All Bard News by Date
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August 2022
08-09-2022
The Bard College Conservatory of Music has appointed acclaimed composers Jessie Montgomery and Missy Mazzoli to the faculty as composers in residence. Composer, violinist, and educator Montgomery has been called “One of the most distinctive and communicative voices in the US, as a player and a creator” (BBC). Grammy-nominated composer, pianist, and keyboardist Mazzoli was recently deemed “one of the more consistently inventive, surprising composers now working in New York” (New York Times). They both join the Bard Conservatory in fall 2022.
Jessie Montgomery is an acclaimed composer, violinist, and educator. A recipient of the Leonard Bernstein Award from the ASCAP Foundation, the Sphinx Medal of Excellence, Montgomery’s works are performed frequently around the world by leading musicians and ensembles. Her music interweaves classical music with elements of vernacular music, improvisation, poetry, and social consciousness, making her an acute interpreter of 21st century American sound and experience. Her profoundly felt works have been described as “turbulent, wildly colorful and exploding with life” (The Washington Post).
Her growing body of work includes solo, chamber, vocal, and orchestral works. Some recent highlights include Shift, Change, Turn (2019) commissioned by the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra and the Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra, Coincident Dances (2018) for the Chicago Sinfonietta, and Banner (2014)—written to mark the 200th anniversary of “The Star-Spangled Banner”—for The Sphinx Organization and the Joyce Foundation, which was presented in its UK premiere at the BBC Proms on 7 August 2021.
Summer 2021 brought a varied slate of premiere performances, including Five Freedom Songs, a song cycle conceived with and written for soprano Julia Bullock, for Sun Valley and Grand Teton Music Festivals, San Francisco and Kansas City Symphonies, Boston and New Haven Symphony Orchestras, and the Virginia Arts Festival (7 August); a site-specific collaboration with Bard SummerScape Festival and Pam Tanowitz Dance, I was waiting for the echo of a better day (8 July); and Passacaglia, a flute quartet for The National Flute Association’s 49th annual convention (13 August).
Since 1999, Montgomery has been affiliated with The Sphinx Organization, which supports young African American and Latinx string players and has served as composer-in-residence for the Sphinx Virtuosi, the organization’s flagship professional touring ensemble.
A founding member of PUBLIQuartet and a former member of the Catalyst Quartet, Montgomery holds degrees from the Juilliard School and New York University and is currently a PhD Candidate in Music Composition at Princeton University. She is professor of violin and composition at The New School. In May 2021, she began her three-year appointment as the Mead Composer-in-Residence with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra. jessiemontgomery.com
Recently deemed “one of the more consistently inventive, surprising composers now working in New York” (New York Times), “Brooklyn’s post-millennial Mozart” (Time Out NY), and praised for her “apocalyptic imagination” (Alex Ross, The New Yorker), Missy Mazzoli has had her music performed by the Kronos Quartet, LA Opera, eighth blackbird, the BBC Symphony, the Minnesota Orchestra, Scottish Opera and many others. In 2018 she became, along with Jeanine Tesori, the first woman to receive a main stage commission from the Metropolitan Opera, and was nominated for a Grammy award in the category of “Best Classical Composition.”
From 2018-2021 Mazzoli was Mead Composer-in-Residence at the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, and from 2012-2015 was Composer-in-Residence with Opera Philadelphia. Her 2018 opera Proving Up, created with longtime collaborator librettist Royce Vavrek and based on a short story by Karen Russell, is a surreal commentary on the American dream. It was commissioned and premiered by Washington National Opera, Opera Omaha and Miller Theatre, and was deemed “harrowing… a true opera for its time” by The Washington Post.
Mazzoli’s 2016 opera Breaking the Waves, commissioned by Opera Philadelphia and Beth Morrison Projects, was called “one of the best 21st-century American operas yet” by Opera News. Breaking the Waves received its European premiere at the 2019 Edinburgh Festival; future performances are planned at LA Opera, Houston Grand Opera, and the Adelaide Festival. Her next opera, The Listeners, will premiere in 2022 at the Norwegian National Opera, Chicago Lyric Opera and Opera Philadelphia.
