained in this position until his retirement in 2000. He also directed the Jazz Band for 20 years and founded Battu, a BW ensemble-in-residence focusing on world music.” Read an obituary here.
Oberlin Alums Among 2025 Grammy Nominees
Oberlin’s Campus Digest reports today that “The 2026 Grammy nominations have been announced, and Oberlin is well represented across multiple genres and categories. Individual nominees include pianist Sullivan Fortner ’08 (Best Jazz Instrumental Album), multi-instrumentalist Rhiannon Giddens ’00 (Best Folk Album), bandleader Ben Jaffe ’92 of the Preservation Hall Jazz Band (Best Regional Roots Music Album), and composer Huang Ruo ’00 (Best Opera Recording). The Grammys take place February 1. Get the complete Obie rundown on the conservatory’s Instagram.
HAPPENING TODAY:
Tonight at 7:30 the Cleveland Museum of Art presents Grammy-winning singer-songwriter Becca Stevens, who performs an intimate solo concert with the audience seated on the stage of Gartner Auditorium.
TODAY’S ALMANAC:
Among the composers who wrote their finales on this November 12: Ernest Pepping (Germany, 1901), Quincy Porter (USA, 1966), Walter Piston (USA, 1976), Carlos Surinach (Spain/USA, 1997), Henryk Górecki (Poland, 2010), and John Tavener (England, 2013).
Some works immediately come to mind to celebrate three of those anniversaries.
Although Walter Piston was a celebrated academic who wrote four theoretical works and taught at Harvard from 1926 until 1960, he started his musical career playing piano in dance bands and saxophone in the Navy during World War I. One of his most engaging orchestral works is the suite he extracted from his ballet score, The Incredible Flutist. Watch the video of a performance by the Spanish Radio and Television Orchestra, Carlos Kalmar conducting, recorded live in April, 2015 at the Teatro Monumental, Madrid. Note the tango in 5/4 time (and the barking dog!)
Henryk Górecki came to prominence outside his native Poland only in the 1990s, chiefly through a recording of his Third Symphony, subtitled “Symphony of Sorrowful Songs,” that commemorated the victims of the Holocaust and featured soprano Dawn Upshaw. It sold more than a million copies worldwide. Listen to the work here in the recording with Upshaw and the London Sinfonietta, David Zinman, conducting.
Speaking of commercial successes, English composer John Tavener achieved wide renown for his religious works, many of which reflected his conversion to Orthodox Christianity in 1977. Among his best-sellers: The Protecting Veil (recorded by cellist Steven Isserlis), Song for Athene (sung at the end of the funeral for Princess Diana in Westminster Abbey in 1997), and the haunting little setting of William Blake’s The Lamb, inspired by his 3-year-old nephew and premiered at the 1982 King’s College Festival of Nine Lessons and Carols. Watch Quire Cleveland perform The Lamb at Trinity Cathedral in December, 2013.
The Choir of Trinity College Cambridge included The Lamb in a 2013 tribute to Tavener, along with his Mother of God, Today the Virgin, Funeral Ikos, and Song for Athene. Stephen Layton conducted the ensemble at the European Festival of Church Music in Schwäbisch Gmünd, Germany in July 2013. Watch here.
