eNews: InterNetzo – March 2022
Message from Seth Brenzel, Executive Director
Dear Walden friend,
I hope this newsletter finds you well. Winter is about to turn into spring, which means summer cannot be that far off. If you’re like me, you are already dreaming of all things summer—and Walden!
I urge you to check out the In the Spotlight section to hear from Junior Conservatory Camp (JCC) alumna and Walden donor Amy Catlin-Jairazbhoy. She has a unique story to share with all of us.
We have not published in a few months, and so there is lots of Community News to share, with still more to come in our April issue. Do you have news to share with us? Please contact us at waldenschool.org/contact, and if we can include your news (career, personal, musical, community, family, etc.), we will.
I hope you enjoy this edition of InterNetzo.
Best wishes,
Seth Brenzel
Executive Director
(415) 587-8157
Walden News
Apply to be part of Summer 2022!
Applications are open for Walden's summer programs, the Young Musicians Program (ages 9–18) and the Creative Musicians Retreat (ages 18-88+).
We are thrilled to welcome back so many returning faculty members for both programs, including Sam Pluta, Osnat Netzer, and Renée Favand-See for the Creative Musicians Retreat and Cara Haxo, Alex Christie, and Lukáš Janata for the Young Musicians Program, among many others. Lei Liang will be the composer-in-residence for the Creative Musicians Retreat, and Amy Beth Kirsten will be the composer-in-residence for the Young Musicians Program.
Start your application today at waldenschool.org/apply. Please tell your friends, family, and colleagues that Walden is currently enrolling for summer 2022!
Application Deadline
April 1
2022 Program Dates
Creative Musicians Retreat
June 11–19, 2022
on the campus of the Brewster Academy in Wolfeboro, New Hampshire
Young Musicians Program
June 25–July 31, 2022
June 25–July 17 (3-week option available to students 7th grade and younger)
on the campus of the Dublin School in Dublin, New Hampshire
Financial aid is available. Applications received after April 1 will be reviewed as they are received until our programs are fully enrolled.
Walden West has moved
Walden West has movedWe have moved Walden’s year-round administrative office to:
7 Joost Avenue, Suite 204
San Francisco, CA, 94131
Please update your records.
Our lease was up, and we found a wonderful new office just around the corner from our most recent administrative office. Seth and Elizabeth Susskind (Walden’s administrative assistant) are excited to be in our new place, and many thanks to Elizabeth and Walden alumnus Noah Mlotek for all of their help in effecting the move.
We hope you’ll come visit us soon!
Comings and goings at Walden
We are thrilled to welcome past Walden staff member and Walden alumnus Noah Mlotek as Walden’s interim Development Manager. In February, we bid adieu to Gloria Yehilevsky, who ably served in the development role after Gaela Dennison-Leonard departed Walden in May 2021 to pursue graduate studies. We thank both Gaela and Gloria for their service to Walden and wish them the very best in all of their future endeavors.
Noah will be with Walden in his role for the coming months, and we are also still searching for a more permanent Development Manager to work with our team in San Francisco and with our donors, alumni, and board throughout the world. Know anyone? Check out the job posting here.
We are delighted to welcome two new wonderful board members to Walden’s board: Bob Bassett and Sarah Stroud. Bob is a CMR alumnus who lives in the Denver area, and Sarah is parent to YMP alumna and staff member Francesca Hellerman and resides in Chapel Hill, North Carolina. This year, we also bade farewell to outgoing board members Carlos Shimizu and Matthew Levy. We were so grateful to have their service and support, and we look forward to staying connected in the months and years ahead.
Walden ends year with strong Annual Fund results
During fiscal year 2021 (October 1, 2020–September 30, 2021), Walden raised more than $370,000 with the help of more than 300 donors, foundations, and other organizations, with the community coming together to raise approximately $100,000 just during September, the final month of our Annual Fund drive. We are so grateful to all of our donors who help make possible amazing artist residencies, critical scholarships, and our amazing faculty and staff each and every summer. We can’t wait for Summer 2022—we’re already making wonderful plans. Walden’s loyal and generous community of supporters ensures that we can dream about summer hikes and swims in Dublin Lake all year long. THANK YOU to our donors and supporters who help us create the music, community, and memories each and every summer.
Community Events
Giving Day Summer 2021
On the last full day of classes at the Young Musicians Program (YMP), and first day of YMP Festival Week, we held our Giving Day fundraiser, sharing a day at Walden via Facebook Live. This included classes, rehearsals, student and faculty interviews, and more insights, culminating in our first Festival Week Composers Forum streamed on YouTube.
This fundraiser brought in a total of $8,003 in donations, surpassing our goal of $4,900 in honor of Walden's 49th season. We were happy to see the Walden community so engaged online, and even saw some fresh faces wander our way and support us.
WOW! Walden Online Workshop featuring Matt Gold
Percussionist and Walden visiting artist Matt Gold presented FROM THE EARTH, this year's first Walden Online Workshop (WOW), on February 22. In this interactive workshop, participants explored how the material qualities of percussion instruments directly influence the sound and structure of a piece. Participants explored innovative works by Frederic Rzewski, Nomi Epstein, John Cage, Carolyn Chen, and Juri Seo. Then, they created music collaboratively using objects from everyday life.
Thanks to Matt and our participants for a wonderful workshop!
In the Spotlight
Amy Catlin-Jairazbhoy
Amy is a Junior Conservatory Camp (JCC) alumna with deep ties to Grace Cushman and her teachings. She is also a donor to Walden who carries herself with a lively and passionate spirit that shines through her research, teaching, music, and everything she does.
Learn more about her work at Apsara Media, and read her full biography on UCLA's website.
How and when did your relationship with the Junior Conservatory Camp (JCC) begin?
My piano teacher in Montgomery County would take me with her every Saturday to Peabody Preparatory; we would take Musicianship classes with Grace Cushman together. Within two years I was teaching my piano teachers' students musicianship as well.
This naturally led to attending the Junior Conservatory Camp for two years, then coming three more years as a faculty member.
In my last two years of high school I studied Bharatanatyam classical dance of South India with Georgia Cushman (one of Grace Cushman's two daughters) in Baltimore. She had just come back from Madras, India (which is Chennai today), where she had studied at Kalakshetra. I was a devoted student, but it's very difficult when you start at 16 years old! That Indian connection was one reason I went to India as a graduate student. I chose college instead of staying at the Conservatory, because I wanted to know more about the rest of the world, especially during the Vietnam War years.
Could you describe a favorite memory from your time at JCC?
I have an aversion to favorites . . . it seems that you are ranking things. I have many favorite memories. The composer forums were stupendous. The performances were breathtaking. To have my own compositions performed—a Robert Frost poem that I set for piano and violin, performed by soprano Shari Fleming. It was the second time I heard my own composition performed.
Also, singing in some of Humphrey Evans' compositions. He was a great inspiration and in my cohort of students. He was a close friend until his last days. He was a genius and iconoclastic, funny, witty. We used to play ping pong together at camp!
What is something from JCC that you have carried with you?
How to improvise with the material you're learning in musicianship. How to make creative use of the knowledge that you acquire was the main teaching that Grace taught all of us. To use what you've learned: if you're just learning facts, you're not making use of it, and you're not using it creatively. That's what I've done with my scholarship also. I try to use it in creative ways, applying music research to address community problems, both in India among underserved communities and here (in the US) with refugees from Southeast Asia: Hmong tribal refugees from Laos and Khmer refugees from the killing fields of Cambodia.
It's so deep. It's so fundamental, the methods that Grace used—not to mention her enthusiasm and her passion!
Mrs. Cushman taught me how to plan a lesson and how to evaluate a lesson after you've taught it. She was very aware of each student's needs, backgrounds, disabilities, insecurities. I still do that—I plan my lectures; I write out every word when I teach now, and afterwards review every line of what I did and what I added. I keep in touch with as many students as I can; it's been born into me because of Grace.
How are music and/or creativity part of your life now?
I've been teaching one course at UCLA for the past 10 years. It's not about classical folk music of India, not about music of the sacred (all topics I taught with my applied work in ethnomusicology); it is called "Music of Bollywood and Beyond." It covers 100 years: from silent films to the present. This history of cinema and music relates deeply to the history and the people of India. I tell my students, most of whom are of Indian heritage, that "you can talk to your grandparents about this." They come back and say they've had the best conversations with their grandparents and parents . . . it bridges the generational gap. Suddenly you have something to share that you both love.
I teach in an applied sort of way. I design the courses myself, and the students are the subjects. We have some great discussions about how films composed 50 years ago might relate to today, about whether they were created before or after independence. It gives it a historical foundation to talk about the films, and the music, and the influence of Western music and jazz.
I also still play the piano. I like to improvise in an Indo-Jazz fusion style which I do sometimes with a partner who plays the saxophone. I've taught him how to improvise in different Ragas (singular Indian Raga), especially one raga that my husband called a "hypothetical" raga because it never occurred, but it should have. It uses the pentatonic (all black keys) with C (tonic) and G (dominant).
What is a non-musical hobby that's part of your life?
Ping pong! It's a great game for musicians. We have an outdoor ping pong "stadium" in our home. It's very good for hand-eye coordination. It's the fastest game there is, good for mental & physical agility. Great for elders, as the sudden movements are good for preventing Alzheimer's.
I also love to dance: couple dancing, or ballroom dancing and Middle Eastern dance. Coordinating with the music is so important—and so good for the brain. I also exercise at the gym on the elliptical trainer while watching the news. I watch Indian news every day on three different channels.
Why do you give to Walden?
Transformation.
When I went to the Peabody, I was teaching there in my Junior and Senior years of high school. In fact, I had left home.
She [Grace Cushman] made it possible for me to leave by getting me this job as a live-in cook and babysitter for the six children of the Rector of St. Paul's cathedral. So, I could afford to leave Chicago where my parents had moved, which I hated! I was able stay on in Baltimore after camp.
See what a difference this made in my life? It made me independent from the time I was 16 . . . I didn't see my parents for two years. I'm telling you: she transformed my life. I owe my life to her. So, when you ask why do I give to Walden? That's why. The transformation of my life.
What hope do you have for Walden's future?
I would love to see a connection with NPR's "From the Top," and to see more international scope, incorporating music from different cultures!
Community News
Leah Reid wins The American Prize; Shawn Crouch ties for 3rd place
YMP alumna Leah was selected from applications reviewed from across the United States, for one of the nation's most competitive non-profit awards offered by The American Prize National Nonprofit Competitions in the Performing Arts. Leah won in the professional vocal chamber music division for her composition Apple; Single Fish. View the full announcement here.
Also, third prize was tied with YMP alumnus and past faculty member Shawn Crouch.
Congratulations to Leah and Shawn!
Freya Waley-Cohen named Composer in Residence of London Chamber Orchestra
YMP Alumna Freya Waley-Cohen has been announced as the London Chamber Orchestra’s Composer in Residence for 2021–22, the orchestra's 100th Anniversary season. View the full announcement of Freya's residency here. On the 26th of October, the LCO opened their concert season with Freya's composition Saffron. This year, Freya will work closely with the LCO on performances of her music, compose two new works for the ensemble, and run workshops for young composers.
New arrangement of Carol Thomas Downing's Walden by Loretta Notareschi
YMP alumna Loretta Notareschi arranged Walden for choir, violin, and piano with a video assembled by the Skagit Valley Chorale. The Chorale recorded the parts from home, which were put together, edited, mixed, and mastered by artistic director Dr. Adam Burdick. In lieu of solo violin, six tracks were compiled for a section sound.
Mivos Quartet travels to Europe
Past visiting artists Mivos Quartet completed a tour to Salzburg, Vienna, Monheim, and Düsseldorf—their first trip abroad since the pandemic. They performed works by Michaela Catranis, Hannah Kendall, Peter Kramer, Henry Threadgill, Jennifer Walshe, Sam Amidon, Sofia Gubaidulina, and past YMP and CMR Composer-in-Residence George Lewis.
Walden alumna and past faculty member Nnenna Ogwo's Juneteenth Legacy Project
On June 18, 2021, Juneteenth Legacy Project (Juneteenth LP), founded by Nnenna, presented a Juneteenth celebration entitled "Songs of Resistance and Restoration" at Bunker Hill Community College (BHCC) in Boston.
For Juneteenth, the group performed outdoors in Astor Place in New York City, joined by guest artist Donnie Johns playing percussion. This event was free and open to the public, hosted by Joe's Pub, as part of Make Music New York.
Alistair Wen receives honorable mention from MTNA for Walden festival piece
YMP student Alistair Wen was recognized by the California Music Teachers National Association for his composition Lunar Waltz, composed at the Young Musicians Program 2021. Congratulations, Al!
Brent Morden writes, conducts Dante-inspired musical
In October, CMR alumnus Brent Morden announced the opening of Infernal the Musical at The Flea Theater in New York. Infernal is a "rock musical based on Dante’s Inferno that explores consequences, remorse, and our own inescapable demons" and features music composed and conducted by Morden. Learn more about Brent's musical projects on his website. Congratulations on your premiere, Brent!
Nat Osborn releases The Quarry Island Sessions
In June 2021, YMP alumnus and former visiting artist Nat Osborn released this collection of music recorded while quarantined in Nova Scotia the previous year. "The record plays as a week-to-week musical diary of the early pandemic months when I was stuck in Nova Scotia. Each song is one week's reflection of those uncertain times, ordered chronologically." Learn the story behind the music and view associated images. It is available on Spotify, Apple Music, and all other streaming platforms.
Peter Thompson invited to serve as Vicar of St. Bartholomew's Church
YMP alumnus Peter Thompson has enthusiastically accepted an invitation to serve as Vicar of St. Bartholomew's Church in the City of New York. View the Facebook announcement by St. Bart's of New York City, and read the full announcement, as letters from Bishop Wolfe and Reverend Peter Thompson, here.
Congratulations, Peter! We wish you the best in this exciting new role.
Live Splinter Reeds concert in Oakland
On November 21, Splinter Reeds presented an in-person program of music by Amadeus Regucera and Yannis Kyriakides at Dresher Ensemble Studio in Oakland, California, as part of the Dresher Ensemble Artist Residency. Splinter Reeds is a reed ensemble comprising Kyle Bruckmann (oboe), Bill Kalinkos (clarinet), David Wegehaupt (saxophone), Jeff Anderle (bass clarinet), and Dana Jessen (bassoon). Splinter Reeds has been a visiting artist and faculty commissioning ensemble at YMP, and Dana Jessen is a current member of The Walden School Players and past YMP faculty member. Read more about Splinter Reeds and stay apprised of future performances on the ensemble's website.
Josie Spencer sculptures exhibited
An exhibition of work by sculptor Josie Spencer, a YMP alumni parent, was on display through January 3 at Riverside Studios, Queen Caroline Street, Hammersmith, London, U.K. The exhibition featured 19 sculptures forming the set of Damage Control, an audio play written by Polly Wiseman.
Alan Chan Jazz Orchestra
Alan Chan, former Young Musicians Program faculty member and alumnus of the Teacher Training Institute (TTI), will perform this season with the Los Angeles-based Alan Chan Jazz Orchestra and the Alan Chan Moo-sic Quartet in venues across the United States. A Moo-sic Quartet concert at the Huntington Botanical Gardens in San Marino, California, in September featured vocalist Laura Dickinson singing jazz standards and songs in English, Mandarin, and Cantonese. Read more about upcoming performances on Chan's website.
Tune in to Lisa Bielawa's Broadcast from Here Radio
BFH Radio (Broadcast from Here) is a continuous and evolving soundscape composed by Lisa Bielawa, incorporating words, voices, and found audio from participants all over the world. Anyone, anywhere can visit the Broadcast from Here page to read more about the project, listen to the broadcast live, or contribute speech, singing, or instrumental performances through the BFH Radio portal. Contributions are integrated into the BFH Radio stream on a rolling basis, and the stream is live 24/7. Lisa Bielawa was Composer-in-Residence at the Online Creative Musicians Experience (OCME) in 2020.
Mary Fineman performs at Flower Piano
Mary Fineman, an alumna of the Junior Conservatory Camp (JCC), the predecessor program to The Walden School, performed in September at the San Francisco Botanical Garden as part of Flower Piano. This five-day event, held last year in September after a two-year hiatus, featured over 75 piano performances throughout the Botanical Garden's many exhibit gardens.
