Class Notes

Eastman School of Music

1948
Marvin Rabin (MM) was awarded the Presidential Medal at Loyola University in April 2003 “in recognition of 18 years of guidance and support for string education in the College of Music and a lifetime of leadership and dedication to music education throughout the world.” He is professor emeritus of music and director of the Wisconsin String and Orchestral Development Program at the University of Wisconsin–Madison.

1953
Margaret Walsh Palmieri (Mas) (see ’54).

1954
Robert Palmieri (Mas) is editor of the second edition of Encyclopedia of the Piano. Margaret Walsh Palmieri ’53 (Mas) is associate editor.

1957
Sydney Hodkinson ’58 (MM) premiered several works in 2003, including Short Cuts: Dances & Vespers at Del Mar College in Corpus Christi, Texas; Drawings, Set No. 13 at Rice University’s Shepherd School of Music in Houston; and Monumentum Pro Umbris and Tela Lacerata at Stetson University in Deland, Fla. His Overture: A Little Travelin’ Music, for orchestra, Drawings, Set No. 9, for percussion trio, and Requiescant, for chamber sextet, were performed at the Aspen Music Festival last summer.

1958
Nicholas Di Virgilio, professor of voice at the University of Illinois, writes to say that more than 50,000 school children have taken part in his 14-year outreach program, YOPE (Youth Opera Preparation and Education). In 2003, he gave master classes and adjudicated competitions throughout the United States. He also stage directed several operas at Illinois. He is planning to retire in May but will keep busy freelancing.

1959
A profile of Ron Carter was the cover story of the September 2003 issue of Bass Player magazine.

1962
June Ackroyd ’64 (MM) writes, “I recently gave a faculty recital at Northern Michigan University featuring music for voice and instruments. I am completing my 25th year as a member of the music faculty.”

1969
Mary Bickel (MM), ’91W (EdD) (see ’91RC graduate).

1973
Jeff Tyzik ’77 (MM), principal pops conductor of the Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra and associate professor of jazz studies and contemporary media at Eastman, made his subscription series debut as the principal pops conductor for the Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra last November. Also in November, he conducted the Omaha Symphony in a pops program of music from the Big Band era, for which he wrote many of the arrangements.

1974
William DiCosimo and Lisa Coolican were married on August 14, 2003, in Cicero, N.Y. He is an assistant professor of music industry at Syracuse University. They live in Cicero.

1975
Waddy Thompson, director of external affairs at the New York Foundation for the Arts, has written The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Grant Writing.

1976
Composer Bradley Nelson’s (DMA) three-movement choral work For Whom the Bell Tolls had its premiere at the California Music Educators Convention in Pasadena, Calif., on March 15, 2003. The second movement of In Flanders Fields was selected for performance by high school honor choirs in central and northern California, and the entire work was performed by the Williamsport (Pa.) Civic Chorus. Streaming recordings and scores are available on Brad’s Web site, www.gladdemusic.com.

1981
William Picher (MM), organist and director of music ministries at Mary, Queen of the Universe Shrine in Orlando, Fla., has recorded a new CD, Te Deum.

1983
William Eddins ’85 (MM), resident conductor of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, led the Dallas Symphony Orchestra, Dallas Symphony Chorus, Children’s Chorus of Greater Dallas, and soloists in two performances of Leonard Bernstein’s Mass last November.

1986
Donna Coleman (DMA), head of keyboard at the Victorian College of the Arts in Australia, e-mails to applaud friend and classmate Louis Goldstein ’80 (DMA): “Dr. Goldstein and I were in the first class of students undertaking the doctor of musical arts at Eastman from 1976 to 1978. He recently has received sensational critical acclaim for his compact disc recording of American composer Morton Feldman’s Triadic Memories, considered by some to be the most important work written for the piano in the 20th century.” Louis is a professor at Wake Forest University. . . . Jonathan Gilley (see ’87).

1987
Laurann Littleton Gilley (MA) e-mails that she and husband, Jonathan Gilley ’86, “are moving back to New York after six years in San Francisco, where Jonathan has been music director at City Church of San Francisco. He will be working for Redeemer Presbyterian Church in Manhattan and freelancing, and I will continue working as a vocal coach/accompanist. We have two sons, Jasper, 4, and Jaden, 1.” . . . William Lumpkin, music director of Boston University’s Opera Institute, joined forces with the university’s theater arts director to present contemporary opera in last year’s Fall Fringe Festival as a crossover project. He says of the collaboration, “Students can come learn to design a set, do a lighting plot, sing, whatever. It feels like we’re running a little opera company here.”

1989
David Eby toured Turkey last fall as cellist with the fusion band Pink Martini, performing songs from the group’s second album. David also plays with the Portland, Ore., opera and teaches and composes music.

1991
Laura Griffiths is the principal oboist for the Cleveland Orchestra. She held the same position in the Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra from 1994 through 2003. . . . Oboist Keve Wilson married trombonist Kerry Farrell, a UCLA graduate and outreach director of the Henry Mancini Institute. They live in Los Angeles.

1992
Percussionist Ingrid Gordon leads the contemporary chamber ensemble Time’s Arrow, which premiered in October a commissioned work by composer Charles Griffin that involves community participation in its performance.

1993
Elizabeth Blades-Zeller (DMA) writes to say that her two books published in 2002, Singing with Your Whole Self: The Feldenkrais Method and Voice and A Spectrum of Voices: Prominent American Voice Teachers Discuss the Teaching of Singing, are receiving national and international attention. Singing is being translated into German. Both books have been reviewed in the Journal of Singing and other publications. . . . Christopher Koch completed his DMA in conducting at the University of Washington last spring and joined the Bethel College music faculty in August as an assistant professor. He conducted the Bethel College Sinfonia for the first time in a concert last November.

1995
Andrea Banke is principal oboist with the Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra. . . . Peter Fletcher (MM) e-mailed in October to announce concerts in Atlanta and Chicago as well as a Midwest tour.

1997
Pianist Jennifer Blyth (DMA), associate professor of music at Dickinson College, performed in a concert at Dickinson last November. She is a member of the Helding/Blyth Duo and the Timaeus Ensemble.

1999
Mike Sakash (MM) is an assistant professor of music at Washington & Jefferson College in Pennsylvania. He is also a member of the Traverser Saxophone Quartet, which released a CD last fall and will tour Europe this summer.

2001
Thomas Rosenkranz (MM), an Eastman doctoral student and American Pianists Association fellow, performed in a recital at SUNY College at Brockport last September.

2002
Cellist Sandra Halleran (MM) is a music fellow in the New World Symphony in Miami.

2003
Danielle McCormick, a master’s degree student at Eastman, appeared as Maria in the Atlanta Lyric Theatre’s production of West Side Story last November.