Faculty Notes
Associate professor Ben Houge developed a class exploring the link between music composition and gastronomy, working in collaboration with chefs from the Berklee Dining Hall. Student participants created a soundtrack to a four-course meal at America’s Test Kitchen.
Under the direction of associate professor Ned Rosenblatt, the Berklee Vocal Jazz Ensemble, won a DownBeat magazine student music award for outstanding performance.
Associate professor John Whynot mixed Mychael Danna’s scores for eight episodes of The Last Tycoon and the feature film The Man Who Invented Christmas. He also mixed scores by Mychael and Jeff Danna for the animated feature The Breadwinner.
Professor Susan Rogers, former recording engineer for Prince, wrote the album liner notes and was a consultant to Warner Bros. for their four-disc set Purple Rain: Deluxe Edition by Prince and the Revolution.
Assistant professor and guitarist Amanda Monaco celebrated the release of her latest CD Glitter at the Cornelia Street Cafe in New York City. Visit amandamonaco.com.
Feather Records has released a single and video for the song “Lean Back into Me” by professor Lauren Passarelli. She has released nine CDs and two EPs.
On October 7, associate professor of guitar Jon Wheatley will perform with vocalist Daryl Sherman at Chan’s in Rhode Island. On October 28, he and vocalist–associate professor Patrice Williamson will present songs from their recent CD Comes Love.
Professor Oscar Stagnaro (bass) performed at Scullers in July with his brother Ramon Stagnaro (guitar) and son Paulo Stagnaro ’10 (percussion).
Professor of Music Therapy Suzanne Hanser published Michio’s Musings, an e-book featuring illustrations by Michio Iwata accompanied by Hanser’s original piano music. Visit michiosmusings.com.
Music by professor Marti Epstein was performed in September at Trinity Church in New York City during the Time’s Arrow Festival celebrating the music of Anton Webern.
Assistant professor Jennifer Andrews launched a summer writing program at Port Townsend School of the Arts in Washington State. Andrews is currently writing a book titled Proud Flesh.
“The Tree House” by professor Beth Denisch was performed multiple times in Scotland in June. In July, she presented a paper at the Feminist Theory and Music 14 Conference at San Francisco State University.
Associate professor Matt Jenson received a Newbury Comics Faculty Fellowship Grant to produce the educational video The Art of Playing Reggae.
Professor Ellen Francese received a Faculty-Led Innovations in Education grant to introduce service learning to the Berklee curriculum. The initiative aims to develop socially responsible student citizens and break down the traditional boundaries of the classroom.
Cellist Catherine Bent recorded her first album of original compositions in Rio de Janeiro with engineer João Ferraz ’04, and worked on a tribute album to Jacob do Bandolim. She also toured Germany with guitarist and vocalist Elisabeth Horst ’14. Visit elisandcatherine.com.
In July, associate professor Marcelle Gauvin taught at the Contemporary Commercial Music Voice Pedagogy Institute at Shenandoah University in Winchester, VA.
Assistant professor Orlando Cela conducted the North Carolina Governor’s School Orchestra in world premieres by composers Renée Baker, Bernhard Lang, and Anthony Green.
Professor Dennis Montgomery III appears on camera with his Praise of Zion Choir in the final scene of the movie Detroit performing James Cleveland’s gospel song “Peace, Be Still.”
This Fall assistant professor Geneviève Leclair will conduct the National Ballet of Canada and the Houston Ballet.
Assistant professor Mike Tucker recently performed with the Arturo Sandoval Quartet and is featured on bassist Dave Zinno’s latest album, River of January.
Professor Sheryl Bailey released Bebop Fakebook, an instructional DVD that features 25 bebop staples.
Assistant professor Sergio Bellotti did a visiting artist residency at Conservatorio della Svizzera Italiana in Lugano, Switzerland, and taught at a percussion summer camp in Taipei, Taiwan, hosted by the Ju Percussion Group.
Professor Victor Wallis penned the review essay “13th and the Culture of Surplus Punishment,” which appeared in the August issue of San Francisco Bay View.
Professor Mark Walker played drums on Steve Khan’s album Backlog with Mike Mainieri, Bob Mintzer, Randy Brecker, Marc Quiñones, Bobby Allende, Ruben Rodriguez, and Rob Mounsey ’75.
Professor Tony Thunder Smith received a faculty recording grant to work on a project at Guilford Sound Studios with faculty members David Fiuczynski, Jeff Lockhart, Jason Stokes, and others.
Professor Bill Elliott and Greg Anthony Rassen wrote the orchestrations for the Broadway musical Bandstand, which opened in May. Their orchestrations received nominations for Tony, Drama Desk, and Outer Critics Circle awards.
Former professor Gregory Fritze won first prize in the World Association for Symphonic Bands and Ensembles Composition Contest held in Utrecht, the Netherlands, in July. Fritze currently teaches summer programs at Berklee Valencia.