Nathan Davis announces fatherhood and new projects
Our heartfelt congratulations to composer, percussionist, and many-time Walden School visiting artist Nathan Davis, who announced the birth of his son this year. Davis's new work Seedling for harmonium and electronics was recorded by frequent Walden visiting artist Jacob Greenberg and released on Greenberg's album Bright Codes in November of this year. A new album of solo music by Davis is slated to follow.
Denise Ondishko Premieres New Music in Cleveland
YMP alumna, faculty member, and past board member Denise Ondishko's new work A More Perfect Union: Reflections on American Equality, Justice, and Hope was performed in September 2021 by members of the Cleveland Chamber Orchestra at Shrine Church of Stanislaus in Cleveland. A More Perfect Union will be professionally recorded by Pantheon Ensemble during summer 2022.
American Academy honors Walden composers
Four Walden-affiliated composers were among the winners of 2022 music awards from the prestigious American Academy of Arts and Letters. Former YMP faculty member Katie Balch won the Wladimir and Rhoda Lakond Award in Music. Arts and Letters Awards were given to Marcos Balter (past YMP and CMR composer-in-residence) and Jim Mobberley (also past YMP and CMR composer-in-residence and former Walden board member). And former YMP faculty member Michael Gilbertson won a Goddard Lieberson Fellowship. These awards recognize outstanding artistic achievement. All of us at Walden send our heartfelt congratulations to these wonderful artists and teachers!
George Brandon and Blue Unity Sextet
In February, CMR alumnus George Brandon's Blue Unity Sextet presented an online watch party as part of the New York City Multicultural Festival's series "The Healing." Performing Jazz, blues, and folk music, Brandon's musical practice is firmly rooted in the cultures of Africa, the Caribbean, and the United States. The watch party, which also features an interview with Brandon, can be viewed here.
Elizabeth R. Austin interviewed
Elizabeth R. Austin was interviewed about her accomplished career as a composer as part of Composers Corner, a series hosted by the Jenks Center in Winchester, Massachusetts. The interview can be viewed here. Austin is an alumna of the Junior Conservatory Camp (JCC), starting in its very first year!
Shawn Crouch's choral music performed
Shawn Crouch's piece Lullaby from Paradise, in a new TTBB version, was written for Cantus for their fall 2021 tour. The performance can be viewed here. Shawn is a YMP alumnus and former YMP and CMR faculty member. He is currently Assistant Professor of Practice of Composition and Theory at the University of Miami's Frost School of Music, where he is artistic director of the Ensemble Ibis New Music Ensemble.
Sam Pluta and Kate Soper release new album
The Understanding of All Things, a new album by Sam Pluta and Kate Soper, was released March 4 on New Focus Recordings. This bracing collection explores the ever-shifting hierarchy between text-driven and music-dominated vocal work. Composer/electronic musician Sam Pluta was a Walden faculty member for more than 15 summers, and will be back at CMR on faculty in 2022! Along with composer/vocalist/pianist Kate Soper, he is also a member of Wet Ink Ensemble, which has been a visiting ensemble on several different occasions at Walden.
Eric Wubbels profiled in New York Times
Pianist/composer Eric Wubbels, a former member of The Walden School Players and a member of Wet Ink, was profiled in the New York Times. The article charted Wubbels's growing exploration of improvisation and his new album, Field of Action / contraposition, with Walden alumna Charmaine Lee and Weston Olencki.
Condolences to Eve Sybor
Walden alumnus David Saslav let us know that Walden alumna Eve Sybor’s husband recently passed away. All of us at Walden send our condolences to Eve and her family.
In Memoriam
Shari Fleming
Junior Conservatory Camp (JCC) alumna and faculty member Shari Fleming, the original composer of "Good Night, Music," passed away on January 17, 2022, in Bradford, Vermont, at the age of 87. The Walden School mourns her loss with her family, friends, and all who loved her. All of us who are touched every summer by her music will cherish her memory. An obituary can be found here.
George Crumb
Pioneering American composer George Crumb died on February 6, 2022, at the age of 92. A longtime member of Walden's Advisory Council, he was an inspiration for generations of creative musicians. The Walden community mourns his loss and is grateful for his legacy.
We want to hear from you!
What's been going on? If you have a recent or upcoming premiere, publication, award, new job or program, or a celebratory life event, please share the news at waldenschool.org/contact.
Stay in Touch
You can like The Walden School page on Facebook and join The Walden School private group to hear about events and opportunities throughout the year. You can also find us on Instagram, Twitter, YouTube, bandcamp, and at waldenschool.org.
eNews: InterNetzo – June 2021
Message from Seth Brenzel, Executive Director
Dear Walden friend,
I hope this newsletter finds you well. Summer is right around the corner, and we have just a few spots left at the Young Musicians Program (YMP) for students ages 9-18, which we will offer in person this summer in beautiful Dublin, New Hampshire. If you would like to join us this summer, go to waldenschool.org/apply to get started. Also be sure to check out the list (below) of exemplary faculty, staff, and artists who will be at our programs and featured on our concert series this summer.
We have an exciting Walden Online Workshop (WOW) on Chromaticism in Renaissance Music coming up TODAY, June 3, presented by faculty member and choral director Sarah Riskind. Learn more and register in the Community Events section.
Be sure to check out the In the Spotlight section to hear from Walden parent and board member David Roberts.
I hope you enjoy this June edition of InterNetzo. Stay tuned for details about tuning in to our livestreamed summer concerts. We cannot wait to welcome our CMR students on June 12 and our YMP students on June 26 - back on the campus of the Dublin School, Walden's summer home since 1983!
Sincerely,
Seth
Community Events
Concert with Dave Eggar to benefit Walden
On Sunday, May 2, cellist Dave Eggar, alongside guest artists Phil Faconti, Beth Snapp, and Blake Collins, gave a stunning concert to benefit Walden. The performance, live from Bristol, Tennessee, featured an amazing array of music, blending Paganini with bluegrass, canonical works with those freshly written. You can listen to an audio clip here of Dave and friends performing Amazing Grace.
The event raised $5,619 and counting! If you would like to make a gift to support Walden's transformative programs, it is not too late to contribute to this event! You can give online at waldenschool.org/donate, or by check payable to The Walden School to Walden's office, 30 Monterey Boulevard, Suite E, San Francisco, CA 94131. Your generous gift of any amount makes a difference in the lives of creative musicians.
Stay tuned for more information, and please send any questions to donors@waldenschool.org.
WOW! Walden Online Workshops!
Chromaticism in Renaissance Music:
What Living Musicians Can Learn from Gesualdo and Friends
Thursday, June 3, 7:30pm Eastern
Presented by Sarah Riskind
Join Walden Online Workshops (WOW!) for a presentation by Walden School faculty member, choral conductor, and composer Sarah Riskind.
If you've heard music by Gesualdo, Marenzio, and Lassus, you might realize that some 16th-century composers wielded flats and sharps to great dramatic effect. In fact, Renaissance music theorists connected chromaticism with specific emotions and even genders! But how can you channel their wacky but beautiful sounds into your own composing, singing, and other musical pursuits? This event will be part presentation, part discussion, and part composition workshop. It will be helpful if you have some background in playing/singing/reading music, but even if you don't, you're welcome to come listen and learn! Bring a pencil and some staff paper or blank paper.
This workshop, like all Walden Online Workshops, is free to attend. Only a few spots are left!
Alumni of CMR, YMP, OYME, OCME, TTI, and JCC, parents, donors, faculty, staff, and artists are especially encouraged to attend WOW presentations. Members of the general public are also welcome to join.
Register
About Sarah Riskind
Previously based in Seattle, conductor and composer Sarah Riskind is the Director of Choral Activities at Eureka College in central Illinois. Through her work as choral director and faculty at The Walden School, she has become an advocate for developing musicianship and improvisational skills in choirs of all ages and abilities.
Among her original works are Jewish and Judeo-Christian music, secular pieces with improvisatory elements, and frequent settings with string obbligato parts. Recent premieres include the tenor/bass arrangement of Oseh Shalom by the Appalachian State Glee Club in April 2019, the Robert Frost setting Looking for a Sunset Bird in Winter by the Pacifica Choirs Interludes Ensemble in March 2019, and several arrangements of Judeo-Spanish melodies by the Seattle Jewish Chorale and Sarah's own ensemble Las Kantaderas del Noroeste in November/December 2018. She has also written for the Quince Contemporary Vocal Ensemble, International Contemporary Ensemble, and Ensemble Dal Niente as part of the Walden School Faculty Commissioning Project and is currently involved with the Creative Commissions project through the University of Cincinnati.
Dr. Riskind enjoys accompanying voices as a violinist/fiddler and improvisor, and she has most recently sung soprano in the Mägi Ensemble, a professional Baltic women's choir in Seattle. She holds a DMA in Choral Conducting from University of Washington, an MM in Choral Conducting from University of Wisconsin at Madison, and a BA in Music from Williams College.
In the Spotlight
David Roberts
David Roberts is the parent of YMP alumnus Marco Roberts, and a member of Walden's Board of Directors. Before moving his family to the Seattle area in 2016, David lived and worked in China for 20 years, most recently as a partner in the Beijing office of O'Melveny & Myers where he practiced corporate and securities law. For a brief period, the four-piece Roberts Family Band rocked the Beijing elementary school and office party circuit with an eclectic mix of Beatles, Cui Jian, and Soundgarden covers until breaking up over creative differences. Having retired from his law career, David spends his time writing fiction, competing in table tennis tournaments around the U.S., and skiing every storm possible in the Cascade Range.
How and when did you get connected to Walden?
I first got connected to Walden in 2014. Our family was living in Beijing at the time. My wife is from Beijing, and both our kids, Marco and his younger sister Sophia, had grown up in Beijing all their lives, our home for 13 years. Connecting with Walden was not intuitive or easy, and it's amazing that we found it.
At that time, Marco was becoming immersed in music, through his own initiative. He had started composing on his own and when he watched the movie Amadeus, he completely connected with images of Mozart composing by hand. He figured out how to make his own staff paper and printed it out and started composing a chamber symphony all on his own.
We thought, "Okay, this is not normal" because none of us were teaching him, he was teaching himself. We tried to find a composition teacher in Beijing, but it's very difficult to join that world if you don't have preexisting connections. I was looking online, and I found Walden among several other programs in the US. Something about Walden connected-it just looked right. I called the office and spoke with Seth, and that was really helpful, but it still sounded pretty daunting. How could we get him from Beijing to rural New Hampshire? Seth also put me touch with an alumni parent who was living in Beijing, whose daughter had attended Walden a number of years before, and she put our minds at ease.
What has been your involvement since then?
Marco first attended Walden when he was 12, and he did five summers in a row, from 2015-2019. Our family was still in China during his first summer, then his second summer we were in transition, moving to the Seattle area. We could tell from the first summer that Marco had found his place-he just loved Walden. We could see that he was developing and growing in the program, and knew it was perfect for him. So my initial involvement was just as a parent. I visited a few summers, not every summer, because even from Seattle it isn't an easy trip.
Our summer 2020 plans were still up in the air when the pandemic happened. We were struggling with what to do when OYME became an option. He signed up and it was great--I am so glad he had those four weeks. The program was unexpected and improvisational, and it was really well done. Marco composed several pieces, but his piece for Festival Week was really meaningful. He has a deep interest in geopolitics, especially regions that are often overlooked. He composed a haunting piece inspired by Armenian music called Erasure that explores ongoing conflicts among Turkey and its neighbors. Two months after he finished the piece, war broke out in Nagorno-Karabakh between Armenia and Azerbaijan. That piece really showed what Walden did for him--it went from a love of music to using it as a language to interpret and comment on the world around him.
Could you describe a favorite memory or experience from being a Walden parent?
My favorite experience is basically the whole first summer, how improbable it was and then watching it become a reality. Sophia named it "Operation Marco" because there were so many pieces that needed to come together. As a family we went from Beijing to Seattle, where we put Sophia in a different camp and lived out of a basement apartment while our new home was being remodeled, then Marco and I flew to New York, and drove from there up to New Hampshire together. He was very quiet, and I could tell he was nervous. As we got closer, taking winding roads through the countryside, my phone lost reception and I casually remarked, "Wow, this is really remote," without thinking what Marco was absorbing. Of course, he had grown up in a city of 30 million people, and now we're in the middle of nowhere without cell service. He started to cry. We talked it through, and I tried to reassure him it would be okay, but he was pretty scared. Finally we arrived at Walden, and I was amazed how friendly and warm the vibe was-it was clearly a special place. There were faculty and staff members greeting students, and they immediately made Marco feel welcome. I stuck around for a few hours, and we met other parents and kids, and he started talking to the other kids, so by the time I left I could tell he was going to be okay.
I was still nervous all summer. That drop-off was a big step for him, but I didn't know how he was going to handle five weeks so far from home when he had never done a live-away program before. He called about a week later and told me that one of the senior campers, Jane, had brought a Chinese instrument to camp (a zither, I believe) and said if anyone was interested in composing for it, they should talk to her. He asked, "Should I talk to her?" and I said, "Absolutely!" Then I didn't hear about it for the rest of the summer. We showed up for Festival Week really excited to hear his piece, but he had hardly told us anything about it-when he gets excited about something, he's so immersed he doesn't say much. But we saw the program, so we knew his piece would be for this instrument, along with violin and cello. Jane and The Walden School Players played the piece beautifully, and I know I'm biased as a proud parent, but it was the best thing I'd ever heard. I couldn't believe it. I thought, "This is what he learned in five weeks? This is incredible." It was so different from what he had been writing on his own before going to Walden. Those pieces were impressive to me, but you could tell he was mostly drawing on Mozart. I had never heard him improvise anything remotely like this piece-it was so unique and drew on both his Chinese upbringing and his love of European music and opera. So that first visit is one of my favorite Walden memories.
How are music and/or creativity part of your life?
I grew up with completely non-musical parents who made a concerted effort to expose me to a lot of music. My mother used to joke about being tone-deaf, and neither of my parents really read music, but they put me in piano and trumpet lessons and I sang in the San Francisco Boys Chorus from age 7-13, which was a great experience. So, I am an amateur musician but can play enough piano to have gotten Marco interested in the instrument from a young age.
Now, creativity for me is mostly writing. I left my law career to pursue writing fiction. I've been taking classes at Hugo House in Seattle and working on a novel for several years, which is a difficult project, and I've also written several short stories. That has given me an appreciation for how difficult any creative process is-it's just really hard work. You have to learn craft skills and how to apply them to achieve your creative vision. So a place like Walden, even for an adult musician, is really cool because someone might love music and want to create music, but you have to learn skills too and find a community that supports your creativity. You generally can't just wing it on your own. Pursuing writing has given me a new appreciation for how difficult it is to be an artist.
What is your hope or dream for Walden's future?
Don't fix it if it ain't broken. There is definitely something to be said for preserving traditions and the way things work, but I like how Walden is innovative at the same time. It's this very interesting balance between traditions (those unique Walden-y things that have been done for decades) and also being experimental and on the cutting edge, whether it's digital music, or this past summer turning on a dime to create online programs from scratch that still preserved the Walden feel. My hope is just that Walden keeps going strong, preserves its core traditions, and continues to innovate with the core traditions and its sense of community as the foundation for that growth.
2021 Summer Programs
A few spots remaining for YMP this summer!
Walden is planning to offer our transformative music programs in person this summer in beautiful Dublin, New Hampshire. We cannot wait to gather again in person for a summer of inspiring programs for creative musicians.
Just a few spots remain for our Young Musicians Program, and we will continue to review applications as they are submitted. Act fast to join us this summer!
Young Musicians Program (YMP): June 26-August 1 (for musicians ages 9-18; 3-week option for students up through 7th grade June 26-July 18, 2021)
Get started on your application at waldenschool.org/apply.
Please let us know if you have any questions or would like any additional information about Summer 2021 by writing to us at applicants@waldenschool.org.
Summer Lineup
Summer Faculty, Staff and Artists
We have a tremendous team of faculty, staff, and visiting artists gathering this summer for the Creative Musicians Retreat (CMR) and the Young Musicians Program (YMP). Stay tuned for details about livestreamed concerts this summer!
