Peabody Conservatory alumni and faculty number among the awardees of the Aaron Copland Fund for Music’s 2023 Performance Program grants and its 30 Grants to Celebrate 30 Years, both of which were announced in January. The 2023 Performance Program awarded 151 grants totaling $925,000, including to the Boulanger Initiative, where faculty artist Bryan Young and Roberto Vela (BM ’05, Piano) serve on the board of directors; Duo Axis, which includes faculty artist Wei-Han Wu; the Ghost Ensemble, which includes faculty artist Sky Macklay; Heidi Duckler Dance, where Rebecca Lee (BFA ’22, Dance) is a company member; the Khemia Ensemble, which includes Mary Matthews (MM ’10, Flute); the Lorelei Ensemble, led by founding artistic director and Peabody Director of Choral Studies Beth Willer; SFJAZZ, where faculty artist Warren Wolf is a member of the SFJAZZ Collective; Sandbox Percussion, featuring Victor Caccese (BM ’11, Percussion), Terry Sweeney (BM ’13, Percussion), and Ian Rosenbaum (BM ’08, Percussion); Sō Percussion, which includes Eric Cha-Beach (BM ’04, GPD ’05, Percussion); and the Wet Ink Ensemble, where faculty artist Sam Pluta is a co-director.

Glimmerglass Opera also received a grant to produce faculty artist Kevin Puts’ Elizabeth Cree and the Los Angeles Master Chorale received a grant to produce a program featuring the work of composers Reena Esmail and Peabody Preparatory alumnus Philip Glass. And Peabody faculty and alumni number among the orchestra members of grant winners the National Symphony Orchestra and the San Francisco Symphony.

The Bergamot Quartet—Ledah Finck (BM ’16, MM ’18, Violin); Sarah Thomas (BM ’17, MM ’19 Violin); Amy Huimei Tan (GPD ’20, Viola); and Irène Han (MM ’18, Cello)—is one of the organizations receiving a 30 Grants to Celebrate 30 Years award to celebrate the Fund’s three decades of supporting contemporary American music. 

By now you likely have heard the exciting news we recently shared regarding Peabody’s financial aid program, a development that will directly and materially benefit many current and prospective undergraduate students in the years ahead.  

Beginning in fall 2024, the Peabody Conservatory will meet 100% of demonstrated financial need for all domestic undergraduate students, without loans. This means that domestic undergraduates (U.S. citizen, Permanent Resident of the U.S., undocumented or DACA) eligible for need-based financial aid will have their full need met and have no more student loans in their financial aid packages. Beginning next year, a qualifying student’s demonstrated need will be covered up to the full cost of attendance through scholarships and work-study—money that student will not owe back. As an initial step, eligible current students also received a one-time grant this spring, with the move to full-need, no-loan packages happening in fall 2024.

The ability to meet 100% of a student’s financial need is unusual among conservatories or schools of music as most aid is in the form of merit-based scholarships. The lack of financial aid can negatively impact access for students with need. With this exciting development, Peabody is the largest conservatory in the U.S. and one of only a very few of our music school or conservatory peers to make the commitment to meet full financial need. 

At the same time, Peabody will continue its robust merit scholarship program for all students, including international undergraduate students and graduate students. As always, Peabody’s commitment to rewarding excellence remains firm, with all students considered for competitive merit scholarships during the admissions process. 

Supported by institutional funds and philanthropic contributions, this is a truly transformational moment for Peabody and for our students as we invest in expanding access to a world-class education for talented students regardless of their financial circumstances. This continues and expands the work we began nearly ten years ago to build our investment in financial aid. With this latest development, Peabody will become ever more selective, while increasing access by removing financial barriers. I am thrilled to think of the many aspiring young performing artists who will realize a new opportunity to pursue their artistic dreams and ambitions, unencumbered by student loan debt, and go on to make an impact as artistic leaders in the world.

Sincerely,

Saturday, February 10, 8:00 pm PST

Poet and teacher Abiodun Oyewole was one of the Afrocentric writers that formed the pioneering proto-hip-hop group the Last Poets, blending politically informed spoken-word performance to rhythmic grooves. Faculty artist Wendel Patrick joins this spoken-word/hip-hop living legend and poet/activist Ursula Rucker as part of UCLA’s Poetry Uncut series hosted by J. Ivy at the Center for the Art of Performance; tickets available online.