Professor Neil Olmstead served as a distinguished fellow at the Hambidge Center for Creative Arts and Sciences in Rabun Gap, GA, in July, and composed a set of etudes and preludes for piano.
Electronic Production and Design Deartment faculty members Michael Bierylo, Richard Boulanger, and Matthew Davidson and students participated in MoogFest in Durham, NC. Boulanger worked with Nona Hendryx on the piece Sounds of Dreaming, which incorporated software developed by the students. Bierylo, Boulanger, and Davidson also performed as the Berklee Modular Synthesizer Ensemble and presented workshops.
Assistant professor Christi Catt received a Berklee faculty grant to write the book The Kinesthetic Singer: Lessons on Singing from Yoga and Basketball. It is available in the Berklee Bookstore.
Piano faculty members Hey Rim Jeon, Robert Christopherson, Ross Ramsay, and Tim Ray contributed arrangements to the new book, Berklee Jazz Standards for Solo Piano, published by Berklee Press.
Assistant professor Alonzo Harris, the musical director and keyboardist for the band H.E.R., opened dates of the Bryson Tiller Set It Off tour of North America.
Berklee faculty members David Tronzo, Ned Rothenberg, David Fiuczynski, Randy Roos, and Amy Bellamy were guest artists during the summer residency of the dub-jazz collective Club d’Elf at the Lizard Lounge in Cambridge, MA.
Professor David Fiuczynski returned to his German roots with the CD Innovative Microtonal Jazz, featuring music inspired by primarily by German expressionist painting and art. Visit rarenoiserecords.com.
Music Business/Management Department chair Don Gorder gave lectures on copyright law and music licensing at the Recording Innovation and Music Culture Symposium and Workshop, sponsored by Communication University of China.
Professor John Funkhouser toured Sweden as the pianist and musical director for Swedish singer Anna-Frida Abrahamsson and a band that included Lars Lamburger ’80.
The fourth edition of the Cambridge Jazz Festival, cofounded by Interim dean of the Performance Division Ron Savage, attracted 8,000 people on July 30. Performers included Ron Savage with Eula Lawrence, Tia Fuller, and Pieces of a Dream.
Professor Teodros Kiros published the novel Cambridge Days and will give keynote speeches at conferences in Antigua and Bonn, Germany, in 2017. He wrote two entries for The Palgrave Handbook of African Philosophy.
The Massachusetts Cultural Council named assistant professor Jason Palmer a 2017 Fellow in Music Composition. Palmer recently completed a semester as a visiting assistant professor for Harvard University’s music department.
Assistant professor Renato Milone won a grant to re-arrange and rerecord all examples of horn writing used for all Berklee’s Arranging 1 and 2 classes and more.
Assistant professor Peter Bufano composed and directed music for the Bindlestiff Family Circus in a performance of “A Cardboard and Duct Tape Spectacular” and “Midnight at the Museum” by Circus Smirkus.
Associate professor Daniel Ian Smith appears on Brian McCarthy’s CD The Better Angels of Our Nature produced by Linda Little ’05 , featuring Civil War–era music adapted for a nine-piece jazz ensemble.
In June, faculty members George Garzone, Phil Grenadier, and John Lockwood were sponsored by Jazz at Lincoln Center for a tour of Mexico.
Santiago in the Stream, a work for orchestra, narrator, percussion ensemble, and dancers by professor Apostolos Paraskevas, was premiered on August 23 at Boston’s Hatch Memorial Shell.
The Omaha Symphony Orchestra, led by music director Thomas Wilkins, performed the orchestral suite The Great Chaplin by associate professor Elena Roussanova Lucas. Additionally, Fanfare magazine published an interview and reviews of a CD featuring her composition Moments of Arrival.
Professor Laszlo Gardony released the solo piano album Serious Play featuring jazz standards and spontaneous improvisations. Visit lgjazz.com.
Associate professor Richie Hart released the CD 45 Lives. It was produced by James Hart (Hohenberger) ’07 and features Bobby Deitch ’75 and Scott Reeves ’16. It’s available on CD Baby, Amazon, and iTunes.
Assistant professor Mark Kohler purchased the Eames Drum Company in Saugus, MA, and builds custom snare drums and drum sets when he’s not teaching at Berklee.
Professor Tom Stein was the keynote speaker at the U.S.-Sino China Online Higher Education Conference held in May at the Chongqing College of Art, Science, and Technology in Chongqing, China.
In May, assistant chair of composition Gregory Glancey heard his work Out of the Fray for cello and piano premiered at the Rhode Island Philharmonic Music School by Ensemble Parallax.
Associate professor Francisco Noya has been appointed as the new music director and conductor of the Boston Civic Symphony Orchestra.
Assistant professor Marshall Gilkes was voted the number-one rising star trombonist in the DownBeat magazine critics poll.
On October 6, assistant professor Mark Zaleski released his band’s second CD Days, Months, Years. Zaleski played saxophone and bass on the recording.