CMR Leadership Team 2021
Sammi Stone, director of operations (staff)
Alex Christie, director of electronic music (faculty)
Seth Brenzel, executive director (staff)
Caroline Mallonee, program director (faculty)
Loretta Notareschi, faculty
D. J. Sparr, faculty
CMR Faculty 2021
Renée Favand-See, faculty
Osnat Netzer, faculty
Jacob Sachs-Mishalanie, faculty
CMR Staff 2021
Karissa Ulrich, director of health services and nurse
Becca Van Kirk, nurse
Kittie Cooper, staff
Lila Meretzky, staff
Nina Kindrachuk, staff
CMR Visiting Artists
Matthew Gold, percussion
David Friend, piano
Tom Colohan, conductor
Members of the International Contemporary Ensemble:
Alice Teyssier, voice and flute
Peter Evans, trumpet
Ryan Muncy, saxophone
Mazz Swift, violin
Nuiko Wadden, harp
Marcos Balter, Composer-in-Residence
YMP Leadership Team 2021
Sammi Stone, director of operations (staff)
Alex Christie, director of electronic music and academic dean (faculty)
Sarah Riskind, choral director and academic dean (faculty)
Cara Haxo, academic dean (faculty)
Nate May, academic dean (faculty)
Doug Hertz, student activities coordinator (faculty)
Seth Brenzel, program director (staff)
YMP Faculty 2021
Kittie Cooper, director of composers forums
Brian Fancher, faculty
Michael Kropf, faculty
Nate Trier, faculty
Leah Asher, faculty
Emily Ostrom, faculty
Lukás Janata, faculty
YMP Staff 2021
Karissa Ulrich, director of health services and nurse
Becca Van Kirk, nurse
Arté Warren, staff
Anastasia Baker, staff
Demmanuel Gonzalez, staff
Theo Trevisan, staff
Francesca Hellerman, staff
Luke Schroeder, staff
Trevor Danko, staff
2021 Concert Series
All events at 7:30pm. All events closed to the public during 2021. Many events to be livestreamed - stay tuned for details!
Creative Musicians Retreat
June 12 - opening concert, featuring music by Marcos Balter and Walden CMR faculty members
June 13 - presentation by Composer-in-Residence Marcos Balter
June 17 - chamber music concert, featuring performances by faculty, artists, and participants
CMR Composers Forums: June 15, 16, and 18
Young Musicians Program
July 27 - Amadi Azikiwe, violin & viola, Mikael Darmanie, piano
July 2 - Aurora Nealand & The Royal Roses
July 9 - Hub New Music performing world premieres commissioned from Walden's faculty
July 16 - Members of the International Contemporary Ensemble
July 23 - The Walden School Players
July 25 - presentation by Composer-in-Residence Lei Liang
YMP Composers Forums: June 29, July 6, 13, 15, 20
Festival Week Composers Forums: July 26, 27, 28
Community News
Work-in-progress performance from Lisa Bielawa
On May 27, the Kaufman Music Center presented a virtual performance of Lisa Biewala's work-in-progress Centuries in the Hours, an opera experience based on diary entries of American women throughout history. The event was the culmination of Lisa's 2020-21 KMC Artist-in-Residence appointment. Adapting to the global pandemic, Lisa is collaborating with librettist/dramaturg Claire Solomon and film and media director Jess Medenbach and using the isolation women have historically faced, reflected in these diaries, as a formal constraint in creating a unique filmed opera experience. Lisa was Composer-in-Residence at Walden's 2020 Online Creative Musicians Experience.
Del Sol String Quartet
On May 22, Del Sol String Quartet performed as part of "Angel Island Insights," a collaboration with The Last Hoisan Poets - Genny Lim, Nellie Wong and Flo Oy Wong - three descendants of Angel Island immigrants who use poetry to speak their individual truths and creatively reclaim the Hoisan-wa language and culture. The event was presented by the Asian Pacific Islander Cultural Center as part of the "United States Asian America Festival 2021: Forging Our Futures - SOMA & Chinatown." The Zoom program wove together the poetry of The Last Hoisan Poets with performances by Del Sol, music by Asian-American composers Kui Dong, Theresa Wong, Jungyoon Wie, Chen Yi and Huang Ruo. The event also included discussion moderated by Angel Island Immigration Station Foundation's Executive Director Edward Tepporn. Del Sol is a past visiting artist at Walden.
Sky Macklay featured on Tectonics Glasgow 2021
Sky Macklay's piece Trrhythms was performed by violinist Ilya Gringolts on May 8 as part of Tectonics Glasgow 2021. Trrhythms (transformation + rhythms) is built of five sections. Each section uses a different short, rhythmic phrase over and over, while other musical elements such as pitches, dynamics, and timbres go through a transformational process. The transitions between each section foreshadow the next section's rhythm. Tectonics Glasgow 2021 is the eighth iteration of the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra's annual festival, this time a virtual festival with audio and video performances streamed on May 8 and 9. Sky is a Walden alumna and longtime faculty member.
Screenings of Alicia Rabins' 
A Kaddish for Bernie Madoff
Alicia Jo Rabin's film A Kaddish for Bernie Madoff won the audience award for Best Narrative Feature at the Ashland Independent Film Festival, April 24-25. The film was also screened at the Sarasota Film Festival in early May and the Washington DC Jewish JXJ Film Festival May 23-30. In an article for The Atlantic titled "What 'A Kaddish for Bernie Madoff' taught me about Mourning," Daniel Pollack-Pelzner writes, "If Anna Deavere Smith, Sarah Koenig, and Joey Soloway wrote a self-reflexive musical about finance and religion, it might approach the film's impish, mystical spirit." Alicia, a YMP alumna, wrote A Kaddish for Bernie Madoff based on her experience working in an artist residency on Wall Street during the 2008 financial collapse, and premiered it in 2012 as solo chamber-rock opera.
Frank Wallace Memorial Festival and Competition
On May 15 and 16, the Boston Classical Guitar Society presented the first Frank Wallace Memorial Festival & Competition, honoring composer and guitarist Frank Wallace (1952-2020). The online festival and competition included two concerts, a masterclass, and a competition open to students ages 16-22. The headlining artist was William Kanengiser of the Los Angeles Guitar Quartet, and donations made as part of this free event went to the BCGS Frank Wallace Scholarship Fund. Frank and his partner Nancy Knowles made up the contemporary song ensemble Duo LiveOak, and have long been friends and supporters of Walden.
Marriage of John Yankee and Stephanie Weaver
John Yankee and Stephanie Weaver were married on January 17 in San Diego as friends and family joined the festivities virtually. John is a conductor, teacher, composer, and folk musician, and was a member of Walden's faculty for more than 15 years, beginning in 1977, and was a visiting artist as recently as 2012. Stephanie, a pianist, is the Executive Director of the La Jolla Symphony & Chorus, and past Executive Director of the Cape Conservatory in Cape Cod, Massachusetts. Congratulations, John and Stephanie!
We want to hear from you!
What's been going on? If you have a recent or upcoming premiere, publication, award, new job or program, or a celebratory life event, please share the news. Email your news to alumni@waldenschool.org.
Stay in Touch
You can like The Walden School page on Facebook and join The Walden School private group to hear about events and opportunities throughout the year, including upcoming regional alumni Composers Forums and Holiday Parties. You can also find us on Instagram, Twitter, YouTube, bandcamp, and at waldenschool.org.
eNews: InterNetzo – April 2021
Message from Seth Brenzel, Executive Director
Dear Walden friend,
I hope this newsletter finds you well. We are accepting applications for the Young Musicians Program (YMP) and Creative Musicians Retreat (CMR), which we plan to offer in person this summer in beautiful Dublin, New Hampshire. We have an application deadline tomorrow, May 1, so send in your applications and/or be sure the creative musicians in your life do too!
I hope you'll join me online this Sunday, May 2, at 4pm Eastern, for a concert to benefit Walden, featuring renowned cellist Dave Eggar.
We also having an exciting Walden Online Workshop (WOW) presentation with Marcos Balter coming up on May 5. Learn more about these events in the Community Events section, where you'll also learn about our next Alumni Composers Forum on May 23.
Check out the In the Spotlight section to hear from JCC and Walden alumna Robin Seto.
I hope you enjoy this April edition of InterNetzo, and I hope to see you at one or more of our upcoming events!
Sincerely,
Seth
Community Events
Concert with Dave Eggar to benefit Walden
Join us online this Sunday for a concert to celebrate and raise funds for Walden's inspiring music programs, featuring renowned cellist Dave Eggar.
Sunday, May 2, 2021 
4-6pm Eastern time
Featuring cellist Dave Eggar
Dave Eggar is regarded as one of the finest cellists performing today. Dave has been a visiting artist at The Walden School, was a member of The Walden School Players for two summers, and performs frequently at regional Walden events throughout the United States.
Dave will be performing with wonderful guest artists Phil Faconti, Beth Snapp, and Blake Collins.
To join, please register through Eventbrite. Call information and other details will be sent out to attendees before the event. While there is no charge to be part of this event, contributions to support Walden's award-winning programs are encouraged and may be made through Eventbrite when you register, at waldenschool.org/donate or by check mailed to The Walden School, 30 Monterey Blvd., Ste. E, San Francisco, CA 94131.
Stay tuned for more information, and please send any questions to donors@waldenschool.org.
WOW! Walden Online Workshops!
More Walden Online Workshops (WOW) are on the horizon! We are excited to continue sharing this FREE series of lectures, demonstrations, classes, and presentations on a variety of musical topics presented over video call by The Walden School's teaching faculty, artists, and special guests.
Alumni of CMR, YMP, OYME, OCME, TTI, and JCC, parents, donors, faculty, staff, and artists are especially encouraged to attend WOW presentations. Members of the general public are also welcome to join.
WOW presentation with Marcos Balter 
Wednesday, May 5, 7:30pm Eastern
Join Walden Online Workshops and Marcos Balter for a presentation on composition and collaboration. This workshop presentation, like all WOW events, is free and open to all.
Register
About Marcos Balter
Praised by The Chicago Tribune as "minutely crafted" and "utterly lovely," The New York Times as "whimsical" and "surreal," and The Washington Post as "dark and deeply poetic," the music of composer Marcos Balter (b.1974, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil) is at once emotionally visceral and intellectually complex, primarily rooted in experimental manipulations of timbre and hyper-dramatization of live performance. Marcos was Composer-in-Residence at Walden's Young Musicians Program in 2018, and will return in 2021 as Composer-in-Residence for the Creative Musicians Retreat.
Other Upcoming Workshops:
Developing a Personal Language Through Improvisation
Led by Dana Jessen
Thursday, May 13, 7:30pm Eastern
Chromaticism in Renaissance Music
Led by Sarah Riskind
Thursday, June 3, 7:30pm Eastern
In the Spotlight
Robin Seto 
Robin Seto attended JCC for four summers and Walden for two summers, graduating from Smith College in 1979 and then University of Hawaii John A Burns School of Medicine in 1983. After completing the University of Hawaii Internal Medicine Residency Program in 1986, she and her internal medicine husband Stephen Denzer moved to the Big Island of Hawaii with the intent of providing comprehensive primary care to an underserved rural community as private practice physicians. In 2004, she joined the Hawaii Permanente Medical Group at the Kaiser Kona clinic, moving to Oahu in 2018 to join the Kaiser Permanente Hawaii Internal Medicine Residency Program. They have two children, Brittany, age 27, a 4th year medical student at the University of Colorado and Ian, age 22, a graduating senior at Yale University in mechanical engineering.
How and when did you relationship with JCC begin?
My relationship with JCC began in the spring of 1969, when I won the Peabody Preparatory Spring Musicianship frolic as an 11-year-old, and was asked by Mrs. Cushman to attend JCC as a recipient of the Elizabeth Brouha JCC scholarship. My first summer at JCC was an eight-week immersion into a culture where creativity and community were the underlying values of the musicianship curriculum, followed by three additional summers at JCC and two at Walden. Those summers became the driving passion for someone intrinsically shy and introverted. I had the privilege of David Hogan's teaching and mentorship during the summers and the academic school years as a Musicianship student at the Peabody Prep.
Many years later, as a physician mother working in Kealakekua, a rural community on the Big Island of Hawaii, I believed in the magic of JCC enough to want to embed the same values and experiences into my daughter's life. Though both my son and daughter had been dutifully enrolled in Junior Music Academy and piano lessons in Kona, I bemoaned the fact that they would not have access to the quality of a Peabody Preparatory education. I considered volunteering as a physician to fill the nurse position posted by Walden, so my daughter could attend as a student, but opted instead for a series of mother daughter journeys back to Walden for the reunions when she was ages 3, 8, 13 and 18. Later, much to my delight, I discovered that, through those reunions, my daughter Brittany had developed her own personal friendship with my JCC roommate, Tamar Bloch, and in college, to her glee, discovered that she had enough credits to minor in music! Connecting with my children through music allowed them to see and connect with another aspect of me that I found most gratifying.
Could you describe a favorite memory from your time at JCC?
I do not have a one, but rather a myriad of JCC memories, as an 11 to 14-year-old, as though they just happened yesterday. The setting of the Burklyn Manor in Vermont, as a child, felt like living in a castle on top of a hillside, surrounded by mountains. Tears still come to my eyes when I recall singing "Come Close the Curtains of Your Eyes" to David Hogan's accompaniment and listening to his "Bist du bei mir" while lingering on the Burklyn manor staircase. Mrs. Cushman would wake us up each morning at 7am, clanging the bell and singing, "Good morning to you." In those days, without cable or YouTube, and reliant on live performances, I remember the thrill of the Sunday afternoon faculty concerts - the brilliance of Alan Shewmon's and Hugh Wolff's piano performances, the colors and sounds of Georgia Cushman's dancing and the beauty of Monteverdi's duet "Pur ti miro, Pur ti godo" sung by David Hogan and Nansi Carroll. I recall the sense of exhilaration while eating oranges on the mountain peaks after a long Saturday morning hike, then swinging through the Virginia Reel at Saturday night square dances. The Mendelssohn Piano Trio in D minor played at Mrs. C's memorial concert will to this day make me pause and reminisce about my JCC summers.
What is something from JCC you have carried with you?
JCC gave me the foundation for a wonderful college experience as a music major at a small liberal arts college, Smith College, the alma mater of JCC faculty Ann Callaway. I was able to indulge in both piano performance and composition, and develop what was to be an influential 15-year relationship with Konrad Wolff, who had just retired from the Peabody Conservatory to teach piano during my freshman year. I was fortunate to be able to study with him in New York City during a three-month summer hiatus between my 1st and 2nd year of internal medicine residency, making time for a visit to the Walden campus together.
The most recent Zoom JCC reunion prompted me to reflect more deeply upon this question, acknowledging that music is not at the forefront of my life. I believe that the repeated summer JCC exposures as a child and teenager imprinted on my developing brain a set of learning values, emphasizing self-actualization, perseverance, joy of learning and sharing in a collaborative, supportive, non-judgmental environment. The goal of such an "appreciative or transformative" learning experience is to create a "growth mindset".
At JCC, we were not taught how to compose, but rather, through analysis and experience of sound, encouraged to independently explore through the act of composition, presenting our works at the weekly Monday night forums for open discussion and feedback. The atmosphere was respectful, non-judgmental, and inter-generational, with the goal of fostering a collaborative, supportive, and creative community.
I believe that the acquisition of the "growth mindset" through my JCC summers contributed to my success and happiness through college and medical school, and then as a physician, mother, and now, after 32 years primary care in Kona, teaching faculty member of the Kaiser Permanente Hawaii Internal Medicine residency program on the island of Oahu since 2018.
How are music and/or creativity part of your life now?
When I was 13, Hugh Wolff presented George Crumb's Ancient Voices of Children to our class, while, at the same time, Humphrey Evans introduced us to John Cage's definition of music as sound and silence placed in time. The sound of voices, percussion and instrumental ensemble in George Crumb's work and our class performance of John Cage's Fontana Mix - "Music is all around us if we only listened" - embedded a lifetime memory of attentive mindfulness to sound, space, and movement, which I believe I carry to this day as a physician. When I enter a patient encounter, I feel, sense, and hear the space, glances and nuances of the patient, family, and/or caregiver, remaining attentive to sound and emotions. In this sense, I can "hear music" in much of what I do.
