News

CARTHAGE-crossing-primosch

Album Release! New Music of Professor James Primosch and The Crossing

GRAMMY-winning choir The Crossing releases CARTHAGE, an album featuring six striking pieces by composer and Penn faculty member James Primosch.
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Professor Dr. Guthrie Ramsey is Elected to The American Academy of Arts & Sciences!

The Department of Music is beyond thrilled for Dr. Guthrie Ramsey, Edmund J. and Louise W. Kahn Term Professor of Music, one of the newest members of the extraordinary American Academy of Arts & Sciences. Academy members are world leaders in the arts and sciences, business, philanthropy, and public affairs.
kraines-kang-duo

Live Stream Performance of Juliette Kang and Tom Kraines hosted by Philadelphia Musicians Union Local 77

Streaming live on Wednesday, April 15 at 7:00 PM is the duo performance of Juliette Kang and Tom Kraines, member of the University of Pennsylvania's resident string quartet, Daedalus Quartet
juan-ney-flute-exhibit

Juan Castrillón, Ph.D. candidate in Ethnomusicology curates multimodal exhibition, "Re-Covering the Ney Collection"

Re-Covering the Ney Collection features a set of four reed-flute instruments brought from Egypt during the nineteenth century along with contemporary research on new organology and ethno-musicology.
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Congratulations to Professor James Primosch on his 2020 award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters

Professor of Music, James Primosch wins the 2020 Virgil Thomson Award in Vocal Music of $40,000, which recognizes an American composer of vocal works. The award, endowed by the Virgil Thomson Foundation and administered by the American Academy of Arts and Letters, recognizes an American composer of vocal works. Candidates were nominated by the Academy’s members, and the winner was chosen by a committee of Academy members: Melinda Wagner (chairperson), Robert Beaser, Martin Bresnick, Chen Yi, George Lewis, David Rakowski, and Augusta Read Thomas.   
jeremy-gill

Penn alumni Jeremy Gill wins 2020 award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters

We congratulate former Penn Doctoral Fellow of the Department of Music who receives the 2020 Goddard Lieberson Fellowship of $15,000, endowed in 1978 by the CBS Foundation. The award is given to mid-career composers of exceptional gifts. Bravo!
Flannery

Flannery Cunningham, Third Year Graduate in Composition and Musicology wins 2020 Hildegard Competition

Flannery Cunningham is a composer and musicologist fascinated by vocal expression, auditory perception, and the resonances of environmental sounds. She aims to write music that surprises and delights. Her work has been performed at festivals such as Aspen, June in Buffalo, TCML, SPLICE, and Copland House’s CULTIVATE and by performers such as International Contemporary Ensemble, TAK, and Music from Copland House. Her current projects include commissions for PRISM Quartet and Musiqa Houston and a new work for Sō Percussion.
Jennifer-Higdon

Jennifer Higdon honored through Penn's 2019 Alumni Award of Merit Gala!

Award-winning composer, Jennifer Higdon (PH.D. in Composition '94), received the 2019 Creative Spirit Award for her life-long commitment to and excellence in the arts. She received her PhD and master’s degrees from Penn following a certificate from the Curtis Institute of Music and bachelor’s from Bowling Green State University. A Pulitzer Prize and two-time Grammy Award winner, Dr. Higdon is one of this country’s most frequently performed living composers. As the Milton L.
ian-macmillen

Ian MacMillen (Ph.D. 2012) publishes book

Playing It Dangerously:  Tambura Bands, Race, and Affective Block in Croatia and Its Intiamtes (Music/Culture). Wesleyan University Press.