Music
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…
Read More Ram’s Head brings The Addams Family, living, dead and undecided, to Stanford
Woeful Wednesday Addams invites her ordinary boyfriend and his family to dinner. Hilarity ensues.
From casting to set design, Stanford’s Ram’s Head Theatrical Society takes advantage of the diverse talent on campus to present their perennial spring musical. This year’s production is The Addams Family. The Addams Family musical takes the humorously macabre characters drawn by cartoonist Charles Addams and places them in an original story on stage. Wednesday Addams, a…
Read More Stanford Live’s 2019-20 season will explore the intersection of art and politics
The stellar line-up includes pianist Lang Lang, banjo and bluegrass virtuoso Rhiannon Giddens, acclaimed violinist Joshua Bell, Afro-Cuban jazz exponent Chucho Valdés and multimedia artist Laurie Anderson.
Stanford Live’s curators have put together a 2019-20 season of multidisciplinary events that intersect music and performance with politics. “A key role of the artist is to reflect a society back upon itself and that political context and content is a crucial part of this storytelling process,” says Chris Lorway, executive director of Stanford Live.…
Read MorePerspectives on “Hamilton”
Last year Allyson Hobbs taught a one-unit interdisciplinary undergraduate course “Hamilton: An American Musical” that explored why Alexander Hamilton and the contemporary musical based on his life resonate so profoundly with the American public.
Hamilton is one the most popular and most celebrated musicals in American history. It has essentially redefined the American musical by drawing on the language and rhythms of hip-hop and R & B, genres that are underrepresented in the musical theater tradition. Last year Allyson Hobbs, associate professor of history in the School of the…
Read MoreThe 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.…
Read More Classy classes: Music 1A takes an interdisciplinary approach to studying music behavior
In Music 1A: Music, Mind, and Human Behavior, students have the opportunity to explore music as a core aspect of human existence through the lenses of cognitive science, culture and anthropology. (Read the full article in the Stanford Daily.)
Read More Stanford University announces Stanford Live partnerships with Goldenvoice and the San Francisco Symphony
The partnerships at Frost Amphitheater will include rock, pop and classical concerts as well as spoken-word performances in the inaugural season of this newly renovated venue in the university’s arts district.
When Frost Amphitheater reopens in the spring, the Stanford and South Bay community will again be able to enjoy live music on the terraced lawn. And thanks to Stanford Live’s two new musical partnerships, the performance offerings are richer than ever. Frost Amphitheater will reopen this spring after an extensive renovation project that includes the…
Read More Stanford’s Frost Amphitheater renovation on pace
The university is upgrading the 82-year-old facility while preserving its iconic past.
In the summer of 2017, renovation construction began on Frost Amphitheater, a venue that holds a special place in the hearts of all those who were lucky enough to attend an event there since its opening in 1937. The goal of the project is to build a state-of-the-art stage and introduce other back-of-house amenities, as…
Read More 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…
Read More 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…
Read More Stanford musicologist reflects on ‘multimusical’ Aretha Franklin
Charles Kronengold talks about Aretha Franklin as a singular figure in American music.
As family, friends and fans pay their final respects to Aretha Franklin, whose funeral is Aug. 31, Stanford musicologist Charles Kronengold discusses with Stanford Report the ways that Franklin defined her time. Aretha Franklin, shown in a 1968 publicity photo, was a major figure in American musical culture. She died Aug. 16 at age 76. (Image credit: Wikipedia…
Read MoreStudent Arts Grants: A Year in Photos 2017-18
This year’s Student Arts Grants supported a wide range of projects across the Stanford campus. The projects covered many genres including contemporary plays, documentary and fiction film shorts, musical theater, painting, photography, drag performance, and more. Many of this year’s grantees utilized Roble Arts Gym as a rehearsal/work space as well as a venue for their exhibits…
Read More Stanford Concert Network staff on organizing the Frost Music & Arts Festival
Student organizers talk about what it takes to pull off the biggest show on campus, scheduled for May 19 at Stanford Stadium and headlined by English indie rock band Glass Animals.
Spring quarter is half past, which means it’s almost time for the seventh annual Frost Music & Arts Festival, scheduled for Saturday, May 19. The festival, which will include performances by Ravyn Lenae, Monte Booker and headliner Glass Animals, will be held at Stanford Stadium due to renovations at Frost Amphitheater. More than a concert,…
Read More Ram’s Head presents ‘Chicago’
Set in the mid-1920s, Broadway favorite Chicago follows the story of budding star Roxie Hart and veteran performer Velma Kelly as they vie for the spotlight in search of the American Dream: fame, fortune and acquittal from their death row convictions. According to Gabe Wieder, director and co-choreographer of the Ram’s Head production of the musical, “Chicago’s…
Read More Louis Menand unmasks the rock god in his cultural history of rock’n’roll
The Pulitzer Prize winner investigates rock’s origins at the 2018 Stanford Humanities Center’s Camp Memorial Lecture.
Who invented rock’n’roll? It’s not who you think. At the Stanford Humanities Center’s 2018 Harry Camp Memorial Lecture, Pulitzer Prize-winning writer and cultural critic Louis Menand exposed rock’n’roll’s origin myths, shedding light on the power of media to shape cultural myths today. In his lecture, titled “Conditions for the Possibility of Rock’n’Roll: An Exercise in Cultural History,” Menand…
Read More Stanford’s spring quarter guest artists
Guest artists are all over campus this spring. Indie rock band Glass Animals play Stanford Stadium; the open-air literary celebration Stories of Exile, Reckoning and Hope takes place on the main stage in White Plaza; Mina Morita directs Bertolt Brecht’s The Good Person of Szechwan in Roble Studio Theater; and Stanford Live’s popular Cabaret series continues in Bing’s cozy…
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