As an internist, my philosophy of care is based on the principles of palliative care, which include respect for an individual's values and beliefs, and care based on a bio-psychosocial and spiritual model. I believe my experiences in music have led me to this point in my career, when I more fully understand and can articulate the importance of blending the art and humanities with the science of medicine.
In a book called Attending by Ronald Epstein, the four foundations of mindfulness - Attention, Curiosity, Beginner's Mind, and Presence -- are outlined as a means to increase physician capacity to promote more patient- centered care for medically complex patients. Mindful awareness of self and others is a cornerstone of the JCC and Walden experience.
On a more concrete note, given the consuming nature of life as a primary care physician, my current goal is to bring music more purposefully back into my life, inspired in part from the most recent JCC Zoom reunion. My 3rd year resident, as a member of Medical Notes, the Hawaii Permanente Medical Group string chamber ensemble, just told me recently that they would be thrilled if I would join them for a piano quintet.
Why do you give to Walden?
I give to Walden in the memory of Mrs. Cushman and David Hogan, and to say "thank you" to all the persons who had the commitment to ensure that Mrs. Cushman's creative approaches to teaching music would live on following the founding of The Walden School in 1972. I still remember the tenuous period following Mrs. Cushman's death in 1971, the responsibility she placed on David Hogan and Pamela Quist, then only in their 20's, to carry her work forward, and the steady guidance of Mrs. Lynn Hebden and later Pat Plude. I salute the brilliance of Seth Brenzel's leadership to lead Walden to a broader, more professional, and international presence in the digital age, and now its perseverance through the Covid-19 pandemic.
What is a hope you have for Walden's future?
I hope that Walden will continue to flourish as a beacon of light for transformative learning, with the understanding that the underlying values and principles of Walden offer opportunities that are broader than the focus on music alone, and of significant value to our society as a whole.
Alumni Composers Forum
The Walden School is hosting an online alumni Composers Forum, featuring the International Contemporary Ensemble performing works composed by Walden alumni. Each piece will be followed by discussion with the composer. This online event will be free and open to the public. Stay tuned for details about the composers featured.
Alumni Composers Forum
Featuring the International Contemporary Ensemble
Sunday, May 23, 2021
4-6pm Eastern time
Featured members of the International Contemporary Ensemble:
Rebekah Heller - bassoon
Josh Modney - violin
Levy Lorenzo - percussion
Dan Lippel - guitar
Stay tuned for details about featured composers. This online event will be free and open to the public. If you have any questions, feel free to write to us at events@waldenschool.org.
About the International Contemporary Ensemble
With a commitment to cultivating a more curious and engaged society through music, the International Contemporary Ensemble - as a commissioner and performer at the highest level - amplifies creators whose work propels and challenges how music is made and experienced. Works by emerging composers have grounded the ensemble's programming since 2001. Through composer residencies, commissions, and workshops, the ensemble actively pursues new relationships with composers and sound artists. The International Contemporary Ensemble frequently partners with The Walden School as a visiting artist and commissioner of student works.
2021 Summer Programs
Send in your applications for Summer 2021
Walden is planning to offer our transformative music programs in person this summer in beautiful Dublin, New Hampshire. We cannot wait to gather again in person for a summer of inspiring programs for creative musicians. We hope that you will join us!
Our 2021 dates are:
Young Musicians Program (YMP): June 26-August 1 (for musicians ages 9-18; 3-week option for students up through 7th grade June 26-July 18, 2021)
Creative Musicians Retreat (CMR): June 12-20 (for adult musicians, 18+, not otherwise eligible to be students at YMP)
We are accepting applications, and the next deadline is tomorrow, May 1.
To request an application, go to waldenschool.org/apply.
Need-based financial aid in the form of tuition assistance is available. Please let us know if you have any questions or would like any additional information about Summer 2021 by writing to us at applicants@waldenschool.org.
Walden is Hiring!
Join our summer and year-round team
Walden is currently hiring for the position of Director of Development & Alumni Relations. This is a full-time position beginning in May 2021, joining the School's year-round San Francisco-based administrative team to help lead the School's annual fund and overall development effort. Read the full job description here, and feel free to spread the word about this opportunity to join the Walden team.
Please direct any questions and inquiries to us at jobs@waldenschool.org.
Community News
Alan Chan Jazz Orchestra Concert
On April 27, the Alan Chan Jazz Orchestra (ACJO) presented an online concert entitled Reopening Blues, honoring the memory of Kevin Garren, a founding member of the ACJO and it's lead saxophone/woodwind player, who passed away in February. The Alan Chan Jazz Orchestra is a Los Angeles-based big band that Alan started in 2011. Alan is a Walden alumnus and past faculty member. You can watch the entirety of Reopening Blues here.
Livestream of new work by Shawn Crouch 
On April 16, a free livestream performance of Shawn Crouch's Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird was presented by Aperio, Music of the Americas, in collaboration with New American Voices. Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird is a new work for solo voices, piano, and percussion, featuring the poetry of Wallace Stevens. This reprise performance of the 2020 world-premiere explores multiple perspectives on the poet's blackbird motif. Shawn is a Walden alumnus and past faculty member, and the winner of the 2015 New American Voices Composition Prize, which supported the completion of Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird.
Olivia De Prato launches Contemporary String Techniques
Olivia De Prato has launched a YouTube series called "Contemporary String Quartet Corner." Each week, she posts videos about contemporary string techniques, explaining how to produce them on the violin and how they are often used in a passage of a score (notation examples), as well as tips from a performers point of view. The series is a resource for composers and performers, and you can find the videos here. Oliva is a member of the new music ensembles Signal and Victoire, and as co-founder and first violinist of the Mivos Quartet, she is a frequent visiting artist at Walden.
Lila Meretzky's Sea Glass Partita premiered 
On April 20, Lila Meretzky's Sea Glass Partita for singing bassoonist was premiered by Eleni Katz as part of her Yale MMA Lecture Recital. Lila composed the five movement partita for bassoon/voice inspired by a poem that Eleni wrote over the summer entitled "Sea Glass." The performance was accompanied by sea glass projections designed by John Horzen. Lila served on staff at the Young Musicians Program in 2018 and 2019, and was on faculty for the Online Young Musicians Experience in 2020.
New project from Brent Morden
Magical Moves: the Musical Chessboard Project is a new work composed by Brent Morden, commissioned by Don MacKay, Ph.D. The project will premiere in May 2021. Magical Moves is an educational piece of musical theatre that teaches children of all ages under 100 about music, chess and life. Its melodies dramatize the magical moves and thoughts of the players in the 2019 World Championship game in Chess960, Bobby Fischer's new type of chess that fosters creativity rather than memorization. Brent is a CMR alumnus.
Popebama featured on Yarn/Wire Feedback 
On April 15, Walden faculty member Dennis Sullivan and past visiting artist Erin Rogers, who together make up the duo Popebama, were featured on Yarn/Wire Feedback. Feedback is a weekly, livestreamed series of conversations between Yarn/Wire and guests, featuring deep dives into past collaborations, inside tips on performance, and more. Popebama is a New York-based experimental duo that focuses on exciting performances of unconventional works. Erin (saxophone) and Dennis (percussion) are composer-performers who apply text, electronics, and high-energy instrumental writing to freshly-squeezed sounds. Yarn/Wire is a past visiting artist, and were featured on Walden's Alumni Composers Forum on April 18. You can watch the conversation, hosted by Andrea Lodge, here.
Leah Reid wins second prize in Iannis Xenakis competition
On April 7, Leah Reid was awarded second prize in the Iannis Xenakis International Electronic Music Competition for her piece Reverie. This year's competition marks the 20th anniversary of Iannis Xenakis' death, and aims to represent his maxim "To make music is to express human intelligence by sound means. All pieces are submitted anonymously, and this year 224 entries were received from around the world. Leah is a YMP alumna.
In Memoriam
Rosemarie Greenwald
Rosemarie Greenwald passed away on April 1st at the age of 86. Rosemarie and her husband David sent their son Mark to Walden for four summers, beginning in 1975, and have been wonderful friends and supporters of Walden ever since. They often visited for Festival Week to hear the performances of all the students' works.
Rosemarie had a lifelong love of music, studied musicianship at Peabody Preparatory, and studied voice with fellow Walden parent Ruth Drucker. While her son was in college, Rosemarie matriculated and graduated from Towson University with a major in Vocal Performance. She was a soloist at churches, a former Choir Director, and a choir member at her synagogue. Rosemarie loved to travel, create sewing and embroidery projects, and make jewelry. When the pandemic began, she started sewing protective equipment for healthcare workers.
Rosemarie is deeply missed, and we are keeping the Greenwald family in our thoughts.
We want to hear from you!
What's been going on? If you have a recent or upcoming premiere, publication, award, new job or program, or a celebratory life event, please share the news. Email your news to alumni@waldenschool.org.
Stay in Touch
You can like The Walden School page on Facebook and join The Walden School private group to hear about events and opportunities throughout the year, including upcoming regional alumni Composers Forums and Holiday Parties. You can also find us on Instagram, Twitter, YouTube, bandcamp, and at waldenschool.org.
eNews: InterNetzo – March 2021
Message from Seth Brenzel, Executive Director
Dear Walden friend,
Spring is here, and I hope this newsletter finds you well. Our next Walden Online Workshop (WOW) is TONIGHT, March 31, at 7:30pm Eastern. You still have time to register, so check the Community Events section to learn more about this exciting workshop led by guitarist Dan Lippel, as well as other upcoming WOW.
We are accepting applications for the Young Musicians Program (YMP) and Creative Musicians Retreat (CMR), and our final Application Deadline is May 1. I will also be leading two online Information Sessions about YMP on April 8 and April 22, so check the 2021 Summer Programs section to learn more and sign up.
We will have our Alumni Composers Forum on April 18 at 4pm Eastern, featuring Yarn/Wire performing works by Walden alumni. Stay tuned for more information, and I hope you'll join us online April 18.
Be sure to check out the In the Spotlight section to hear from Walden alumna Amirah Stewart. You can also check the Community News section to read about some of the happenings in the lives and careers of fellow Walden community members.
I hope you enjoy this March edition of InterNetzo, and I hope to see you at one or more of our upcoming events!
Sincerely,
Seth
Community Events
WOW! Walden Online Workshops!
More Walden Online Workshops (WOW) are on the horizon! We are excited to continue sharing this FREE series of lectures, demonstrations, classes, and presentations on a variety of musical topics presented over video call by The Walden School's teaching faculty, artists, and special guests.
Alumni of CMR, YMP, OYME, OCME, TTI, and JCC, parents, donors, faculty, staff, and artists are especially encouraged to attend WOW presentations. Members of the general public are also welcome to join.
TONIGHT: Exploring Microtonality in Guitar Repertoire 
Wednesday, March 31, 7:30pm Eastern
Led by Dan Lippel
Dan Lippel, guitarist and 2019 visiting artist at The Walden School's Young Musicians Program, presents an exploration of alternate tunings and fretting systems in guitar repertoire as a window into microtonality, well temperaments, and different divisions of the octave. Dan will demonstrate different tunings and temperaments on standard guitars as well as guitars with fretting systems in different equal divisions of the octave and well temperaments.
This workshop is free and open to all! Register here.
Other Upcoming Workshops:
Wow Presentation with Marcos Balter
Wednesday, May 5, 7:30pm Eastern
Developing a Personal Language Through Improvisation
Led by Dana Jessen
Thursday, May 13, 7:30pm Eastern
Chromaticism in Renaissance Music
Led by Sarah Riskind
Thursday, June 3, 7:30pm Eastern
Alumni Composers Forum
The Walden School is hosting an online alumni Composers Forum, featuring Yarn/Wire performing works composed by Walden alumni. Each piece will be followed by discussion with the composer. This online event will be free and open to the public. Stay tuned for details about the composers featured.
Alumni Composers Forum
Featuring Yarn/Wire
Sunday, April 18, 2021
4-6pm Eastern time
Yarn/Wire is a New York-based piano percussion quartet. Noted for their "spellbinding virtuosity" and "restlessly curious" programming (TimeOut NY), the ensemble is admired for the energy and precision it brings to performances of today's most adventurous music. Expanding the world of new music, they create music in partnership with their peers: composers, sound artists, noise musicians and more around the world. The members of Yarn/Wire include a Walden alumna, as well as past artists-in-residence at Walden.
Save the Date!
We will be hosting another Alumni Composers Forum on Sunday, May 23, featuring members of the International Contemporary Ensemble performing works by Walden alumni. Stay tuned for a call for scores!
Alumni of the Young Musicians Program (and OYME), Junior Conservatory Camp, Creative Musicians Retreat (and OCME), and/or Teacher Training Institute are eligible to submit works by April 26.
Concert with Dave Eggar to benefit Walden
The Walden School is hosting an online concert to celebrate and raise funds for Walden's inspiring music programs.
Sunday, May 2, 2021
4pm Eastern time
Featuring cellist Dave Eggar
Dave Eggar is regarded as one of the finest cellists performing today. Dave has been a visiting artist at The Walden School, was a member of The Walden School Players for two summers, and performs frequently at regional Walden events throughout the United States.
This event will take place via Zoom video call. To join, please register through Eventbrite. Call information and other details will be sent out to attendees before the event. While there is no charge to be part of this event, contributions to support Walden's award-winning programs are encouraged and may be made online at waldenschool.org/donate or by check mailed to The Walden School, 30 Monterey Blvd., Ste. E, San Francisco, CA 94131.
Stay tuned for more information, and please send any questions to donors@waldenschool.org.
In the Spotlight
Amirah Stewart
Amirah StewartAmirah Stewart is a violist and saxophonist born and raised in Brooklyn, New York. Amirah is a Walden alumna who spent four summers at the Young Musicians Program. She has also attended Juilliard MAP and Face The Music. She has a Bachelor of the Arts in Music from Hunter College. Throughout her 12 years of playing, she has performed various genres of music including classical, contemporary, r&b, and rap. She has performed at venues such as Carnegie Hall, The Symphony Space, The Queens Museum, WQXR, Alice Tully Hall, and many more around the New York City area. Amirah's true passions are creating, performing, and sharing her music with world.
How and when did you relationship with Walden begin, and what has been your involvement since then?
I had a cousin who went to Walden, and my aunt and I went to pick him up at the end of the summer. I saw the campus, and I was in love with it, and everyone looked like they were really happy to be there and happy to be alive. When I got home, I told my mom it was something I would be interested in, and so the next summer, the summer of 2011, was my first summer.
I haven't been as involved with Walden since being a student, which is sad, but it's challenging to juggle school and work and other things. Now that I've finished school, I hope to be more involved, going to composers forums and other events in New York City. The get-togethers we would have in the winter are some of my favorite winter memories, seeing my Walden friends. We all had different things going on during the year, but we put that time aside to be together, and also see other students, faculty, and staff from outside New York who would come to the gathering.
Could you describe a favorite memory from your time at Walden?
I think the dances are some of my favorite memories. At Walden, you have the opportunity to be who you want to be for five weeks, but particularly the dances are a time to be as weird as you want to be, create your own costumes from tinfoil and whatever else you can find, and everyone embraces that. The staff and faculty perform live, and even though you know how talented they are, you don't often get to see them showcase that the way they do at the dances, and being playful and weird along with us. The songs Do You Love An Apple and the Tennessee Waltz are songs to this day I listen to and get a little emotional, because I miss that time. You dance with close friends, and also with students you haven't necessarily spent a lot of time with and connect with through the dances, and faculty and staff are always there to jump in or to teach you the steps.
How are music and/or creativity part of your life now?
I went to college and studied education, but the program I was in required another major to complement the education major. Many people in the education program pair it with history or sociology or English or math, and I do love those, but I have been doing music since I was a baby, so why not take the chance to extend my knowledge? So I studied music and education in college, and now I teach music to babies and young children, 4 months to 5 years, and that work is so fulfilling. At Walden, I always wondered how the faculty felt teaching us, and it seemed like they found it really fulfilling, so now I get to combine my education degree and my love of music.
