Ralph Farris
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Ralph Farris
Ralph Farris (born Ralph Howard Farris, Jr., 1970) is an American violist, violinist, composer, arranger, producer and conductor, best known as a founding member and artistic director of the ensemble ETHEL. Farris is an electric string player with a lengthy career that spans the gamut of musical genres from rock and jazz to Broadway. His instruments are outfitted with a piezoelectric pickup which allows him to play amplified. Amplification was initially adopted early in Farris's career in order to facilitate the playing of various "contemporary classical" pieces that involve electronic components. It continues to be integral to his signature sound. Early life Farris was born in Boston, Massachusetts in 1970, the son of musicians, Nancy DuCette Farris and Ralph Howard Farris. He began studying music at the age of 3, beginning with recorder and piano, moving on to violin at age six. As a boy soprano, he was featured as a soloist in several of his parents' Ralph Farris Chorale pro ...
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Viola
The viola ( , also , ) is a string instrument that is bow (music), bowed, plucked, or played with varying techniques. Slightly larger than a violin, it has a lower and deeper sound. Since the 18th century, it has been the middle or alto voice of the violin family, between the violin (which is tuned a perfect fifth above) and the cello (which is tuned an octave below). The strings from low to high are typically tuned to scientific pitch notation, C3, G3, D4, and A4. In the past, the viola varied in size and style, as did its names. The word viola originates from the Italian language. The Italians often used the term viola da braccio meaning literally: 'of the arm'. "Brazzo" was another Italian word for the viola, which the Germans adopted as ''Bratsche''. The French had their own names: ''cinquiesme'' was a small viola, ''haute contre'' was a large viola, and ''taile'' was a tenor. Today, the French use the term ''alto'', a reference to its range. The viola was popular in the heyd ...
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Requiem (Fauré)
Gabriel Fauré composed his Requiem in D minor, Op. 48, between 1887 and 1890. The choral-orchestral setting of the shortened Catholic Mass for the Dead in Latin is the best-known of his large works. Its focus is on eternal rest and consolation. Fauré's reasons for composing the work are unclear, but do not appear to have had anything to do with the death of his parents in the mid-1880s. He composed the work in the late 1880s and revised it in the 1890s, finishing it in 1900. In seven movements, the work is scored for soprano and baritone soloists, mixed choir, orchestra and organ. Different from typical Requiem settings, the full sequence is omitted, replaced by its section . The final movement is based on a text that is not part of the liturgy of the funeral Mass but of the burial. Fauré wrote of the work, "Everything I managed to entertain by way of religious illusion I put into my Requiem, which moreover is dominated from beginning to end by a very human feeling of fai ...
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The Juilliard School
The Juilliard School ( ) is a private performing arts conservatory in New York City. Established in 1905, the school trains about 850 undergraduate and graduate students in dance, drama, and music. It is widely regarded as one of the most elite drama, music, and dance schools in the world. History Early years: 1905-1946 In 1905, the Institute of Musical Art, Juilliard's predecessor institution, was founded by Frank Damrosch, the godson of Franz Liszt and head of music education for New York City Department of Education, New York City's public schools, on the premise that the United States did not have a premier music school and too many students were going to Europe to study music. In 1919, a wealthy textile merchant named Augustus Juilliard died and left the school in his will the largest single bequest for the advancement of music at that time. In 1968, the school's name was changed from the Juilliard School of Music to The Juilliard School to reflect its broadened missi ...
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Diego Masson
Diego Masson (born 21 June 1935) is a French conductor, composer, and percussionist. The son of artist André Masson and brother of the singer and actor Luís Masson, Diego Masson was born in Tossa de Mar, Spain. He studied piano and composition at the Paris Conservatoire. Upon graduation, he joined the Domaine Musical as percussionist and began studying conducting with the group's director, Pierre Boulez. In 1966 he formed Musique Vivante, a group specializing in contemporary music which he still directs. Musique Vivante has introduced many important compositions by French and foreign composers, in particular the music of Boulez and Karlheinz Stockhausen. In 1969 Masson conducted the world première of Stockhausen's '' Stop'', which is dedicated to him, and the group also took part in the premières of "Setz die Segel zur Sonne" from '' Aus den sieben Tagen'' and the 1972 version of ''Momente''. In addition to conducting specialist new-music groups like the Asko Ensemble, X ...
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Dartington International Summer School
Dartington International Summer School is a summer school and festival of music held on the medieval estate of Dartington Hall and is a department of the Dartington Trust. Operation First established at Bryanston School in 1948 (largely through the work of William Glock), the summer school moved to Dartington in 1953. It caters for anyone who wants to enjoy music, from conservatoire students and young professionals to enthusiastic amateurs and late starters. Internationally renowned musicians teach and direct the courses and perform concerts in the evenings, with some courses working towards student performances at the end of the week. The summer school is unique in catering for young professionals and amateurs alongside each other in such a large range of courses. Although predominantly classical music, from early through to contemporary, other genres such as digital, world, jazz and folk are also covered. Artists and participants stay in accommodation on the Dartington Es ...
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Festival Dei Due Mondi
The ''Festival dei Due Mondi'' (Festival of the Two Worlds) is an annual summer music and opera festival held each June to early July in Spoleto, Italy, since its founding by composer Gian Carlo Menotti in 1958. It features a vast array of concerts, opera, dance, drama, visual arts and roundtable discussions on science. The "Two Worlds" in the name of the festival comes from Gian Carlo Menotti's intention to have the worlds of American and European culture facing each other in his event; this concept would then be strengthened by the fact that it was held in conjunction with its "twin", the Spoleto Festival USA held annually in May/June in Charleston, South Carolina. That twinning lasted some 15 years and, after growing disputes between the Menotti family and the board of Spoleto Festival USA, in the early 1990s a separation occurred. Under Menotti's direction in 1986, a third installment in the Spoleto Festival series was held in Melbourne, Australia. Melbourne's Spoleto Festiva ...
