Campus Stories - Music
Student Arts Grants: A Year in Photos 2016-17
This year’s Student Arts Grants supported a wide range of projects across the Stanford campus. The projects covered many genres including devised performance, contemporary dance, printmaking, classical and contemporary plays, documentary and fiction film shorts, musical theater, painting, photography, and more. Many of this year’s grantees utilized the new Roble Arts Gym as a rehearsal/work space as…
New conductor appointed for Stanford Symphony Orchestra and Stanford Philharmonia
Paul Phillips has been named the new director of orchestral studies at Stanford and will take over the baton as music director and conductor of the Stanford Symphony Orchestra and Stanford Philharmonia. Phillips is currently director of orchestras and chamber music and distinguished senior lecturer in music at Brown University. “We’re absolutely thrilled to welcome…
Stanford Taiko testimonials
“Since joining the group as a freshman, I have come to view Stanford Taiko as the defining feature of my Stanford experience. Through Stanford Taiko, I have grown musically, but more importantly, I have grown as a human being. ST is fundamentally based upon respect – respect not only for the drums and the practice…
Alternative digs for the 6th Annual Frost Music & Arts Festival
Frost Amphitheater is closed for an upcoming renovation, but the show must go on – elsewhere. This year the annual Frost Music & Arts Festival will take place in the Stanford stadium on May 20 with Grammy award winning electronic dance music master Zedd headlining and special guests BROOD, the synth pop brother-sister duo. The…
Stanford Taiko celebrates 25 years on campus
Stanford Taiko alums descended on the campus earlier this month to socialize, eat, jam and perform with the current crop of drummers in celebration of the ensemble’s 25th anniversary. The capacity crowd at the spring concert in Bing Concert Hall enjoyed an evening of original works for North American taiko performed by current and former…
Stanford Mohr Visiting Artist Majel Connery reimagines the string quartet
What happens when you imagine the string quartet as a theatrical genre? How can the inherent showmanship of the four musicians expand to interact with voice, acting and operatic performance? These are the questions Mohr Visiting Artist Majel Connery examined in her winter class, Theatricality and the String Quartet, with help from Pulitzer Prize-winning composer…
Stanford musicologist brings the 15th century to life
Audiences often trust that performers know the history of the music they present, but even for the most dedicated performers there are unanswered questions. How, for instance, were ensemble performances experienced during the Renaissance? Do we experience them similarly today? For Jesse Rodin, associate professor of music, questions like these are central. “We might not…
Stanford’s St. Lawrence String Quartet brings Beethoven to the San Francisco County Jail
Music lives and thrives in all sorts of unexpected places: theaters and living rooms, dingy warehouses and brightly lit stadiums. It blasts through car stereos and provides quiet comfort in moments of solitude. Stanford’s ensemble-in-residence, the St. Lawrence String Quartet (SLSQ), brought live music to an unexpected place, far removed from the concert hall. They…
Stanford Live features world-class artists, integrates them into campus life
When the Danish String Quartet visited campus this past October, the members didn’t simply drop in for a public performance of Wallin, Janácek and Beethoven at Bing Concert Hall and head home. They also joined in a chamber music reading session with students and the St. Lawrence String Quartet, Stanford’s ensemble-in-residence. “They all read together…
Stanford hosts Rolston String Quartet
“Where words fail, music speaks.” This simple adage, attributed to 19th-century Danish author of children’s fairy tales Hans Christian Andersen, still rings true today. His words get to the heart of why we listen to music – for its ability to express what we would otherwise never know how to say. The music of the…
Bringing Baby back at Dinkelspiel Auditorium
Sixty years ago, one of the first successful American operas, The Ballad of Baby Doe, made its West Coast premiere at Stanford’s then brand-new Dinkelspiel Auditorium. The opera, based on the true and tragic story of Elizabeth “Baby” Doe Tabor and her romance with the wealthy silver king Horace Tabor, was commissioned by Colorado’s Central…
Stanford alum returns to campus as visiting artist to explore connections between his art and other disciplines
When artist Will Clift, BS ’02, MS ’03, was at Stanford, his course load included classes on nearly everything but making art. As an undergraduate he majored in integrative design, an individually designed program that combined engineering, philosophy and psychology. He then earned a master’s degree in management science and engineering. With the exception of…
Commitment to reforms paves way for Stanford Band resumption
Stanford Provost John Etchemendy has accepted proposals from the Stanford Band to address concerns about its organizational conduct. Convinced by the strength of those proposals, the provost is replacing a previously announced Band suspension with a pathway for the Band to resume activities as a student-run organization. In a Thursday letter to Band leadership, the…
Harry Elam appointed vice president for the arts and senior vice provost for education
Harry Elam, vice provost for undergraduate education at Stanford since 2010, has been appointed to two additional key leadership roles in the Office of the President and Provost. He will now oversee the non-departmental arts programs as well as direct and coordinate critical efforts in education, President Marc Tessier-Lavigne and Provost-designate Persis Drell announced Monday….
Stanford Symphony Orchestra tours Catalina Island
In an annual tradition, 18 members of the Stanford Symphony Orchestra traveled down the California coast and then 26 miles across the sea to arrive at Catalina Island last month. This is the fourth year that the ensemble has made the trip to perform at the Catalina Island Museum’s Annual Holiday Symphony Concert at the…
Gaieties marks its 105th year
As Stanford celebrates the year that it turns 125, Ram’s Head Theatrical Society is celebrating a Stanford tradition almost as old: Big Game Gaieties is turning 105. Gaieties is an original, student-written, student-produced musical parody thatPoster for Gaieties is performed in Memorial Auditorium the week before Stanford’s Big Game against Cal. This year, Gaieties is…
