Department of Music

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Creative agency during a pandemic

Music professor and composer urges students to think of constraints as opportunities for creative growth.

Artists have faced constraints that affected their ability to practice their craft throughout history. The limitations artists currently face due to COVID-19—from a lack of access to concert halls and theaters to the inability to collaborate freely with others in person—are not necessarily new. Yet they also pose an opportunity for creative growth, according to…

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Humanities at home

From their kitchen tables and their living rooms, faculty in the School of Humanities and Sciences translate poems, compose music, share childhood memories, read meaningful texts, examine visual artworks, and more.

What has been on the minds of Stanford professors as they navigate this turbulent and anxious time? Where do they find comfort and solace, challenge and struggle, beauty and grace? While many aspects of campus life are now mediated through a computer screen, the extended time apart has offered us a rare chance to hear from faculty informally,…

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Student winners of the Stanford Concerto Competition play on

Earlier this year, sophomores ADDISON JADWIN and ETHAN CHI won the annual Stanford Concerto Competition. The sophomores planned to perform concertos with the Stanford Symphony Orchestra (SSO) this year, but the COVID-19 pandemic interrupted those plans. Jadwin and Chi. (Image credit: Adriana Ramirez Mirabal) Jadwin was to perform the Walton Viola Concerto this quarter and Chi planned to perform the…

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Department of Music salutes 2020 Deans’ Award winners

We would like to congratulate four winners of the 2020 Deans’ Awards for Academic Achievement, each of whom have included the Department of Music in their Stanford activities while majoring in other areas: Léa Bourgade (upper left) is a senior majoring in Human Biology. Having played the violin for 17 years, she seeks to combine her musical…

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COVID-19’s impact on Stanford arts events

Stanford University has been closely monitoring the rapidly evolving events surrounding COVID-19, also known as novel coronavirus. The university is working to take steps that inhibit, rather than accelerate, the ability of infection to spread. Events that bring participants to campus have been canceled or postponed. This includes a range of arts performances, public lectures,…

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Winter quarter 2020 guest artists

The roster of winter quarter guest artists includes talent from around the globe. Melbourne Australia’s Choir of Trinity College performs with the Stanford Chamber Chorale; Chinese dance legend and renowned choreographer Yang Liping presents her reimagined production of Rite of Spring to Memorial Auditorium; Maqueque, a collective of female artists from Cuba led by Canadian Jane Bunnett,…

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Joshua Redman returns to Stanford for an extended stay

Charismatic jazz saxophonist and composer Joshua Redman returns to Stanford as a visiting artist with the Department of Music in the School of the Humanities and Sciences. Redman was the Mohr Visiting Artist with the Department of Music during winter quarter 2019 and he has a long history with the Stanford Jazz Workshop both as…

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Grad student awarded $10K to create multimedia project with San Francisco homeless

Composer and doctoral student Julie Herndon is the first winner of the Bay Area Composer Residency Award, which will support the production of a concert featuring the stories of homeless San Franciscans.

Artist and music doctoral student Julie Herndon is the inaugural recipient of the Bay Area Composer Residency Award from the American Composers Forum. The $10,000 prize will support her work creating a multimedia project in collaboration with homeless residents in San Francisco. During the summer of 2020, Herndon will work with the homeless community in…

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Musicians from all over the world come to Stanford for the annual Chamber Music Seminar

Every summer, Stanford’s St. Lawrence String Quartet and special guest faculty teach an intensive seminar to professional and amateur musicians on the delicate art of performing chamber music.

Musicians from all over the world ranging in age from 18 to 82 arrived on the Stanford campus to participate in the 10-day St. Lawrence String Quartet (SLSQ) Chamber Music Seminar. Although each of the 75 musicians brings a unique background and musical goals, all share an eagerness to work directly with the SLSQ, Stanford’s…

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Stanford launches new free online course on Beethoven

A new online course explores Ludwig van Beethoven’s music and development as a composer. The class, led by music historian Stephen Hinton, features performances by and discussions with the St. Lawrence String Quartet, Stanford's ensemble-in-residence.

Composer Ludwig van Beethoven’s history, reception and evolution as an artist is the subject of a new Stanford Online course that is free and open to the public. The course, which launched in spring quarter, is designed for any level of musical literacy – from beginner to buff – with the aim of enhancing people’s understanding and…

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Spring quarter 2019 guest artists

Thirty different departments and organizations on campus host 80+ guest artists during spring quarter.

Over 30 departments, centers and campus organizations host guest artists each quarter. The Architectural Design Program and the University Architect/Campus Planning and Design Office co-present the annual Architecture & Landscape–Spring Lecture Series, and the theme this year is “Architecture of Humanity.” The series features five designers who believe architecture has a much greater responsibility beyond aesthetics.…

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The first two VAF artists are Turkish ud player and composer Necati Çelik and Indian photographer Gauri Gill

New Visiting Artist Fund in Honor of Roberta Bowman Denning (VAF) brings international artists into Stanford classrooms across campus.

The Office of the Vice President for the Arts at Stanford University announces the first two artists in the new Visiting Artist Fund in Honor of Roberta Bowman Denning (VAF). The program brings international artists into Stanford classrooms in order to provide a stimulus in artistic thinking and aesthetic perspectives to disciplines across the university.…

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New Stanford Libraries exhibition highlights rare artifacts important to Stanford research

Scholars Select highlights rare books and artifacts held in Green Library collections that are valuable to the research of scholars at Stanford. Faculty members share their cherished item.

A 17th-century volume of William Shakespeare’s plays, a piano roll recorded by Claude Debussy and a 1959 edition of the Green Book, a travel guide for African Americans driving through the Jim Crow-era South, are among dozens of unique artifacts now on display at Stanford’s Green Library Bing Wing as part of a new exhibition. Scholars…

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Stanford polymath blazes a new trail with his design manifesto

Written as a photo comic book, Ge Wang’s publication charts new ethical and aesthetic territory.

Stanford scholar Ge Wang has chosen an unconventional medium for a manifesto about why technology and design needs to reflect human values: a comic book. “It’s nerdy. It’s philosophical. It’s a core dump of my brain in comic form,” said Wang, an associate professor of music in the School of Humanities and Science, who has…

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Stanford unveils new Presidential Residencies on the Future of the Arts and welcomes international guest artists

Guest artists from around the world bring vitality and variety to campus in the fall.

Artists from across the globe come to Stanford to perform, create and engage. The 80-plus guest artists visiting campus this fall are hosted by over 20 Stanford departments, centers and programs. Some of the artists will be at Stanford for a single public event and others will stay for an extended visit for deep engagement…

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