Tuesday, February 13, 12:10 pm EST

Born free in 1825 Baltimore, Frances Ellen Watkins Harper was one of the first Black women published in America; composer Jasmine Barnes sets pieces of Harper’s poetry for her new Songs for the People, with music inspired by Johann Sebastian Bach. Third Practice—the chamber vocal ensemble that includes Joshua Bornfield (DMA ’13 Composition; MM ’14, Music Theory Pedagogy), Taylor Hillary Boykins (MM ’14, Voice), and Katelyn Grace Jackson (MM ’19, Voice)—co-commissioned the work with the Bach Choir of Bethlehem and the Handel Choir of Baltimore, and performs its world premiere at a free concert at the Central Moravian Church, Bethlehem, PA. Third Practice also performs the work April 14 at the Westmoreland Congregational United Church of Christ in Bethesda and May 11 at Second Presbyterian Church in Baltimore in collaboration with Handel Choir of Baltimore (tickets).

Thursday, February 15, and Friday, February 16, 8:00 pm, EST

Jonathan Taylor Rush (MM ’19, Orchestral Conducting) leads the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra through a program curated by composer Carlos Simon featuring the choirs from both Morehouse and Spelman Colleges and spoken-word artist Marc Bamuthi Joseph. The program includes two Simon works, pieces written or arranged by under-celebrated Black composers Moses Hogan, Babatunde Olatunji, and Hale Smith, and more. Tickets are available online.

Friday, February 23, 8:00 pm CEST

Composer Jake Runestad (MM ’11, Composition) collaborated with poet/librettist Todd Boss for Earth Symphony, a five-part dramatic monologue by Mother Earth. Commissioned and debuted by Arizona’s True Concord Voices and Orchestra and subsequently aired on Arizona PBS, Earth Symphony received a 2022 Rocky Mountain Emmy Award for music composition. The BR Munich Radio Orchestra performs the 35-minute work for chorus and orchestra alongside Howard Swanson’s Symphony No. 2 and Morten Lauridsen’s Lux Aeterna at the Sacred Heart Church in Munich; tickets available online.

Sunday, February 25, 7:30 pm EST

Cellist/activist Amanda Gookin and the early music ensemble Alkemie, co-founded by Niccolo Seligmann (BM ’15, Early Music), commissioned 11 female and non-binary composers to respond to 36 extant texts from trobairitz, the 12th-century feminine counterparts to troubadours. The resulting “A Worthy Mirror” program at National Sawdust debuts works by Gelsey Bell, Maya Bennardo, Alison Cheeseman, Hai-Ting Chinn, Melika Fitzhugh, Sarah Goldfeather, Tis Kaoru Zamler-Carhart, Racquel Acevedo Klein, Li Qi, Patricia van Ness, and Seligmann, who also performs. Tickets are available online.

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Peabody Notes highlights select off-campus performances featuring Peabody performers. For other events, please visit our Peabody events page.

Estro

Deutsche Grammophon commissioned composer and pianist Julian Gargiulo (MM ’97, Piano) to write a new work for the debut recording project of Spanish violinist María Dueñas. “Estro”—to Gargiulo, “the impetus responsible for creation which comes from the ‘other side’ and operates through the composer”—was recorded in Vienna last summer and is available to stream or download from Deutsche Grammophon, who also licensed and released Dueñas and Gargiulo’s performance of his Violin Sonata No. 4, "From the Window."

Rebecca Clarke: Sonatas for Violin, Viola & Piano

The latest album from violin Professor Judith Ingolfsson and pianist Vladmir Stoupel excavates the eloquent profundity of British composer Rebecca Clarke, whose passionate Viola Sonata caused a sensation in 1919, disappeared from the repertoire by the 1940s, and began to be rediscovered in the late 1970s. Duo Ingolfsson-Stoupel’s Rebecca Clarke: Sonatas for Violin, Viola & Piano (OehmsClassics) was supported by a 2023 Dean’s Excellence Accelerator Award and can be streamed or purchased online.

Going Off Topic

During the pandemic, Composition graduate student Zachary Detrick formed a virtual band to perform his work, recruiting Peabody classmates—saxophonist Nikolai Klotchkov and percussionist AJ Hudson—and musician friends around the country. The Filibuster Saloon includes contributions from 14 musicians, who bring to life Detrick’s instrumental mélange of rock, jazz, and folk idioms and ideas. Going Off Topic is available on Bandcamp.

Mending Wall

Matthew Levy, co-founder of the contemporary saxophone quartet PRISM, noted that the staged concert experience Mending Wall began as a response to walls as symbols of dehumanizing force. In February 2022, soprano and faculty artist Tony Arnold and pianist/composer Arturo O'Farrill joined PRISM for the project’s world premiere—which the New York Observer enthused was “performed with the technique and finesse of classical musicians, while projecting the intimacy and playfulness of a Balkan wedding band.” XAR Records recently released the studio recording, which is available to stream or download online.