In terms of creativity in general, I like doing things with my hands, which is part of why music is such a good outlet. I still play viola and saxophone, and I try my best to keep up with piano. For my job, I've gotten the opportunity to learn the basic of many instruments. Just last week I got a guitar. I feel stagnant if I'm not doing something creative. I also crochet and have been making sweaters and hats over quarantine, and I've started doing punch needle embroidery. For punch needle, you use a hollow needle that you draw yarn through, and then you poke it through monk's cloth, and that leaves a pattern. All of these things keep me going and keep the creative juices flowing.
What is something from the past year you have been excited about?
I graduated from college. Graduation was on a Zoom call, but it was still a graduation. My mom was present for that, even though it was via a separate Zoom call in the living room. I've been excited just to see what the future holds after graduation. Some people graduate with a job alright lined up, others don't, some don't know what they want to do. I was in that uncertain place, especially with COVID, but things have a way of falling into place, and I feel like I'm on the right track now.
Is there a hope or dream for Walden's future you could share?
I had a dream once about Walden being overseas in the mountains of Switzerland, in the summertime. It was gorgeous. We had morning meeting and the birds were chirping and there was water running--it was amazing. Of course, then I woke up to New York City, but it would be amazing if Walden were international. I think when some organizations expand, they lose the heart they started with, but the concept of Walden is so deeply ingrained that it couldn't be lost.
It would be great for people to have access to Walden in more places. Walden became an oasis for me during high school that I needed in the summers. I think so many people need that space, and don't know that there is somewhere they can go. You don't have to be a maestro at Walden--if you enjoy music and you want to be there, the faculty will see that potential and work with you. I love that about Walden, and I think that would be great in more places. So "Walden around the world" is a dream I have.
2021 Summer Programs
YMP Information Sessions
Join us for online, interactive information sessions led by Walden's Executive Director, Seth Brenzel, alongside Young Musicians Program faculty members.
This event is open to prospective students, music teachers, and anyone else who would like to learn more about Walden's award-winning music programs. Walden Information Sessions take place over Zoom video call.
Information to access the call will be shared with registered attendees via e-mail no later than 24 hours before the event.
Thursday, April 8, 2021, 8pm Eastern
Register
Thursday, April 22, 2021, 8pm Eastern
Register
Applications open for summer 2021
Walden is earnestly and actively planning for a return to in-person programming in Dublin, New Hampshire, in 2021, with the understanding that pandemic circumstances may require our programs instead be offered again online next summer. Whether in-person or online, Walden is excited to offer our students, participants, and audiences another summer of transformative, creative music programs and presentations. We hope that you will join us!
Our 2021 dates* are:
Young Musicians Program (YMP): June 26-August 1 (for musicians ages 9-18; 3-week option for students up through 7th grade June 26-July 18, 2021)
Creative Musicians Retreat (CMR): June 12-20 (for adult musicians, 18+, not otherwise eligible to be students at YMP)
We are accepting applications, and the next deadline is May 1.
To request an application, go to waldenschool.org/apply.
Need-based financial aid in the form of tuition assistance is available. Please let us know if you have any questions or would like any additional information about Summer 2021 by writing to us at applicants@waldenschool.org.
*Dates for online programs, if necessary, will be similar to those for the in-person programming.
Walden is Hiring!
Join our summer and year-round team
We are hiring for 2021 summer positions in Dublin, New Hampshire, as well as for a year-round administrative position based in San Francisco, California. We are seeking new teammates to join our creative community, and we hope that you might help spread the word about these opportunities to your friends and colleagues.
The positions currently open are:
- Director of Development & Alumni Relations (full-time beginning late April 2021; San Francisco)
- Electronic Music Faculty Member - Creative Musicians Retreat (June 2021; Dublin, NH)
- Faculty Member - Young Musicians Program (June-August, 2021; Dublin, NH)
- Staff Member - Young Musicians Program (June-August, 2021; Dublin, NH)
Please direct any questions and inquiries to us at jobs@waldenschool.org. All positions are open until filled.
Community News
New work from Giacomo Baldelli 
On March 5, Giacomo Baldelli released a new work on Bandcamp called Music for Bathtubs. The work is an experiment, which Giacomo hopes will help listeners disconnect from devises and social media, and just relax. He cautions that, while the work may pair well with a hot bath, no bathtub is included with the download. Giacomo is a NYC-based guitarist focused on exploring works of the 20th century, while also developing new repertoire for guitar. He is a Walden alumnus and past visiting artist.
Yarn/Wire Preview with Victoria Cheah
New York-based piano percussion quartet Yarn/Wire has released the second installment of Preview, a recurring series that looks inside new collaborations for the upcoming 7th installment of Yarn/Wire/Currents. This installment features members of the quartet chatting with Walden alumna Victoria Cheah about her new work for the quartet, Ocean into Wire, and her process in bringing it to life. Victoria is multi-disciplinary composer interested in boundaries, sustained energy, and social/performance rituals. The members of Yarn/Wire include a Walden alumna, as well as past artists-in-residence at Walden.
Matthew Cummings featured on concert 
On March 26, singer-songwriter duo Luna, based in Arlington, Virginia, hosted a livestreamed tribute to singer-songwriter Paul Koors. The concert featured cellist Matthew Cummings performing his arrangement of Paul Koors song, The River, as well as an original composition. He will also be featured on a live outdoor performance of the tribute concert in May. Matthew was a student at the Online Young Musicians Experience in 2020
Kaleidoscope announces Call for Scores finalists
Kaleidoscope Chamber Orchestra has announced the 172 composers who are finalists in their call for scores. The finalists include Walden alumna, faculty member, and CMR Director Caroline Mallonee or her piece The Butterfly Effect, as well as Walden alumna Leah Reid for her piece Cranberries, past visiting artist Ned McGowan for Cycle Games 1, and past faculty member Michael Gilbertson for The Beautiful & The Good. In addition to being the works advanced to the final round, Kaleidoscope plans to program as many of these works as possible in the coming months and throughout the 2021-22 season. Applicants also had the opportunity to have their music published open-access by the UCLA Library.
Research Award to Jack Langdon in Digital Musics
Jack Langdon received the 2020 Guarini Alumni Research Award to support their work in Digital Musics. The Alumni Fund and the Guarini School of Graduate and Advanced Studies at Dartmouth University awarded funding to support Jack's work toward a Digital Musics master's thesis. Jack's research has focused on "reclaiming the organ as a site of speculation for future collective musical ritual which incorporates experimental approaches to soundmaking, spatial organization, and social facilitation." Jack attended the Creative Musicians Retreat, and you can read a reflection on their research, published on March 2, here.
Presentation by Sky Macklay
On March 17, Sky Macklay gave a presentation entitled "The Drama of Inevitable Unfurling: Process Music as a Metaphor for Biological Processes." Sky, a fellow with the Institute for Ideas & Imagination, describes many of her pieces as "process music," or music governed by rules that audibly transform musical materials in predictable ways. You can watch the presentation on YouTube here. Sky is a composer, oboist, and installation artist and is Assistant Professor of Music at Valparaiso University in Northwest Indiana. She is also a Walden alumna and longtime faculty member.
Mivos Quartet premieres student works 
On March 12 and 13, Mivos Quartet gave two concerts of world premiere performances of student compositions from Peabody Institute of The Johns Hopkins University and Boston University. Both concerts were livestreamed and free. The March 12 concert featured world premieres of six student works, and the March 13 concert featured world premieres of 13 student works, and is still available to watch on YouTube here. Mivos Quartet is a frequent artist-in-residence at Walden, most recently at the Online Creative Musicians Experience in 2020.
Premiere from Dede Ondishko
On March 19 and March 20, CityMusic Cleveland performed two concerts (one in-person and one livestreamed) entitled New Voices, featuring the world premiere of Dede Ondishko's Cloudshift, a piece commissioned by CityMusic. CityMusic's 2020-21 season, Celebrating Women's Rights to Vote and Create, honors the centennial of the 19th Amendment. You can read more about the concert here, and watch a recording of the concert here. Dede spent four summers as a student at the Young Musicians Program, and has also served on faculty, staff, and the Board of Directors.
Ash Paris-Carter UNCSA featured composer
Ash Paris-Carter is the March featured composer for the University of North Carolina School of the Arts (UNCSA) Composition Studio. As highlighted in the profile, "whether it's traditional art song, avant-garde electronics, folk music or punk rock, Ash is a composer-performer who slides easily among genres, finding what they call the 'wildly energetic, angry, flirtatious, overjoyed and animated' spirit that unites them." You can read the feature here. Ash has spent seven summers as a student at the Young Musicians Program.
We want to hear from you!
What's been going on? If you have a recent or upcoming premiere, publication, award, new job or program, or a celebratory life event, please share the news. Email your news to alumni@waldenschool.org.
Stay in Touch
You can like The Walden School page on Facebook and join The Walden School private group to hear about events and opportunities throughout the year, including upcoming regional alumni Composers Forums and Holiday Parties. You can also find us on Instagram, Twitter, YouTube, bandcamp, and at waldenschool.org.
eNews: InterNetzo – February 2021
Message from Seth Brenzel, Executive Director
Dear Walden friend, 
I hope this newsletter finds you well. We are accepting applications for the Young Musicians Program (YMP) and Creative Musicians Retreat (CMR), and our next Application Deadline is March 15. We also have a YMP Information Session coming up on March 4.
We have two more Walden Winter Wednesdays (WWW) coming up, so check the Community Events section to find out more about these casual community gatherings over Zoom. You'll also find a list of upcoming Walden Online Workshop (WOW), as well as information about our Alumni Composers Forum coming up on April 18, featuring Yarn/Wire.
Be sure to check out the In the Spotlight section to hear from Walden alumnus and faculty member Michael Kropf. You can also check the Community News section to read about some of the happenings in the lives and careers of fellow Walden community members.
I hope you enjoy this February edition of InterNetzo, and I look forward to seeing you for a WWW, a WOW, or another gathering soon.
Sincerely,
Seth
Community Events
Walden Winter Wednesdays
We hope you will join us for Walden Winter Wednesdays (WWW), a series of casual online gatherings over Zoom, to catch up with fellow students, faculty, staff, parents, and artists. Each WWW is for a different Walden cohort, so check the list below to find out when your WWW is happening. Each WWW will begin at 8 pm Eastern/5 pm Pacific, and last about an hour. Even if you have already joined us for a WWW, are welcome to join the WWW for any and all cohorts of which you have been part!
Bring your favorite winter beverage or snack and wear your favorite cozy scarf. (For those of you in warm climates, creative workarounds for cozy scarfs are welcome.)
To attend, register through Eventbrite and we will send you Zoom details before the gathering. Feel free to send any questions to alumni@waldenschool.org.
March 3 - CMR, OCME, & TTI - Register
If you came to as an adult, as a participant, faculty member, staff, member, or visiting artist at CMR, OCME, and/or TTI, this is for you!
March 10 - 2010s (YMP & OYME) - Register
If you were a YMP student, parent, faculty member, staff member, or visiting artist during the 2010s, or part of OYME in 2020, this is for you!
Young Musicians Program Information Session
Join us for an online, interactive information session led by Walden's Executive Director, Seth Brenzel, alongside Young Musicians Program faculty members.
Thursday, March 4, 2021
8pm Eastern/5pm Pacific
This event is open to prospective students, music teachers, and anyone else who would like to learn more about Walden's award-winning music programs.
Reserve your spot on Eventbrite here.
Information to access Zoom session will be shared with registered attendees.
Alumni Composers Forum
The Walden School is hosting an online alumni Composers Forum, featuring Yarn/Wire performing works composed by Walden alumni. Each piece will be followed by discussion with the composer. This online event will be free and open to the public.
Alumni Composers Forum
Featuring Yarn/Wire
Sunday, April 18, 2021
4-6pm Eastern time
Alumni of the Young Musicians Program (and OYME), Junior Conservatory Camp, Creative Musicians Retreat (and OCME), and/or Teacher Training Institute are eligible to submit works.
Yarn/Wire is a piano/percussion quartet, and works featured on the Composers Forum can be for any combination up to the full quartet (two pianists and two percussionists).
To be featured on the Composers Forum, you must be available to join the online event on April 18, as well as a Zoom rehearsal on April 17 or 18.
If you would like to submit a piece, please fill out this Google form and upload a PDF of your score.
To be considered, you must submit your score by March 19, 2021. If you have any questions, please write to us at alumni@waldenschool.org.
In the Spotlight
Michael Kropf 
Michael Kropf is a composer whose work deals with hidden emotions and evocative places. He has collaborated with Marin Alsop, the Telegraph Quartet, the San Francisco Conservatory Orchestra, and the Aspen Contemporary Ensemble. Michael completed his Master's degree in Composition at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music in 2016, and he is currently pursuing a doctoral degree in music composition at the University of Michigan. Michael attended the Creative Musicians Retreat in 2015 and is a faculty member at the Young Musicians Program.
How and when did you relationship with Walden begin, and what has been your involvement since then?
I first got to experience the Walden community when I attended the Creative Musicians Retreat (CMR) in the summer of 2015. It had been strongly recommended to me, and that was a summer when I wanted to do composition programs. I did a couple programs in that one summer, and CMR made much more of an impact than anything else I did that summer. I was really impressed by the program, really liked the musicianship curriculum, and enjoyed the choral singing. I made some great connections with teachers and other composers, even in that short time. It was really a pivotal moment for me. Two years later, I graduated from my Masters program and started teaching full time in San Francisco. I learned Walden was hiring faculty for the Young Musicians Program (YMP), so I applied, and have been a teacher for that program ever since!
Could you describe a favorite memory from attending CMR?
The program is relatively short compared to other types of programs, but it is packed with so many fantastic and valuable learning experiences! I remember feeling like I accomplished more in 9 days than I usually accomplished in an entire summer, in terms of my musical education. At CMR there are many optional activities, and I signed up for a lesson with D. J. Sparr, who was on faculty. I was working on an orchestra piece, and I brought it to him, and we had a whole lesson about orchestra writing. It's a lesson I still refer back to when I'm writing for orchestra, because it was so incredibly helpful. So that lesson is one memory, but it was also surrounded by so many other wonderful things.
Could you describe a favorite memory from your time on faculty?
There are so many great ones, so it is difficult to choose! In the summer of 2019, the entire camp had reached the summit of Mount Monadnock and broke out in a spontaneous choral performance of Andrea Ramsey's Stomp on the Fire. I loved that moment because it combined many of my favorite things. There was hiking, we were out in nature, and it was near the end of the summer, so all the students have this wonderful confidence in their own musicality and musicianship, and it shines through. They're singing this complex choral piece really well, so much so that it was a challenge to keep up. That's satisfying because you see how the students have blossomed as musicians throughout the summer. It's also really beautiful because Mount Monadnock is one of the most climbed mountains in the country, so there are a lot of other people at the top, and you could see how much they were enjoying being on top of a mountain and hearing music. It was just this incredible moment where it felt like our joy in music-making spread beyond us, brightening the day of people around us. That was really special.
Outside of Walden, how are music and/or creativity part of your life?
I am currently working towards a doctoral degree in Music Composition at the University of Michigan, which involves both a lot of composing and teaching. I'm constantly drawing on my experiences from Walden for both! Music and creativity have been a helpful way for me to work through this difficult year - right after the pandemic began, a number of Walden community members began doing informal zoom improvisations and performances of Pauline Oliveros, and I found those very grounding. More recently, I had the opportunity to perform a movement of a new violin concerto that I'm writing, alongside a masked and socially-distanced orchestra, which was amazing. I think this year has helped me realize just how important the communal aspect of performing and listening to music together is for me.
What is a non-musical hobby that's part of your life?
The 2019 YMP participants might know this a little too well, due to a certain activity involving spray-painted rocks, but I really enjoy gold-panning. I think there are a number of similarities between gold-panning and the way I like to compose, just in terms of that incessant searching and sifting through sand/musical ideas to find ones that "sparkle." I took a geology class last fall, and I think both my composing and gold-panning have improved from that.
What is your hope or dream for Walden's future?
The most immediate part is of course for us to meet in person again. Beyond that, the thing I hope for, which I think already happens, is that the creativity and the joy for music that exists at Walden continues to filter into the world around us. I do wish our society and the world around us could be more like that. I think everyone who has a camp or a musical experience where they feel that spirit ends up taking that with them as an aspiration. Walden is a very aspirational community.
