UNCG Faculty
Composers Concert
with guest composer
Rodney Wasachka (NCSU)
Tuesday, February 19, 2013
7:30 pm
Recital Hall, Music Building
Program
RockStar (8 min) Mark Engebretson
2013, world premiere
Marjorie Bagley, violin
Interactive electronics
Ala Barocca (11 min) Gregory Carroll
2013, world premiere
I. Ritornelle
II. Aria
III. Gigue
Michael Burns, bassoon
Ināra Zandmane, piano
Blues for Bari/Bass Saxophone (4 min) Michael Burns
2010, world premiere of version for baritone saxophone
Mark Engebretson, baritone saxophone
Diptych (8 min) Rodney Waschka
I. Still Life with Castanets (2001)
II. La Verdad (2006)
digital media
Cantabile Hop (14 min) Alejandro Rutty
2012
Vincent Van Gelder, piano
Charles Rasmussen, cello
Steven Landis, bass
Alejandro Rutty, percussion
Eduardo Vargas, conductor
Composer Bios and Notes
The music of Mark Engebretson is driven by melody, timbre, virtuosity, clear and
balanced formal structure, the integration of new media, multiple levels of
associations, and a desire for fresh, engaging expression. Of course, the concept of
melody can be interpreted quite broadly: a melody could be a singing, arcing line, a
single tone with constant microtonal or timbre changes, a jumping, jagged,
asymmetrical riff, or a lick played on a snare drum. A fascination with both
performance and compositional virtuosity joins melody to form the basis of my
ongoing interest in writing works that push my boundaries as a composer and that
engage superstar performers in technical and musical challenges. Such works teach us
something about music, endless possibilities, and ourselves.
RockStar was written for violinist Marjorie Bagley. It’s just straightforward head-banging
fun with a violin. With some fancy electronic/computer footwork running
around behind the scene. And with a pretty middle movement. The result may be far
from the inspirations, but one could try to make connections to Jimi Hendrix, Pink
Floyd, Aerosmith.
Gregory Carroll (Associate Professor) holds a B.A. in music from St. John's University
(MN), and an M.M. and Ph.D. in Composition/Theory from the University of Iowa.
Prior to coming to UNCG in 1981, he taught at The University of Iowa and Indiana
State University. His compositions have been performed at national and international
conferences. Other performance venues include Canada, Alaska, Europe, and
Australia. He has frequently served as finalist judge for state, regional, and national
composition contests. He has published theoretical articles in state and national
journals, and is frequently sought after as a guest clinician and lecturer. Dr. Carroll is
a past President of the Southeastern Composers League.
Ala Barocca was inspired after spending many hours with Bach fugues and student
fugue projects in my Tonal Counterpoint class. Bach aficionados will most likely
recognize the inspirational sources the great master.
This work is technically in the style of the late Baroque, but seen (heard) through the
prism of the octatonic scale. For this reason, some listeners might think it sounds like
“Bach on drugs!” My working title was “The Unhinged Continuo,” given that a
keyboard and bass instrument (the basso continuo) held the position of servants who
kept ensembles together, but here find themselves detached from an orchestra.
The overall structure of the work resembles a Baroque concerto. The first movement is
in ritornello form, where a section of music returns periodically throughout. You will
always hear the ritornello performed in octaves. The second movement is an aria—a
song for bassoon—with a stately walking-bass accompaniment in the piano. The final
movement is a perpetual motion gigue (jig) in binary form.
Michael Burns is Professor of Bassoon for the UNC Greensboro School of Music,
Theatre and Dance and a Yamaha Performing Artist. His first solo CD Primavera:
Music for Bassoon and Piano by Bassoonists was released on the Mark Masters label in
2009 to critical acclaim. He holds the BM degree from the Victoria University of
Wellington, New Zealand, the MM from the New England Conservatory, and the
DMA from the University of Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music. He has
performed in numerous professional orchestras including the Cincinnati and the New
Zealand Symphonies and played Principal in the Midland/Odessa, Richmond and
Abilene Symphonies and the Cincinnati Chamber Orchestra. Currently Burns plays
principal with the Asheville Symphony, North Carolina Ballet and the North Carolina
Opera as well as performing frequently with the North Carolina and Greensboro
Symphony Orchestras. Prior to UNCG he taught at the Cincinnati College-
Conservatory, Indiana State University, and Midland College. He remains active as a
solo and chamber performer with numerous recitals and master classes throughout
North America, Germany, China and the South Pacific, as a solo bassoonist and in the
EastWind Ensemble, the Blue Mountain Ensemble, and the Cascade Quintet. Burns
has recorded for the Centaur, CAP, Telarc, EMI, Klavier, and Mark labels. He is also
an active composer with many of his pieces being published by TrevCo Music and
frequently performed. He is archivist for the International Double Reed Society and
was co-host for the IDRS 2003 Conference in Greensboro, NC.