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Spoleto Festival USA
Spoleto Festival USA in Charleston, South Carolina, is one of America's major performing arts festivals. It was founded in 1977 by Pulitzer Prize-winning composer Gian Carlo Menotti, who sought to establish a counterpart to the Festival dei Due Mondi (''The Festival of Two Worlds'') in Spoleto, Italy. When Italian organizers planned an American festival, they searched for a city that would offer the charm of Spoleto, Italy, and also its wealth of theaters, churches, and other performance spaces. Charleston was selected as an ideal location, with Menotti saying of Charleston: :It's intimate, so you can walk from one theatre to the next. It has Old World charm in architecture and gardens. Yet it's a community big enough to support the large number of visitors to the festival. The annual 17-day late-spring event showcases both established and emerging artists in more than 150 performances of opera, dance, theater, classical music, and jazz. History of the Charleston festival Begi ...
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Tanglewood
Tanglewood is a music venue in the towns of Lenox and Stockbridge in the Berkshire Hills of western Massachusetts. It has been the summer home of the Boston Symphony Orchestra since 1937. Tanglewood is also home to three music schools: the Tanglewood Music Center, Days in the Arts and the Boston University Tanglewood Institute. Besides classical music, Tanglewood hosts the Festival of Contemporary Music, jazz and popular artists, concerts, and frequent appearances by James Taylor, John Williams, and the Boston Pops. First seasons, 1934 and 1935 The history of Tanglewood begins with a series of concerts held on August 23, 25 and 26, 1934 at the Interlaken estate of Daniel Hanna, about a mile from today’s festival site. A few months earlier, composer and conductor Henry Kimball Hadley had scouted the Berkshires for a site and support for his dream of establishing a seasonal classical music festival. He found an enthusiastic and capable patron in Gertrude Robinson Smith. ...
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Walnut Hill School
Walnut Hill School for the Arts is an independent boarding school and day school for the arts located in Natick, Massachusetts, United States. It is intended for student artists in grade 9-12. History and programs Boarding school Walnut Hill was founded in 1893 by Florence Bigelow and Charlotte Conant as a college preparatory school for women and a feeder school for Wellesley College. Even as a traditional private boarding school for girls, Walnut Hill's arts programs were strong. The school was home to acclaimed Fenway Studios artist and teacher Marion L. Pooke, class of 1901, and Pulitzer Prize–winning author and Poet Laureate Elizabeth Bishop, class of 1930. It became coeducational and arts-focused in the late 1970s in response to changes in the educational landscape. Majors Students at Walnut Hill major in one of five arts disciplines: dance, music, theatre, visual art, and writing, film, and media arts. Writing, film and media arts classes include but are not limited to po ...
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Benjamin Zander
Benjamin Zander (born 9 March 1939 in Gerrards Cross, Buckinghamshire, England) is an English conductor, who is currently the musical director of the Boston Philharmonic Orchestra and the Boston Philharmonic Youth Orchestra. Biography Benjamin Zander was born in Gerrards Cross, Buckinghamshire, England. His parents, Walter and Margarete (Gretl) Zander, had emigrated from Berlin in 1937 to escape the Nazis, and raised their four children: Michael, Luke, Angelica, and Benjamin. At home, his father would regularly sing and play piano after work. Benjamin Zander started to compose music at the age of nine. Several of his compositions came to the attention of composer Benjamin Britten, who invited the Zander family to spend three summers in Aldeburgh, England, the beautiful seaside town in Suffolk where he lived. Benjamin Zander took lessons with Benjamin Britten and became a student of theory of Britten's amanuensis and assistant, Imogen Holst. Early life Zander's main instrume ...
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Youth Orchestra
A youth orchestra is an orchestra made of Youth, young musicians, typically ranging from pre-teens or teenagers to those of Music school, conservatory age. Depending on the age range and selectiveness, they may serve different purposes. Orchestras for young students have the primary purpose of music education, often led by a Conducting, conductor who is also a music teacher. Some youth orchestras have been set up by professional symphony orchestra, symphony orchestras, both as a training ground for future players, and as part of their community outreach program. This is particularly common in the List of youth orchestras in the United States, United States, examples including the San Francisco Symphony Youth Orchestra and the New York Youth Symphony. While a professional orchestra will receive the parts and have a few days of rehearsal, and then play several performances, youth orchestras will typically rehearse the concert program over several months. This additional time gives ...
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New England Conservatory Of Music
The New England Conservatory of Music (NEC) is a Private college, private music school in Boston, Massachusetts. It is the oldest independent music Music school, conservatory in the United States and among the most prestigious in the world. The conservatory is located on Huntington Avenue along Avenue of the Arts (Boston), the Avenue of the Arts near Boston Symphony Hall. NEC is home to 750 students pursuing undergraduate and graduate studies, with 1400 more in its Preparatory School and School of Continuing Education. It offers bachelor's degrees in classical performance, Musical improvisation, contemporary improvisation, Musical composition, composition, jazz, musicology, and music theory, as well as graduate degrees in accompaniment, conducting, and vocal pedagogy. The conservatory has also partnered with Harvard University and Tufts University to create joint double-degree, five-year programs and provide multi-passionate students access to Boston's premier academic resources ...
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