I have a theory about that and the music of Pauline Oliveros. Oliveros' music kind of takes the temperature of a community. If there is a lot of generosity and patience and the other good things we want our communities to have, the music goes really well. If those things are absent, that music does not function very well. I think Oliveros' music being such a big part of Walden is indicative of the health of the community, and I wish for that to spread. I want the kindness and joy of music, and the sincerity I find in the Walden community, to keep spreading into the world around us, because those are very important and needed elements, as is the music itself.
2021 Summer Programs
Applications open for summer 2021
Walden is earnestly and actively planning for a return to in-person programming in Dublin, New Hampshire, in 2021, with the understanding that pandemic circumstances may require our programs instead be offered again online next summer. Whether in-person or online, Walden is excited to offer our students, participants, and audiences another summer of transformative, creative music programs and presentations. We hope that you will join us!
Our 2021 dates* are:
Young Musicians Program (YMP): June 26-August 1 (for musicians ages 9-18; 3-week option for students up through 7th grade June 26-July 18, 2021)
Creative Musicians Retreat (CMR): June 12-20 (for adult musicians, 18+, not otherwise eligible to be students at YMP)
We are accepting applications, and the next deadline is March 15.
To request an application, go to waldenschool.org/apply.
Regular deadline: March 15
Final deadline: May 1
Need-based financial aid in the form of tuition assistance is available. Please let us know if you have any questions or would like any additional information about Summer 2021 by writing to us at applicants@waldenschool.org.
*Dates for online programs, if necessary, will be similar to those for the in-person programming.
WOW! Walden Online Workshops!
More Walden Online Workshops (WOW) are on the horizon! We are excited to continue sharing this FREE series of lectures, demonstrations, classes, and presentations on a variety of musical topics presented over video call by The Walden School's teaching faculty, artists, and special guests.
Alumni of YMP, CMR, OYME, OCME, TTI, and JCC, parents, donors, faculty, staff, and artists are especially encouraged to attend WOW presentations. Members of the general public are also welcome to join.
Tuesday, March 9, 7:30pm Eastern/4:30pm Pacific, led by Nate May
Sunday, March 21, 4pm Eastern/1pm Pacific, led by Ted Moore
Wednesday, March 31, 7:30pm Eastern/4:30pm Pacific, led by Dan Lippel
Thursday, May 13, 7:30pm Eastern/4:30pm Pacific, led by Dana Jessen
Thursday, June 3, 7:30pm Eastern/4:30pm Pacific, led by Sarah Riskind
Job Announcement
After nearly three years of amazing service to Walden, Gaela Dennison-Leonard, our current Director of Development & Alumni Relations, is leaving Walden in order to pursue graduate studies on her path to becoming a chaplain. Gaela will be with us into the Spring, and we hope to have a successor in place prior to her departure so that she can train Walden's next wonderful fundraiser. Walden is seeking applications for the position of Director of Development & Alumni Relations to join the School's San Francisco-based administrative team to help lead the School's annual fund and overall development effort. Read the full job description here, and feel free to spread the word about this opportunity to join the Walden team.
Community News
Whit Bernard and Freya Zaheer welcome a new baby
Whit Bernard and Freya Zaheer have welcomed their second child, Raza Lyons Bernard, born on February 22. Everyone is healthy and happy. Whit is a Walden alumnus who spent three summers as a Young Musicians Program student, two summers on the YMP staff, and a summer on faculty. Whit and Freya are Walden supporters, often at events with their son Cyrus, who will now have his little brother in tow.
Joshua Edward receives Alarm Will Sound MMIF support 
Alarm Will Sound has announced Damon Davis and the duo Joshua Edward and Zharia O'Neal as the most recent recipients of support from the Matt Marks Impact Fund (MMIF), now in its third year. MMIF supports projects with Alarm Will Sound that have potential to make significant cultural and social impact. Joshua Edward and Zharia O'Neal are currently students at the University of Southern California. Their proposed project, to be Black and believe in God is to know absence / this great on-the-behalfness of you, expands on an existing collaboration between the two of them--Joshua a white composer and Zharia an Afro-Carribean spoken-word artist--involving dialogues that "aim to examine the performativity of wokeness in artistic collaborations across difference." Joshua is a CMR alumnus.
Mary Fineman shares piece written at JCC
Mary Fineman is an alumna of the Junior Conservatory Camp (JCC), Walden's predecessor program, and she marked the New Year by posting a video on YouTube of Watercolor, a piece she wrote at JCC when she was 16. Mary recorded the piece decades later, and has now paired it with nature photography by Bruce Sadavow. You can watch the video here.
Annie Gosfield 2021 Music Award Winner 
The American Academy of Arts and Letters has announced the 2021 Music Award Winners. Annie Gosfield is one of four composers to receive an Arts and Letters Award in Music, which honors outstanding artistic achievement and acknowledges composers who have arrived at their own voice. The recipients of this year's awards were selected by a committee of Academy members: Chen Yi (chair), Robert Beaser, Martin Bresnick, Stephen Hartke, George Lewis, Shulamit Ran, and Julia Wolfe. The awards will be presented virtually at the Academy's Ceremonial on May 19, 2021. Annie Gosfield is a past Composer-in-Residence at Walden. Among the committee of Academy members are three other past Composers-in-Residence at Walden: Chen Yi, Martin Bresnick, and George Lewis.
Film scored by Nate May premieres at Big Sky Film Festival
Nate May scored his first feature film, A Reckoning in Boston, which premiered in February as part of the Big Sky Film Festival. The film was also featured on the Human Rights Watch Film Festival. In the words of Lecia J. Brooks of the Southern Poverty Law Center, "A Reckoning in Boston will encourage honest dialogue about systemic racism and oppression in the U.S. at a time when a national conversation, from the Deep South to the NorthEast corridor, is urgently needed to catalyze lasting change." Nate joined the Young Musicians Program faculty in 2018.
News from Loretta Notareschi 
In November 2020, the U.K.-based musician Donald Bousted released The New Classical Ukelele CD, featuring the Four Moods and Five Etudes by Loretta K. Notareschi. Regarding the etudes, Bousted wrote, "I was blown away. I loved the fact that she had taken this instrument, not losing sight of its beautiful beginnings, into a completely different dimension--musically, spiritually and intellectually." On February 3rd, the online publication NewMusicBox published an article by Loretta Notareschi and David Farrell titled "Composer Commission Pay in the United States," an introduction to a research report on the Composer Commission Pay Survey they conducted in Fall 2019. You can read the complete report here. Loretta is a Walden alumna and longtime faculty member.
Nnenna Ogwo presents livestreamed concert
On Friday, February 26, The Juneteenth Legacy Project presented Sonic Tapestries; Musical Ancestors & Descendants, a closing celebration of Black History Month with Dr. Nnenna Ogwo, Founder and Artistic Director of The Juneteenth Legacy Project, a New York-based musical collaborative. The livestreamed concert featured Nnenna (pianist), Eric Cooper (cellist), and Erika Banks-Alvarezv (soprano) presenting a collection of works by past and contemporary composers form the African Diaspora. A post-concert discussion with the musicians concluded the program. Nnenna spent six summers at a YMP student, attended CMR in 2014, has been a faculty member and visiting artist at YMP, and also served on Walden's Board of Directors.
Nat Osborn Band concert recording 
On February 5, 2020, the Nat Osborn Band performed at Rockwood Music Hall as a part of the venue's 15th anniversary celebration. At the time, they had no idea it would be the last time that year the band played, and still to this day. They had recorded the whole concert, and just put it on YouTube to mark the one-year anniversary. You can watch it here. Nat spent four summers as a student at the Young Musicians Program. The Nat Osborn Band is a Brooklyn-based seven-piece band, flanked by a three-piece horn section, blending soul, funk, indie-rock, and jazz.
Alicia Jo Rabins adds song for Esther to Song Cycle
Alicia Jo Rabins has added a new song and video to her Girls in Trouble song cycle. So Many Ways We Can Hide is a song about about Esther approaching King Ahashverush. The video features more than 20 people dancing in their apartments and yards to Alicia's song. Girls in Trouble is an indie-folk song cycle about the complicated lives of women in Torah. With this project, Alicia draws on her background as a musician, writer and feminist Torah teacher to mine the complex and fascinating stories of Biblical women, exploring the hidden places where their lives overlap with our own. Alicia is a YMP alumna, having spent six summers at Walden.
New release and livestream concert from Mariel Roberts
Armament, a new record from cellist Mariel Roberts was released on February 5. Created as a series of unedited improvised pieces for cello and pedals, Armament represents Mariel's abilities as a cellist, as well as a unique voice responding to the current moment. To mark the release, Mariel gave a livestreamed performance of Armament at Roulette on February 5. She was accompanied by Brian Chase and Mario Diaz de Leon. Mariel is a past visiting artist at Walden, and Mario was Composer-in-Residence for the 2020 Online Young Musicians Experience. Mariel is also a member of Wet Ink Ensemble, a past Walden ensemble-in-residence.
Zach Shemon solo recording released
Alto saxophonist and PRISM Quartet member Zach Shemon's first solo recording was released on February 5 on XAS. Zach is joined by the Conservatory Wind Symphony of the University of Missouri-Kansas City under Steven D. Davis for Solace: A Lyric Concerto by Houston-based composer Joel Love. The work is inspired by David Whyte's book, Consolations: The Solace, Nourishment, and Underlying Meaning in Words. PRISM Quartet is a past visiting artist at Walden and an ongoing commissioning partner.
New project from Spektral Quartet, featuring Eliza Brown
Spektral Quartet is launching a new participatory digital concert format, called Something to Write Home About. The project invites listeners to be creative right alongside Spektral Quartet, penning postcards as the quartet performs an elastic program featuring the music of imaginative composers. The second installment, presented on March 30 in partnership with Harris Theatre in Chicago, will feature works by Eliza Brown, Tomeka Reid, Samuel Adams, Gene Knific, and Nathalie Joachim, alongside works of visual art. Spektral Quartet is a past visiting artist at Walden. Eliza Brown is a Walden alumna and longtime faculty member.
Splinter Reeds in conversation with Sky Macklay and Eric Wubbels
On February 9, Splinter Reeds shared a livestreamed conversation with composers Sky Macklay and Eric Wubbels. Sky Macklay's Choppy (2017) and Eric Wubbels' Auditory Scene Analysis II (2016) feature some of the most extensive and wide-ranging extended techniques in the reed quintet repertoire. Splinter Reeds spoke with Sky and Eric about their work, compositional practice, and upcoming projects. Splinter Reeds is a past artist-in-residence at Walden, and founding member Dana Jessen is a past Walden faculty member and a member of The Walden School Players. Sky Macklay is a Walden alumna and longtime faculty member, and Eric Wubbels is a past member of The Walden School Players.
In Memoriam
John Weaver
John Weaver passed away on February 1, in Ithaca, New York, where he and his wife, Marianne, were living. John attended the Junior Conservatory Camp and served on its faculty, and was involved for many years at JCC. He was Director of Music at the Madison Avenue Presbyterian Church from 1970-2005. He was chair of the Juilliard School's organ department from 1987 to 2004 and Head of the organ department at the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia from 1972 to 2003. You can find an announcement here on the website at Curtis, from which he received a degree in organ performance in 1959.
John was involved with Walden in many ways over the last 50 years, including hosting numerous gatherings for Walden and JCC alumni, along with summer planning meetings for YMP, in the Madison Avenue Presbyterian Church grounds, where he and Marianne lived. He also served as a visiting composers forum moderator, and served on Walden's advisory council for the past 20 years. He was a wonderful supporter of Walden, and we have sung his choral music as part of Walden choral concerts over the years. Some years ago, he performed a concert on Walden's concert series in Peterborough, New Hampshire, at All Saints Church. We at Walden join all of John's family and friends and students in mourning his passing.
We want to hear from you!
What's been going on? If you have a recent or upcoming premiere, publication, award, new job or program, or a celebratory life event, please share the news. Email your news to alumni@waldenschool.org.
Stay in Touch
You can like The Walden School page on Facebook and join The Walden School private group to hear about events and opportunities throughout the year, including upcoming regional alumni Composers Forums and Holiday Parties. You can also find us on Instagram, Twitter, YouTube, bandcamp, and at waldenschool.org.
eNews: InterNetzo – January 2021
Message from Seth Brenzel, Executive Director
Dear Walden friend, 
I hope this finds you well and enjoying the start of the new year. We are now accepting applications for the Young Musicians Program (YMP) and Creative Musicians Retreat (CMR), and our Early Application Deadline is February 5.
Walden Winter Wednesdays (WWW) are here, a series of casual community gatherings over Zoom, so check the Community Events section to find out more. You'll also find the next installment in the Walden Online Workshop (WOW) series, coming up on February 7 and February 16.
Be sure to check out the In the Spotlight section to hear some wonderful stories from Walden alumna Mariana Szklo. You can also check the Community News section to read about some of the happenings in the lives and careers of fellow Walden community members.
I hope you enjoy this January edition of InterNetzo, and I look forward to seeing you for a WWW, a WOW, or another gathering soon.
Sincerely,
Seth
Community Events
Walden Winter Wednesdays
We hope you will join us for Walden Winter Wednesdays (WWW), a series of casual online gatherings over Zoom, to catch up with fellow students, faculty, staff, parents, and artists. Each WWW is for a different Walden cohort, so check the list below to find out when your WWW is happening. Each WWW will begin at 8 pm Eastern/5 pm Pacific, and last about an hour. You are welcome to join the WWW for any and all cohorts of which you have been part!
Our first WWW was on January 27, for the 1970s/1980s:
Bring your favorite winter beverage or snack and wear your favorite cozy scarf. (For those of you in warm climates, creative workarounds for cozy scarfs are welcome.)
To attend, register through Eventbrite and we will send you Zoom details before the gathering. Feel free to send any questions to alumni@waldenschool.org.
February 3 - 2000s - Register
If you were a Walden student, parent, faculty member, staff member, or visiting artist during the 2000s, this is for you!
February 10 - JCC - Register
If you were a student, faculty member, staff member, or visiting artist at the Junior Conservatory Camp, this is for you!
February 24 - 1990s - Register
If you were a Walden student, parent, faculty member, staff member, or visiting artist during the 1990s, this is for you!
March 3 - CMR, OCME, & TTI - Register
If you came to as an adult, as a participant, faculty member, staff, member, or visiting artist at CMR, OCME, and/or TTI, this is for you!
March 10 - 2010s (YMP & OYME) - Register
If you were a YMP student, parent, faculty member, staff member, or visiting artist during the 2010s, or part of OYME in 2020, this is for you!
WOW! Walden Online Workshops!
More Walden Online Workshops (WOW) are on the horizon! We are excited to continue sharing this series of lectures, demonstrations, classes, and presentations on a variety of musical topics presented over video call by The Walden School's teaching faculty, artists, and special guests. Alumni of CMR, YMP, OYME, OCME, TTI, and JCC, parents, donors, faculty, staff, and artists are especially encouraged to attend WOW presentations. Members of the general public are also welcome to join.
Implementing Creative Delight 
Sunday, February 7, 2021
4 pm Eastern
Led by Lisa Bielawa
Fulfilling our role as creators and artists in our communities during challenging lockdown and social distancing conditions can be daunting. How might we or must we turn our own process on its head in order to fulfill this role? How can we spark the vitality we need to make new work that engages community and participation without access to each other in real space and time?
In this workshop Lisa will share some strategies she has used to protect the element of Delight - which leads to creative inspiration - from our current limitations and challenges, after which we will play some creativity games together to send everyone off into a newly energized creative practice.
About Lisa Bielawa
Composer, producer, and vocalist Lisa Bielawa (b. 1968) is a Rome Prize winner in Musical Composition. She takes inspiration for her work from literary sources and close artistic collaborations. Her music has been described as "ruminative, pointillistic and harmonically slightly tart," by The New York Times. She is the recipient of the 2017 Music Award from the American Academy of Arts & Letters and a 2020 Discovery Grant from OPERA America's Opera Grants for Female Composers. She was also Composer-in-Residence for the 2020 Online Creative Musicians Experience.