Blues for Bari/Bass Saxophone is a reworking and re-adaptation of two earlier
worksBlues for Tuba, written for Dennis AsKew in 1998 and Blues for Contra written
in 2005. The tuba work was premiered here at UNCG and then performed at the
International Tuba and Euphonium Conference in Sydney, Australia in 1998. It wasn’t
until 2005 that I thought of rewriting it for solo contrabassoon and then Dr. Steven
Stusek requested a version for Bass or Baritone Sax after that but this is its first
performance tonight. The contra, the tuba and bass and baritone sax are all
instruments with a very small and limited repertoire although contemporary
composers are starting to explore their tonal possibilities more and more. All are also
relegated to their primary roles of playing basslines and being the foundation of a
group while hardly ever getting the solo spotlight. This piece partially explores both
roles with the player acting as both the ‘walking’ bassline and also the solo voice.
Some extremes of range are called for in all three versions. I chose the context of the
blues for several reasons: 1. Most of my compositions have at least jazz inflections if
not outright stylistic elements, whether it be rhythms, chords, melodic lines, or
somesuch, no doubt because of my background as a jazz drummer in my youth. The
blues, as an essential element of and precursor to Jazz fits this tendency very well. 2.
There is a bit of a back-story for the tuba version as Dennis had an instrument stolen
out of a van and then another ‘flattened’ by an accident. So the title of the earlier work
has also appeared as Blues for a Stolen Tuba, and Blues for a Flat Tuba. 3. In some
respects the blues were chosen as a form of musical protest and statement on behalf of
these neglected solo instruments—to paraphrase Rodney Dangerfield, “we don’t get
any respect.” 4. All of these low instruments actually have the potential for a lot of
expressive nuances and can inflect the music in quite an evocative manner.
Rodney Waschka II is best known for his algorithmic compositions, his unusual
operas, and theater pieces. While he frequently composes music for traditional
ensembles, his works often include electronic computer music or other media: visuals,
theater, or poetry. Recent commercial recordings include the London Schubert Players
chamber orchestra performing his trumpet concerto, Winter Concerto, on the Nimbus
label and the Nevsky String Quartet performing his string music on the Capstone
label. His opera, Saint Ambrose, recorded on Capstone by Steve Duke, is part of a
trilogy of operas he has just completed. Waschka teaches at North Carolina State
University.
The two parts of Diptych are named Still Life with Castanets and La Verdad. Source
material for Still Life with Castanets consisted of a single short recording of the sound
of castanets clacked together. That source material is presented in the first second or
so of the piece. La Verdad (The Truth) uses only the sound of the Spanish word
"Digame" ("tell me") as source material except for the final sound of the piece. The
piece is dedicated to politicians throughout the world and to corrupt and incompetent
journalists everywhere.
Alejandro Rutty's compositional output includes orchestral, chamber and mixed-media
music, arrangements of Argentine traditional music, and innovative outreach
musical projects.
A unique feature of Rutty's music is its affection for textures suggested by modern
recording processing techniques, and the use of Tango - a genre he performs as a
pianist-and other South American genres as part of the music's surface.
Rutty's compositions and arrangements have been played by the Minnesota
Symphony Orchestra, Boston Modern Orchestra Project, Indianapolis Chamber
Orchestra, National Symphony Orchestra of Argentina, National Symphony
Orchestra of Brazil, Porto Alegre Symphony Orchestra, New Mexico Symphony
Orchestra, Linköping Symphony Orchestra, the New York New Music Ensemble, the
Red Clay Saxophone Quartet, and the Cassatt String Quartet among other groups.
Rutty's music has been published by Effiny Music, SCI/European American Music,
and Ricordi Sudamericana.
Recordings of his music have been released by Capstone Records, Arizona University
Recordings, and ERM Media. The Conscious Sleepwalker (an All-Rutty CD, Navona
Records) including A Future of Tango and other orchestral pieces was released in early
201
Founder and Artistic Director of the Hey, Mozart! Project, Alejandro Rutty is
currently Associate Professor of Music at the University of North Carolina at
Greensboro.
Cantabile Hop, written for pianist Vincent Van Gelder, is a chamber-sized piano
concerto, integrating World Music, Electronic Dance Music, Funk and the classical
tradition into a one-movement cantabile groove.