Mazzoli is also active in the orchestral and chamber music field, recently writing new works for the National Symphony, Cincinnati Symphony, BBC Philharmonia, and the Bergen Symphony, among others. In 2016, Mazzoli and composer Ellen Reid founded Luna Lab, a mentorship program for young female, non-binary and gender nonconforming composers created in partnership with the Kaufman Music Center.
Mazzoli attended the Yale School of Music, the Royal Conservatory of the Hague and Boston University. She has studied with (in no particular order) David Lang, Louis Andriessen, Martin Bresnick, Aaron Jay Kernis, Martijn Padding, Richard Ayres, John Harbison, Charles Fussell, Martin Amlin, Marco Stroppa, Ladislav Kubik, Louis DeLise and Richard Cornell. Her works are published by G. Schirmer. missymazzoli.com
Jessie Montgomery is an acclaimed composer, violinist, and educator. A recipient of the Leonard Bernstein Award from the ASCAP Foundation, the Sphinx Medal of Excellence, Montgomery’s works are performed frequently around the world by leading musicians and ensembles. Her music interweaves classical music with elements of vernacular music, improvisation, poetry, and social consciousness, making her an acute interpreter of 21st century American sound and experience. Her profoundly felt works have been described as “turbulent, wildly colorful and exploding with life” (The Washington Post).
Her growing body of work includes solo, chamber, vocal, and orchestral works. Some recent highlights include Shift, Change, Turn (2019) commissioned by the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra and the Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra, Coincident Dances (2018) for the Chicago Sinfonietta, and Banner (2014)—written to mark the 200th anniversary of “The Star-Spangled Banner”—for The Sphinx Organization and the Joyce Foundation, which was presented in its UK premiere at the BBC Proms on 7 August 2021.
Summer 2021 brought a varied slate of premiere performances, including Five Freedom Songs, a song cycle conceived with and written for soprano Julia Bullock, for Sun Valley and Grand Teton Music Festivals, San Francisco and Kansas City Symphonies, Boston and New Haven Symphony Orchestras, and the Virginia Arts Festival (7 August); a site-specific collaboration with Bard SummerScape Festival and Pam Tanowitz Dance, I was waiting for the echo of a better day (8 July); and Passacaglia, a flute quartet for The National Flute Association’s 49th annual convention (13 August).
Since 1999, Montgomery has been affiliated with The Sphinx Organization, which supports young African American and Latinx string players and has served as composer-in-residence for the Sphinx Virtuosi, the organization’s flagship professional touring ensemble.
A founding member of PUBLIQuartet and a former member of the Catalyst Quartet, Montgomery holds degrees from the Juilliard School and New York University and is currently a PhD Candidate in Music Composition at Princeton University. She is professor of violin and composition at The New School. In May 2021, she began her three-year appointment as the Mead Composer-in-Residence with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra. jessiemontgomery.com
Recently deemed “one of the more consistently inventive, surprising composers now working in New York” (New York Times), “Brooklyn’s post-millennial Mozart” (Time Out NY), and praised for her “apocalyptic imagination” (Alex Ross, The New Yorker), Missy Mazzoli has had her music performed by the Kronos Quartet, LA Opera, eighth blackbird, the BBC Symphony, the Minnesota Orchestra, Scottish Opera and many others. In 2018 she became, along with Jeanine Tesori, the first woman to receive a main stage commission from the Metropolitan Opera, and was nominated for a Grammy award in the category of “Best Classical Composition.”
From 2018-2021 Mazzoli was Mead Composer-in-Residence at the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, and from 2012-2015 was Composer-in-Residence with Opera Philadelphia. Her 2018 opera Proving Up, created with longtime collaborator librettist Royce Vavrek and based on a short story by Karen Russell, is a surreal commentary on the American dream. It was commissioned and premiered by Washington National Opera, Opera Omaha and Miller Theatre, and was deemed “harrowing… a true opera for its time” by The Washington Post.