Text Score Teatime 
Tuesday, February 16, 2021
7:30 pm Eastern
Led by Kittie Cooper
In this workshop, we will explore the creative potential in using text to notate music. We will make sounds and words together, and discover means of integrating text scores into your own creative practice and interests. Whether you are an experienced composer/writer/artist, or whether you haven't done any writing since elementary-school book reports, this workshop is for you! (no experience with music or writing required). Bring a mug of tea or hot chocolate, and come enjoy a peaceful evening (or afternoon, or morning) of sounds, words, and the company of others.
About Kittie Cooper
Kittie Cooper is a composer, performer, and educator based in Charlottesville, Virginia. She makes art that incorporates feminism and explores the spectrum between silliness and seriousness. Her work has been called "highly original and wonderfully fun". She is interested in text and graphic scores, improvisation, and DIY electronic instruments. She also performs as a guitarist, electronic musician, and improviser. Kittie currently serves as Director of Composers Forums and Teaching Faculty for The Walden School Young Musicians Program.
Stay tuned for details, and visit waldenschool.org/wow to learn about more exciting workshops.
In the Spotlight
Mariana Szklo
Mariana Szklo, PhD, MHS, is Associate Professor of Community and Environmental Health at Old Dominion University in Norfolk, Virginia, and serves as associate editor of the journals American Journal of Epidemiology and SLEEP. Her expertise is in applied sleep. Mariana was a student at Walden for seven summers, beginning in 1978.
How and when did you relationship with Walden begin?
Lynn Hebden, with Leo Wanenchak and Pat Plude, were my musicianship teachers at Peabody during the year, and recommended to my mother that I go to Walden. She told me I was going to Walden without a lot of advance notice. I had just finished third grade, and I asked, "What am I going to read on the trip?" the day I was traveling. She gave me a copy of Hamlet, and off I went on the bus. Looking back, six weeks in the summer after third grade was a long time.
It was a very memorable bus ride (starting in Baltimore with stops along the eastern seaboard). I met Jessie Urbaitis, who is only six months older, and became a lifelong close friend, and many others like Lance Reddick, who was a student a few years older, and John Yankee, who became my teacher and another lifelong friend. That was the beginning of my Walden experience, and I loved it so that I kept going back.
What was your experience at Walden like after that?
I was at Walden for seven summers, 1978-84, from the ages of 9 to 15, which is a long stretch, and very formative. During the year I studied at the Peabody Preparatory in Baltimore. Jeff Cohen was my piano teacher, and he also was affiliated with Walden. Walden was at the Mountain School in Vermont then, maybe '78- '82, and it was a very beautiful setting, very open and free form.
Because I was very young, I had a private orchestration class with David Hogan (Hoagie), and we would sit on the rock outside the dining hall. He also taught a score reading class my second summer, and it was challenging and very exciting. The demands were high, yet it was seamless. We never felt we couldn't do it-everything was possible--and we never felt pressured, it was just interesting, and we learned. Hoagie was an inspiring teacher, and I have very clear memories of those classes.
There were many people I studied with over the years, both privately and in classes, and so many classes that were formative. David Drucker taught a 20th century music class, and I had saved the syllabus, which I sent to him recently. I studied with Ann Callaway as a composition teacher when I was around 12, and she was instrumental. I also studied composition and analysis with John Yankee many summers.
I arrived at Walden in 1978 really liking poetry, and John wrote Songs of Nonsense, with one song his setting of a little poem I'd written about a pen. I was learning about that interplay between poetry and music from the starting point of poetry. That connection with words and language was powerful for me, and I have a lifelong interest in poetry and words. I draw from Walden in many ways, I always have, but now I consciously draw on those experiences and consider how to bring them into what I do.
What stands out to you from that time?
The freedom that we had, how we could pursue anything we wanted. There were no boundaries, intellectually. I was a child, but there wasn't any condescension, there was equality. I felt heard. It was musically exciting, and people also spoke of literature and poetry and science. I recall older students like Becca Hammann and Laura Giles reading nightly to us younger students (often from The Chronicles of Narnia), Tom Johnson's chamber music sessions, Hoagie's bell waking us every morning, and hiking, including Mt. Washington one summer.
There were many spontaneous evening musical events. Dede Ondishko, who was around 20 then, had been at conservatory, and she arrived one evening as a guest, and gave a talk on the Webern Piano Variations Op.28 in the library, and I recall her writing on the board in the library and explaining 12-tone music, and it was all quite exciting. I was 11, it was late at night, past my usual bedtime, and there was this sense of freedom--it was just about learning, and how exciting learning can be. There was no other agenda. I hope I have carried that with me. I think that's still central in my life, that curiosity and immersion and love of learning, just as it is, without knowing where it may take you.
There was a sense of whimsy and also playfulness at Walden I've tried to carry with me. We developed that as students, and the faculty nurtured it. We had a sense of real immersion and engagement. We would all look at the stars at night, talking and singing. There is a silo on the campus of the Mountain School, and the whole camp sang Sanctus in the silo. I look back on those years really fondly, and to this day, some of my best dreams are of those early years.
How are music and/or creativity part of your life now?
I think that sense of the exploration being as important as where you arrive. Uncertain space can be very creative space. I'm always looking for interconnections among different mediums and ways of thinking. I'm in the process of planning a study of sleep in the Arctic. I'm collaborating with someone who has done a study of sleep in the Antarctic, as well as an oceanographer, and that spirit of collaboration was very much part of Walden. Studying things that are different and new relates to Walden, even though for me it's in a field outside music. I think Walden helped me develop a sense of fearlessness. You have to try new things, and study what you want to study, whether or not it's in vogue.
Music is with me all the time. I'm always listening to music and going to concerts and thinking about music. I'm married to Steve Coxe, who was also at Walden and is a composer. Our daughter Alice is 15, and she also loves music. She is a percussionist and really likes the melodic percussion instruments.
Are there other things you carry from Walden?
I think Walden has given me an appreciation for listening to people and not getting in the way of what they're endeavoring to do. You provide them with information that might be able to assist them, but you don't push them toward any particular thing. You never know what interrelationships will form or what they will mean. Everything is open, and unknown, and it's an adventure, and that's a spirit I found at Walden in those early years. It was just about being and learning, without constraints. I try to recreate that kind of environment for the students I teach and in research. I don't always do it consciously, but these memories from Walden are part of me, and I want to recreate the endless possibility of that time.
You'd awaken and go to sleep with the sense of promise and beauty of each day at Walden, and the spirit of community. Once you experience this, it's hard not to have in other settings, because you know what's possible. It was very magical. I use that term sparingly, but it really was.
2021 Summer Programs
Applications open for summer 2021
Walden is earnestly and actively planning for a return to in-person programming in Dublin, New Hampshire, in 2021, with the understanding that pandemic circumstances may require our programs instead be offered again online next summer. Whether in-person or online, Walden is excited to offer our students, participants, and audiences another summer of transformative, creative music programs and presentations. We hope that you will join us!
Our 2021 dates* are:
Young Musicians Program (YMP): June 26-August 1 (for musicians ages 9-18; 3-week option for students up through 7th grade June 26-July 18, 2021)
Creative Musicians Retreat (CMR): June 12-20 (for adult musicians, 18+, not otherwise eligible to be students at YMP)
We are accepting applications, and the Early Application Deadline is Friday, February 5.
To request an application, go to waldenschool.org/apply.
Early deadline: February 5
Regular deadline: March 15
Final deadline: May 1
Need-based financial aid in the form of tuition assistance is available. Please let us know if you have any questions or would like any additional information about Summer 2021 by writing to us at applicants@waldenschool.org.
*Dates for online programs, if necessary, will be similar to those for the in-person programming.
Community News
Alan Chan Jazz Orchestra presents Camel Walk
The Alan Chan Jazz Orchestra, along with suona performer Guo Yazhi, presented the Camel Walk Project as part of the Jazz Education Network Annual Conference, which took place online January 6-9. The Alan Chan Jazz Orchestra is a Los Angeles-based big band that Alan started in 2011. Alan is a Walden alumnus and past faculty member. You can find video of the Camel Walk project here, from performances in 2016 and 2019.
Alex Christie offers virtual workshops
Walden alumnus and faculty member Alex Christie is offering a series of hands-on virtual workshops on synthesizers. Alex's Synths for Beginners workshops are presented through the Bridge Progressive Arts Initiative, and require no prior experience. There were three sessions for adults in January, and sessions for youth ages 10-18 coming up in February and March. Alex is a composer, technologist, and instrument-builder based in Charlottesville, Virginia.
Astronautica premiere features Renée Favand-See
Astronautica - Voices of Women in Space is a newly commissioned work of music, voice, and video by women composers, with a libretto drawn from the words of the women who have traveled in outer space. Astronautica premiered on January 27, and features two pieces by Renée Favand-See, Walden alumna and faculty member. Astronautica is the first event in Voices of The New, Voices of Ascension's new commissioning program. Astronautica was commissioned by Trio Triumphatrix: mezzo-soprano Hai-Ting Chinn, soprano Lindsay Kesselman, and contralto Kirsten Sollek.
Lukáš Janata commissioned by SF Symphony 
The San Francisco Symphony has announced the upcoming season of programs presented online. A SoundBox program on July 8 will be curated by Nico Muhly, features choreographer and dancer Emma Lanier, and includes performances of Inti Figgis-Vizueta's Inbhir; Muhly's Motion, and his arrangements of Orlando Gibbons's "See, See the Word is Incarnate" and Meredith Monk's Fat Stream, and the world premiere of a new work commissioned from Lukáš Janata. Lukáš is a CMR alumnus.
Laura Jobin-Acosta IDEA Opera Residency
Laura Jobin-Acosta in one of three Resident Artists selected for the first-ever IDEA Opera Residencies, a new initiative by OPERA America. IDEA Opera Residencies (Inclusion, Diversity, Equity, and Access) provides New York City-based composers and librettists of color an opportunity to explore opera as an expressive medium. Laura is an alumna of the Creative Musicians Retreat. The other two inaugural Resident Artists are librettist J. Mae Barizo and composer Tamar-kali Brown.
Josie Kovash welcomes a new baby
Josie Kovash has welcomed a daughter, Hunter Moon Pierre Edwards, born on Mother's Day 2020. Josie was a student at the Young Musicians Program for three summers, 1996-98, and was on staff at the Young Musicians Program in 2013. Congratulations, Josie!
Joel St. Julien featured on modular synth event
On January 24, Colorado Modular Synth Society presented January Skies, a modular synth space music event. Featured on the event was Fool's Paradise by CMR alumnus Joel St. Julien. Joel is a San Francisco-based composer, musician, songwriter and sound artist. The Colorado Modular Synth Society's mission is to connect people with information, inspiration, and a community of peers fascinated with modular synthesizers. You can watch a recording of January Skies here.
Anjna Swaminathan Roulette premieres
Anjna Swaminathan was awarded a 2020 Van Lier Fellowship from Roulette Intermedium to produce two evening-length multidisciplinary concerts. The first, Rivers Above, Floods Below, premiered on November 16, and the second, |borders/lines|, will premiere via livestream on March 25, 2021. Anjna is a queer multidisciplinary composer, musician, and theatre artist, and was a visiting artist at the Young Musicians Program in 2018.
Freya Waley-Cohen featured on launch of SF Symphony+
The San Francisco Symphony, under Music Director Esa Pekka-Salonen, is launching a new online streaming service, SFSymphony+. SFSymphony+ will launch with a chamber music program, Nostalgia, as part of the SoundBox series. Nostalgia features works by three women composers--Freya Waley-Cohen, Missy Mazzoli, and Caroline Shaw--and will be performed on February 4. Freya is an alumna of the Young Musicians Program.
We want to hear from you!
What's been going on? If you have a recent or upcoming premiere, publication, award, new job or program, or a celebratory life event, please share the news. Email your news to alumni@waldenschool.org.
Stay in Touch
You can like The Walden School page on Facebook and join The Walden School private group to hear about events and opportunities throughout the year, including upcoming regional alumni Composers Forums and Holiday Parties. You can also find us on Instagram, Twitter, YouTube, bandcamp, and at waldenschool.org.
eNews: InterNetzo – December 2020
Message from Seth Brenzel, Executive Director
Dear Walden friend,
I hope this finds you well and enjoying the holiday season. In this December edition of InterNetzo, be sure to read our "In the Spotlight" section to hear some inspiring reflections from Walden alumna and faculty member Renée Favand-See. You can also check the Community News section to read about some of the happenings in the lives and careers of fellow Walden community members. And be sure to check out information on the next installment in the Walden Online Workshop (WOW) series, coming up on January 13.
As we reach the end of 2020, I am filled with gratitude for the Walden community. Thank you for your participation, support, and enthusiasm through this unprecedented year. We have so much to look forward to in the year ahead. From all of us here at Walden, best wishes for a healthy, hopeful, and peaceful New Year!
Sincerely,
Seth
In the Spotlight
Renée Favand-See 
Renée Favand-See a composer and soprano who lives in Portland, Oregon. Her works explore the music of words, of natural and made environments, of emotions and spiritual questions. These investigations yield vocal music of all stripes, Musique Concrète-esque electronic pieces, lyrically driven instrumental music, and counterpoint or the relationships that unfold in the spaces between voices. She is also a Walden alumna and faculty member.
How and when did you relationship with Walden begin, and what has been your involvement since then?
I started going to Walden in 1985, and I heard about Walden from Rosie Hollander, a friend from middle school. So thanks, Rosie! We both loved music--she played the piano, and I sang in a children's choir in Maryland. She told me about the camp, and I went the next summer. I was there for five summers, starting when I was 12.
Since then, I taught on the Young Musicians Program (YMP) faculty for more than 10 summers. I started when I was a senior at Eastman School of Music. I really appreciated the spirit of apprenticeship in the Walden community; my mentors had been my teachers, and those relationships evolved as we became peers. That was a special experience, and very affirming for me as a young musician. I've been teaching at the Creative Musicians Retreat (CMR) since 2015 and have loved that as well. I think all teaching at Walden is connected by a foundation of gratitude. Teachers and students alike are so grateful to be in this incredibly nurturing, stimulating, and creative environment. I look forward to CMR every year, knowing I will feel how much the participants appreciate the experience, a nurturing environment which is unique in adulthood.
Could you describe a favorite memory from your time as a Walden student?
It is hard to pick! There is one memory I bring up often when I'm teaching text setting (how to set text to music). As a student, I wrote a song cycle called Bird Songs, and one of the songs had a text by Walt Whitman from Leaves of Grass. He's looking up at the sky and he sees a flock of geese, and the poem reads, "Ya-honk! And it sounds down to me like an invitation." I took the word Ya-honk, and I just went for it in my song, writing, "YA-HONK! YA-HONK! YA-HOOOOONK!" I got grilled in the Composers Forum, and was asked, "Did you have to be so obvious in your text-setting with the word Ya-honk?" It was a type of text-setting where the melody line kind of Mickey-Mouses, really doing what the text means.
That lesson stayed very much on my mind. I write a lot of songs these days, it's my favorite thing to do as a composer, and I always think about Ya-honk. For the longest time, I put any kind of text-setting thing in the piano, and just kept the voice steady. I was probably 16 when I wrote that piece, and maybe 15 years later, I realized my mistake wasn't setting ya-honk so dramatically--my mistake was choosing a poem with the word ya-honk in it! What else are you going to do? But that lively discussion has stuck in my mind, and I always tell my students the ya-honk story when we're discussing tasteful setting of a vocal line of text.
Another memory is from one of my first classes at Walden, which was a eurythmics class with Dede Ondishko. We sat in a circle and the first thing we did was say our names and notice the accent structure. That was when I realized that my name was totally iambic--Renée Louise Favand--and that has stuck with me. These seeds from when I was quite young have taken root and borne fruit in so many ways, all my life. It has been amazing. When I set a text now, the first thing I pay attention to is the natural rhythm of the words. The music of a poem is rhythm-based, so I'm always trying to listen to that. That first exercise where we got sensitized to the accent stress and the syllables of spoken word has been a part of me ever since.
Then of course the hiking and joy of the dances and the joy of singing...just being in your body. Music-making at Walden is embodied in a beautiful way that lives in me now.
Could you describe a favorite memory from your time on faculty?