Performer Bios
Violinist Marjorie Bagley made her Lincoln Center concerto debut in 1997 with the
Little Orchestra Society after beginning her performing career at the age of nine in her
home state of North Carolina with the Asheville, Winston-Salem, and North Carolina
Symphonies. Having graduated from the Manhattan School of Music in the first class
of Pinchas Zukerman, she is active as a recitalist, chamber musician, and teacher.
Marjorie has also performed as soloist with the Utah Symphony, Idaho Falls
Symphony, Ann Arbor Symphony, the University of Michigan Symphony, and the
Washington Square Music Series. As first violinist and founding member of the
Arcata String Quartet, Marjorie performed in the Weill Recital Hall at Carnegie,
London's Wigmore Hall, and across Western Europe and the United States. She is also
an active proponent for new music and has premiered works by Paul Chihara, David
Noon, Nils Vigeland, and Judith Shatin. Through her travels to music festivals,
Marjorie has had the opportunity to play with some of the great artists of our time
including Pinchas Zukerman, Itzhak Perlman, Joseph Kalichstein, members of the
Guarneri, Emerson, American, Tokyo, and Borromeo String Quartets. Ms. Bagley can
be heard on recordings for the VOX, New World and Summit labels, and a recording
of music for violin and percussion on the Equilibrium label featuring a concerto by
Lou Harrison. Marjorie is the Co-Director of the Juniper Chamber Music Festival in
Logan, Utah, which is becoming one of the most elite chamber music festivals in the
nation. Ms. Bagley has been on the faculty of Ohio University, Utah State University,
and the International Music Academy in Pilsen, Ms. Bagley has also taught at the
Brevard Music Center, the Perlman Music Program, the Kinhaven Music School, and
the Manhattan School of Music Preparatory Program.
Vincent van Gelder was born in Rotterdam, The Netherlands. After studying at the
Conservatory of Hogeschool Enschede. From 1995 till 1997, he studied at the Latvian
Academy of Music in Riga, Latvia. Vincent holds BM and MM degrees from the
Conservatory of Hogeschool Enschede, an MM in performance from the Southern
Illinois University at Carbondale and a DMA in piano performance from the
University of Missouri at Kansas City. He also studied with Czerny-Stefanska during
the Chopin master classes in Duszniky, Poland, and with Leslie Howard during Liszt
master classes in Utrecht, The Netherlands.
He is the top prizewinner in the 2011 Liszt-Garrison International Piano Competition
where he also received an award for the best performance of a work by an American
composer. In 2007, Vincent van Gelder was declared a winner in the "Artist
International Competition" in New York. As a result he performed a solo recital in
Carnegie Weill recital Hall, on May 11, 2008. The critic for the New York Concert
Review wrote about this concert: “Dr. Van Gelder is a formidably equipped, no-nonsense
virtuoso.” In January 2000, Vincent van Gelder won the Concerto/Aria
Competition and appeared as a soloist with the UMKC Conservatory Orchestra
performing Liszt’s Totentanz.
He is the Winner of 1999 St. Louis Artist Presentation Society Auditions. The St.
Louis Post wrote about his performances of the Chopin Ballades: “He brought out the
different layers with the precision of a brain surgeon”. Also in 1999, he was a soloist
with the Southern Illinois University Symphony Orchestra, performing Prokofiev’s
2nd Piano Concerto. Dr. van Gelder has played recitals in The Netherlands, Germany,
Latvia, and in many states in the US, including a full Liszt recital on one of Liszt’s
own pianos at the Spencer Art Museum in Lawrence, Kansas.
Vincent van Gelder currently lives in Greensboro, North Carolina. He recently
premiered the combo version of "Cantabile Hop", by composer Alejandro Rutty, at
the NCMTA conference where it was the commissioned work. This work was written
for him and will have its premiere as a piano concerto in late 2013. He appears
frequently as a soloist and with orchestra. As a chamber player he has performed
with Dmitry Sitkovetsky, members from the Ciompi Quartet, and Inara Zandmane.
He is a frequent performer on the “Focus on Piano Literature Conference” at UNCG.
Next to his regular student circle he teaches at UNCG Summer Music Camp, gives
occasional master classes, and is a judge in several competitions. His recordings have
been played on radio and tv stations in the US and The Netherlands.
He has been on the piano faculty of Duke University, where he recently performed
the world premiere of Bill Robinson’s trio for Piano, Violin, and Cello. Upcoming
performances include the World Premiere of Alejandro Rutty’s 1st Piano Concerto,
written for Vincent van Gelder, with Kevin Geraldi, conductor.
Steven Landis (b.1977) earned both a BM in composition (1999) and an MM in double
bass performance (2002) from the University of Florida School of Music.