Mazzoli’s 2016 opera Breaking the Waves, commissioned by Opera Philadelphia and Beth Morrison Projects, was called “one of the best 21st-century American operas yet” by Opera News. Breaking the Waves received its European premiere at the 2019 Edinburgh Festival; future performances are planned at LA Opera, Houston Grand Opera, and the Adelaide Festival. Her next opera, The Listeners, will premiere in 2022 at the Norwegian National Opera, Chicago Lyric Opera and Opera Philadelphia.
Mazzoli is also active in the orchestral and chamber music field, recently writing new works for the National Symphony, Cincinnati Symphony, BBC Philharmonia, and the Bergen Symphony, among others. In 2016, Mazzoli and composer Ellen Reid founded Luna Lab, a mentorship program for young female, non-binary and gender nonconforming composers created in partnership with the Kaufman Music Center.
Mazzoli attended the Yale School of Music, the Royal Conservatory of the Hague and Boston University. She has studied with (in no particular order) David Lang, Louis Andriessen, Martin Bresnick, Aaron Jay Kernis, Martijn Padding, Richard Ayres, John Harbison, Charles Fussell, Martin Amlin, Marco Stroppa, Ladislav Kubik, Louis DeLise and Richard Cornell. Her works are published by G. Schirmer. missymazzoli.com
08-03-2022
The Borromeo String Quartet (BSQ), now entering its 33rd season, will welcome violist and Bard Conservatory faculty member Melissa Reardon as the newest member of the ensemble. Reardon takes the place of Mai Motobuchi, who is retiring from performing after a remarkable 22-year tenure in the quartet. Leading a multifaceted career, Reardon is an artist in residence at Bard College and the Bard Conservatory, artistic director of the Portland Chamber Music Festival, and a founding member and executive director of East Coast Chamber Orchestra.
A Grammy-nominated performer, Reardon was the violist of the Ensō Quartet from 2006 to 2018. On joining the BSQ, she says, “I have long admired the Borromeo String Quartet and I feel so incredibly excited and lucky to join Nick Kitchen, Kris Tong, and Yeesun Kim. I have some big shoes to fill and hope to honor Mai Motobuchi’s legacy in the group. It is a dream come true to have the opportunity to play quartets with these musicians!” Reardon begins performing with the BSQ in August 2022.
A Grammy-nominated performer, Reardon was the violist of the Ensō Quartet from 2006 to 2018. On joining the BSQ, she says, “I have long admired the Borromeo String Quartet and I feel so incredibly excited and lucky to join Nick Kitchen, Kris Tong, and Yeesun Kim. I have some big shoes to fill and hope to honor Mai Motobuchi’s legacy in the group. It is a dream come true to have the opportunity to play quartets with these musicians!” Reardon begins performing with the BSQ in August 2022.
08-03-2022
Viveca Lawrie wasn’t looking to come to Bard. She was discovered—by a member of the faculty at the Bard College Conservatory of Music.
Lawrie recalls that Edward Carroll, who teaches trumpet, heard her play and asked her to apply to Bard. She enrolled in the Conservatory, as a bachelor of music student in trumpet performance, and in the College, as a bachelor or arts student majoring in French studies, with a concentration in medieval studies. “The double degree appealed to me,” says the Sedona, Arizona, native. “Trumpet and French are two things I enjoy.”
Her first impression of Bard was of “a beautiful campus.” Her next impression was one of welcome. “It’s a small community and I felt part of it right away.” She soon met Karen Sullivan, Irma Brandeis Professor of Romance Literature and Culture, “and that set me up for the rest of my academic career.” She credits Sullivan with teaching classes “that were 100 percent fun,” and Carroll with “being on board with my love of contemporary music, and help with the technical side” of horn virtuosity. “Bard is very good at matching you with someone,” she says.
At the Conservatory, she and colleagues played together and critiqued one another in “brass class.” “We are a tight-knit group. We really support each other,” she says. “Elsewhere there’s competition, but it’s never been that way here.”
At Bard, “I definitely learned how to write an essay and push the boundaries of how to study.” A surprise was realizing how much she enjoyed academic research and “learning history from the perspective not of the conqueror but of those not in power. This is something that will forever influence how I approach all my research.”
With work for her Senior Project in Welsh Arthurian legend, and her Graduation Recital in trumpet, she has little time for extracurricular activities. But she works in the Conservatory audio-visual office on live streaming and recording, and gave AV assistance to a student-organized concert to benefit a Conservatory student whose family is suffering from consequences of COVID-19.
For Lawrie, that kind of outreach exemplifies the Bard community. “I meet people who are interested in what I’m doing and I’m open to what they’re doing. It’s healthy that we all show such curiosity.”
After graduation, she plans to apply to an MA program in Wales, then a PhD in comparative literature; she also wants to commission composers of contemporary works. “I think people should have multiple options,” she says.
How should high school students prepare for Bard? “Come with an open mind. I can’t stress enough how wonderful a preparation Bard’s Language and Thinking Program is for thinking about the world.” She adds, “And come uncomfortable, because you won’t be used to such focused thinking. But don’t feel afraid of it, and be open to listening to others.”
Bard has changed Lawrie’s life in myriad ways. “I am a lot more confident,” she says. “As a homeschooled student, I learned to live on my own. Here I’ve learned how to make friends. I’ve learned—through the support system, counseling, and Upper College students who do tutorials—how to deal when things don’t go my way. Every professor lets me know I can come to them with any problem, especially in the Conservatory. And the French Studies Program has more of a support system than I could imagine, in terms of recommendations, tutoring, wanting to help. Not a lot of colleges have that.”
Lawrie recalls that Edward Carroll, who teaches trumpet, heard her play and asked her to apply to Bard. She enrolled in the Conservatory, as a bachelor of music student in trumpet performance, and in the College, as a bachelor or arts student majoring in French studies, with a concentration in medieval studies. “The double degree appealed to me,” says the Sedona, Arizona, native. “Trumpet and French are two things I enjoy.”
Her first impression of Bard was of “a beautiful campus.” Her next impression was one of welcome. “It’s a small community and I felt part of it right away.” She soon met Karen Sullivan, Irma Brandeis Professor of Romance Literature and Culture, “and that set me up for the rest of my academic career.” She credits Sullivan with teaching classes “that were 100 percent fun,” and Carroll with “being on board with my love of contemporary music, and help with the technical side” of horn virtuosity. “Bard is very good at matching you with someone,” she says.
At the Conservatory, she and colleagues played together and critiqued one another in “brass class.” “We are a tight-knit group. We really support each other,” she says. “Elsewhere there’s competition, but it’s never been that way here.”
At Bard, “I definitely learned how to write an essay and push the boundaries of how to study.” A surprise was realizing how much she enjoyed academic research and “learning history from the perspective not of the conqueror but of those not in power. This is something that will forever influence how I approach all my research.”
With work for her Senior Project in Welsh Arthurian legend, and her Graduation Recital in trumpet, she has little time for extracurricular activities. But she works in the Conservatory audio-visual office on live streaming and recording, and gave AV assistance to a student-organized concert to benefit a Conservatory student whose family is suffering from consequences of COVID-19.
For Lawrie, that kind of outreach exemplifies the Bard community. “I meet people who are interested in what I’m doing and I’m open to what they’re doing. It’s healthy that we all show such curiosity.”
After graduation, she plans to apply to an MA program in Wales, then a PhD in comparative literature; she also wants to commission composers of contemporary works. “I think people should have multiple options,” she says.
How should high school students prepare for Bard? “Come with an open mind. I can’t stress enough how wonderful a preparation Bard’s Language and Thinking Program is for thinking about the world.” She adds, “And come uncomfortable, because you won’t be used to such focused thinking. But don’t feel afraid of it, and be open to listening to others.”
Bard has changed Lawrie’s life in myriad ways. “I am a lot more confident,” she says. “As a homeschooled student, I learned to live on my own. Here I’ve learned how to make friends. I’ve learned—through the support system, counseling, and Upper College students who do tutorials—how to deal when things don’t go my way. Every professor lets me know I can come to them with any problem, especially in the Conservatory. And the French Studies Program has more of a support system than I could imagine, in terms of recommendations, tutoring, wanting to help. Not a lot of colleges have that.”
listings 1-3 of 3