Landis studied composition with Paul Richards, James Paul Sain, and Mark
Engebretson and studied bass with Kevin Casseday. Landis is currently pursing an
MM in composition (2013) from the University of North Carolina at Greensboro and
studies with Mark Engebretson and Alejandro Rutty. Prior to continuing his graduate
studies, Landis held the position of Principal Double Bass with the Gainesville
Chamber Orchestra (FL) and the Albany Symphony Orchestra (GA) and performed
with the polystylistic rock band Black Swan Theory.
As a composer Landis works with many mediums including solo instrumental, mixed
chamber groups, large ensembles, digital and mixed media, as well as film and
theater. Recordings of his work can be found on, Substream Films, Postcards a
double-disc release by the Gainesville Chamber Orchestra, and CURRENT recorded
by trumpeter Adam Hayes and pianist Kris Carlisle. Works by Landis are available
from Veritas Musica Publishing and Theodore Front Distribution. When time allows
Landis writes poetry, enjoys bass fishing, and is a fan of GATOR football.
Charlie Rasmussen performs on both modern and baroque cello. He is currently
pursuing a Master of Music Degree in cello performance at the University of North
Carolina Greensboro, under the tutelage of Dr. Alex Ezerman. Before his studies at
UNCG, Charlie graduated magna cum laude with a Bachelor of the Arts degree in
music from Luther College, which is located in Decorah, Iowa. While there he
studied with Dr. Eric Kutz and was a recipient of a Weston Noble music scholarship.
For his scholarly activities, Charlie was inducted into Phi Beta Kappa. Charlie has
also attended several summer music festivals and has played under renowned
conductors Gerard Schwartz and David Lockington. As a baroque cellist, Charlie
performs with Greensboro Early Music, and he has also attended the Magnolia
Baroque Institute at North Carolina School of the Arts, where he studied with Brent
Wissick. After finishing his Master’s degree at UNCG, Charlie plans to pursue a
Ph.D. in Musicology.
Conductor Eduardo Vargas holds a DMA in Instrumental Conducting from The
University of North Carolina Greensboro. Vargas earned his Bachelor's and Master's
degrees in Cello Performance at the Universities of Alabama and Wyoming
respectively. As a conductor, he has guest-conducted Bolivia’s National Symphony
Orchestra and was founder and conductor of the Chamber Orchestra of Bolivia. In
Wyoming, he guest conducted the University of Wyoming’s Chamber and Symphony
Orchestras and conducted his own new music group, Ensemble 2120. He served as
Interim Conductor of the Appalachian Symphony Orchestra at Appalachian State
University and was Conductor of the UNCG String Orchestra. His conducting
teachers include Dr. Michael Griffith at the University of Wyoming and Dr. Kevin
Geraldi at UNCG.
Born in the capital of Latvia, Riga, Ināra Zandmane started to play piano at the age of
six. Ms. Zandmane holds BM and MM from Latvian Academy of Music, MM in piano
performance from Southern Illinois University at Carbondale, and DMA in piano
performance from the University of Missouri at Kansas City. She has been the staff
accompanist at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro since 2003, performing
up to fifty recitals per year. Ms. Zandmane is frequently invited to serve as an official
accompanist at national competitions and conferences, among them the North
American Saxophone Alliance conference and the MTNA National competition since
2004. Ms. Zandmane has been presented in solo recitals in St. Paul, Kansas City,
Cleveland, St. Louis, and New York, as well as in many Republics of former Soviet
Union. In April 2000, she was invited to perform at the Glenn Gould Studio in
Toronto. Inara Zandmane has appeared as a soloist with the Latvian National
Orchestra, Liepaja Symphony, Latvian Academy of Music Student Orchestra, SIU
Symphony, and UMKC Conservatory Symphony and Chamber orchestras. She has
performed with various chamber ensembles at the International Chamber Music
Festivals in Riga, Vilnius, Tallinn, Helsinki (Finland), and Norrtelje (Sweden). Ms.
Zandmane has collaborated with such musicians as Martin Storey, Paul Coletti,
Branford Marsalis, Michel Debost, Kelly Burke, Steven Stusek, and Susan Fancher. For
a few last years, Inara Zandmane has worked together with Latvian composer Peteris
Vasks. She has given Latvian premieres of his two latest piano pieces, Landscapes of
the Burnt-out Earth and The Spring Music, and recorded the first of them on the
Conifer Classics label. Solo recordings include the piano works by Maurice Ravel,
recorded together with her husband, Vincent van Gelder, and the complete Sonatas
for piano by Alexander Scriabin. She also can be heard on various chamber music
CDs.