I had this hotshot group of three girls in my musicianship class who were close friends, all around the same age and were very goofy and playful and sweet. We were doing a dominant-seventh pivot drill, and they were nailing it--they were doing all the resolutions, all the pivots, and it was amazing. It was so much fun to teach them because they were so hungry to learn and so facile with their musical language because of the wonderful grounding they had-they had all been studying Walden musicianship for a few years already. But the V4/3, the second inversion dominant seventh chord, made Danielle Oberdier laugh. Every time we got to singing V4/3, she would just break into giggles. It was a running joke, because we would try to get through the pivot drill and Danielle would start laughing in the middle every time.
Along with that, constantly witnessing students' excitement around learning and creativity. It's so inspiring--I learn so much from that and Walden is where I learned to teach. I really felt that beautiful exchange-I was teaching the students and they were teaching me all along the way how to be a better teacher.
I was also thinking about CMR, and we always do Pauline Oliveros' Rock Piece as an orientation activity. There was one year when we did Rock Piece and the silence after was this velvety, sacred silence. My ears were burst open with bird song and the breeze and the breath and the not-silence of it, and the feeling of connection in our little community that had only been together for a little while but somehow that piece connected us. The sensitive responses of the participants after, how moved everyone was, grew out of how we shared that moment.
Outside of Walden, how are music and creativity part of your life?
I'm a composer, largely of art songs and choral music, and I think Walden planted some beautiful seeds with all the singing we do. I'm also a teacher--I teach composition, theory, and orchestration at Portland State University. And also as a mother! I am realizing that mothering is a very creative activity, and all my training as a teacher is bearing fruit in this other context, which is really interesting. Improvisation is a core idea at Walden, making you flexible in the moment so you can adjust and shift with the direction things are going in. Listening is such a big part of teaching, and such a big part of mothering. Just being in the present moment for what might happen. The first year of mothering felt like a living meditation--"Pay attention. What is happening? Respond in the moment in the most authentic way you possibly can."--and that is the core of creativity as far as I'm concerned.
I also wrote a song at the beginning of quarantine for my friend Arwen, who is a vocalist. She asked 12 composers to write songs she could sing and play herself. It was such a tricky time with my son's napping, so I really had to leave the house to compose, but it was early enough in the pandemic that no one was really leaving their houses, and going to my studio felt totally taboo. I actually composed in my car using a water bottle drone. We had this water bottle that made a gorgeous gong-like drone, so I figured Arwen could tap the water bottle and sing. So I composed with a water bottle gong in the car while my son napped. I felt proud of my flexibility in that moment, finding a way through.
What is a non-musical hobby that's part of your life?
Hiking is probably my favorite. We try to go hiking all through the year, no matter the weather. It's a way to get the squirrels out of your head if you're feeling stressed or anxious, just get moving on the trail and breathe. For me, nature is a connector to the sacred. It brings you into the moment; "I'm here now, and this place is so captivating, I'm just here to enjoy it." My son Morgan, who is turning three, loves hiking. He keeps telling us, "I want to live where I can walk to the woods." That is a great dream to have. My first taste of hiking was at Walden, and it has been in my life ever since.
What is your hope or dream for Walden's future?
Just that Walden continues to thrive, bringing deep personal growth to people - participants, teachers, performers, listeners - across all socioeconomic and geographic boundaries, and continues to touch hearts through the sacred ritual of music. Walden is doing that. That's the amazing thing. It branches out more and more to places all over the world, and tries to offer students of all different backgrounds the opportunity to study there. It's a healing force in the world, and I just want it to keep sending ripples outward in all these branching, beautiful ways.
News and Goods
WOW! Walden Online Workshops!
More Walden Online Workshops (WOW) are on the horizon in 2021! We are excited to continue sharing this series of lectures, demonstrations, classes, and presentations on a variety of musical topics presented over video call by The Walden School's teaching faculty, artists, and special guests. Alumni of CMR, YMP, OYME, OCME, TTI, and JCC, parents, donors, faculty, staff, and artists are especially encouraged to attend WOW presentations. Members of the general public are also welcome to join.
The first workshop of 2021 will be on Wednesday, January 13, led by percussionist Matthew Gold.
In a Sound Place
Found Object Percussion
January 13, 2021, 7:30 pm Eastern
Discover the musical potential in the everyday objects all around us in this exploration of found object percussion. Using only materials collected from our environment, as well as our voices and bodies, we will discover new ways of making music together and new modes of listening. This workshop will trace a history of found object music through works by John Cage and Pauline Oliveros and will explore strategies for discovering, creating, and notating new sounds made with everyday objects. Learn to see the whole world as your instrument and be ready to make some noise(s) as we connect, create, and perform together!
Stay tuned for details, and write to wow@waldenschool.org for more information.
About Matthew Gold
Percussionist Matthew Gold is a performer, ensemble director, and educator who appears across the U.S. and internationally presenting concert programs with a focus on new and experimental music. He is a member of the New York-based new music group Talea Ensemble and the Talujon percussion group. Matthew is an Artist in Residence in Percussion and Contemporary Music Performance at Williams College where he directs the Williams Percussion Ensemble and New Music Williams, and is the Artistic Director of the annual I/O Festival of New Music. He is a frequent visiting artist at Walden, most recently at the Online Creative Musicians Experience in 2020.
Will you close 2020 with a gift to Walden?
The generosity of Walden's donors-an extraordinary community of approximately 400 individuals-makes possible all that we do, both in-person and online. We are so glad you are part of our Walden community. As we plan for the coming year, will you donate to Walden to help us get there? Your gift of any amount helps keep Walden thriving for generations of creative musicians to come.
You can make a gift online at waldenschool.org/donate, or mail a check payable to The Walden School to our administrative office at 30 Monterey Boulevard, Suite E, San Francisco, CA 94131.
On behalf of our entire Walden community, thank you for your support. We can hardly wait to gather in person (hopefully!) in New Hampshire next summer, and for many wonderful summers to come.
2021 Summer Programs
Walden is earnestly and actively planning for a return to in-person programming in Dublin, New Hampshire, in 2021, with the understanding that pandemic circumstances may require our programs instead be offered again online next summer. Whether in-person or online, Walden is excited to offer our students, participants, and audiences another summer of transformative, creative music programs and presentations. We hope that you will plan to join us!
Our 2021 dates* are:
Young Musicians Program (YMP): June 26-August 1 (for musicians ages 9-18; 3-week option for students up through 7th grade June 26-July 18, 2021)
Creative Musicians Retreat (CMR): June 12-20 (for adult musicians, 18+, not otherwise eligible to be students at YMP)
Application materials and information will be posted on our website in early January, with a first round application deadline of February 1, 2021. Subsequent deadlines will be March 15 and May 1. Need-based financial aid in the form of tuition assistance is available. Please let us know if you have any questions or would like any additional information about Summer 2021 by writing to us at applicants@waldenschool.org.
*Dates for online programs, if necessary, will be similar to those for the in-person programming.
End-of-year AmazonSmile shopping?
Do you still have some end-of-year shopping to do? Are you using Amazon.com to help you get ready for 2021? Don't forget to use AmazonSmile! A portion of every sale will be donated to Walden.
Just go to smile.amazon.com and select "Walden School" (listed in San Francisco, CA) as your charity.
You'll know it's us, because you'll see this information:
Mission: The Walden School inspires artistic expression and personal growth through experiential music programs.
Programs: Young Musicians Program, Creative Musicians Retreat
Community News
Andrew Barnes Jamieson
On December 25, YMP alumnus Andrew Barnes Jamieson performed a live online solo piano concert, highlighting the complexity that has always been part of the holidays through unique piano reinterpretations of well-known holiday music. Andrew's Christmas Day concert encouraged playful and meaningful celebration and reflection on this moment of our lives. Andrew's live polytonal mashup work involves at least two recognizable melodies in two different hands, with independent/clashing tonalities and rhythms. You can watch a recording of the performance here.
Nathan and Sylvia Davis welcome first child 
Nathan and Sylvia Davis have welcomed their first child, Llewelyn Milo Davis, who was born in November. Nathan spent eight summers as a visiting artist at Walden, including two summers as a member of The Walden School Players. Congratulations to the Davis family!
Maya Engenheiro to attend NYU
YMP alumna Maya Engenheiro has been accepted to New York University, where she plans to pursue a Bachelor of Music through NYU's Steinhardt School of Culture, Education, and Human Development, majoring in Music Business. Maya will start at NYU in the fall of 2021.
Mary Fineman featured on Art Show
Mary Fineman was featured on an Online Multimedia Art Show, Peace and Peaceful Activism, presented by the Diablo-Alameda branch of the National League of American Pen Women (NLAPW). Since 1897, NLAPW has promoted and supported the creative efforts of women nationwide. Mary performed two of her pieces as part of the show. You can watch the show on YouTube here, and a Meet the Artist segment with Mary here. Mary attended the Junior Conservatory Camp, Walden's predecessor program.
Ofurhe Igbinedion completes PhD
Ofurhe Igbinedion has completed her PhD in Geography at the University of California, Davis. Her focus was critical race and feminist geography, and she worked on research assessing the health impacts of transportation plans in Sacramento County. Ofurhe completed her Bachelors in Geography and Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations at the University of Chicago. She was a student at the Young Musicians Program for three summers. Congratulations, Ofurhe!
Digital premiere of Felix Jarrar short film
An operatic short film of Felix Jarrar and B. L. Foxley's Stardust premiered in early December. The film was produced by Modular Opera Project, an initiative of Helios Opera, and ran December 4-13. Felix, a CMR alumnus, composed the piece and served as collaborative pianist. Each screening was followed by discussion with the creative team, with topics ranging from BIPOC representation in the arts to artmaking in the era of COVID-19 to the creation of a multi-genre solo show.
New album from Ted Moore
Ted Moore's new album, bruit, was released on November 20. bruit is a portrait album of improvisations in conversation with collaborators Jenna Lyle, Ben Roidl-Ward, Yung-Tuan Ku, Emerson Hunton, Eric Krouse, Anna La Berge, and Tom Weeks. All tracks feature Ted improvising on electronics. Ted is a composer, improviser, intermedia artist, and educator based in Chicago. He is also a Walden alumnus, and has been on faculty since 2011. Anne LaBerge is a past visiting artist to Walden.
Amy Sham married 
On October 8, Amy Sham married David Grant Smith in Cape May, New Jersey. Although a "DIY pandemic wedding" may not have been the original plan, Amy says the day was perfect. All our warmest wishes to Amy and David. Amy is an alumna of the Young Musicians Program.
January livestreaming concert with Kate Stenberg
On Sunday, January 31, 2020, violinist Kate Stenberg, cellist Mary Artmann, and pianist Ava Soifer will perform an online concert featuring works by Shostakovish, Dvorak, and Piazzolla. The concert will begin at 5 pm Pacific, presented by Music on the Hill. Music on the Hill has been presenting chamber music in San Francisco since 1998, and you can find concert details on their website. Kate is a past visiting artist at Walden.
Jonathan Thomas and Gail Nakano welcome a new baby
Jonathan Thomas and Gail Nakano welcome their new baby, Cassia Ruby Thomas, born at 3:01 pm on December 22, 2020. Jonathan was previously Walden's Development Manager, and is now the Senior Manager of Individual Giving at Lyric Opera of Kansas City. Jonathan and Gail continue to support and stay connected to Walden, and Jonathan volunteers with Walden. We send congratulations and warmest wishes to their growing family.
We want to hear from you!
What's been going on? If you have a recent or upcoming premiere, publication, award, new job or program, or a celebratory life event, please share the news. Email your news to alumni@waldenschool.org.
Stay in Touch
You can like The Walden School page on Facebook and join The Walden School private group to hear about events and opportunities throughout the year, including upcoming regional alumni Composers Forums and Holiday Parties. You can also find us on Instagram, Twitter, YouTube, bandcamp, and at waldenschool.org.
eNews: InterNetzo – November 2020
Message from Seth Brenzel, Executive Director
Dear friend, 
I hope you will enjoy this November edition of InterNetzo. Be sure to read our "In the Spotlight" section to hear some wonderful stories from Matthew Gold, a frequent visiting artist at Walden. You can also learn about the next Walden Online Workshop (WOW) on December 2, led by Carrie Mallonee. You can also check the Community News section to read about some of happenings in the lives and careers of fellow Walden community members.
As we enter the holiday season, I am filled with gratitude for the Walden community. Thank you for your participation, support, and enthusiasm. I send you my very best wishes for a joyous and peaceful holiday season.
Sincerely,
Seth
In the Spotlight
Matthew Gold
Matthew GoldPercussionist Matthew Gold is a performer, ensemble director, and educator who appears across the U.S. and internationally presenting concert programs with a focus on new and experimental music. He is a member of the New York-based new music group Talea Ensemble and the Talujon percussion group. Matthew is an Artist in Residence in Percussion and Contemporary Music Performance at Williams College where he directs the Williams Percussion Ensemble and New Music Williams, and is the Artistic Director of the annual I/O Festival of New Music.
How and when did you relationship with Walden begin?
I first became involved with Walden as part of the Young Musicians Program (YMP) in the summer of 2006, and it was completely last-minute. I had heard of the program from musicians I'd worked with, and that July I was performing on a concert in Brooklyn with Meighan Stoops (a member of the Walden School Players). At intermission, she told me that the percussionist in the Players had to cancel due to an illness in the family. She told me the program was the most incredible thing in the world, her favorite thing that she did, and they needed somebody last-minute. She asked if there was any way I could clear my schedule the next week and just come out there in 3 days to fill in. She was certain I wouldn't regret it. I had been playing a Broadway show for 2 years that had just closed that week, and I wanted a change. So I thought, "Yeah, why not? It's summer, I wouldn't mind getting out of New York for a week, and Meighan has said all these great things about it." So I rented a van, packed it up with a million instruments, and drove to New Hampshire. Almost immediately, I was absorbed by everything that Walden was. Meighan was absolutely right, I was so glad I went. So that was my first summer at Walden, and it was a really great experience.
What has your involvement with Walden been since then?
After that first summer, I didn't go back the next couple summers, but starting in 2010, I spent three years as the percussionist in the Walden School Players at YMP. After that, I had a few more years off, then returned in the resident ensemble for the Creative Musicians Retreat (CMR), and I've been doing that for four years now. Being part of both YMP and CMR, I've met many participants, ranging from the youngest students to retirees. It has been particularly interesting to see participants who were at YMP when I was there returning to CMR as college students and beyond. I see their evolution as composers, and also the things that remain about their personalities and styles. Sure, they become more mature and develop their voices as composers and become more self-assured, and yet there are unique aspects of their personalities that remain. I also see people who were students at Walden who are now on the faculty or staff, and I get to think back to when they were teenagers or younger, and I had to lie on my back and bang on the underside of the piano for their piece, or any number of things like that one does at Walden. I like to remember those things and see how they relate to the work they do later.
Could you describe a favorite Walden memory?
I'm sure others remember this piece more clearly than I do, so my telling may be limited, but it's symbolic of how I think about Walden. My last summer in The Walden School Players, there was a student whose name I can't recall, but she was fairly young and her piece was a song, I think, about a whale. The text of the song was mostly backwards, or at least in some sort of code that gradually revealed itself over the course of the performance. The gist of it was, "Underwater, everyone understands what I'm saying, but when I'm not underwater, nobody can understand me." It was very beautiful and very poignant, and as I listened to it, I became aware that's what Walden was to her. When she's there, she can speak this musical language, drawing on what students learn together and understand really deeply. Then when it's over and the students go home, it's like they're out of water. They have this deep connection with each other and they're the only ones who understand this language. I was really moved by that, and that seemed to me the way I felt about Walden. There is something really special about the place, the relationships, and musically how everyone interacts. I think of Walden as an ideal for a musical community and a way of making music. It's something I strive for in my professional life, in my teaching, in every way, to create that sort of possibility, but it's really at Walden that you can have that entirely. So I was deeply moved by that piece, which I think encapsulates the Walden experience.
Over the years I've been involved, I've also met so many professional musicians who come to teach or perform, who have learned so much from Walden and are involved in many parts of the contemporary music world. When I'm out there in the rest of the world, I have chances to think about those connections and how we also have a way of seeing the world that's shaped by Walden, and we can communicate with one another, with a shared understanding of music and how one sees it.
Outside of Walden, how are music and creativity part of your life?
Music is really central to my life year-round. It is what I do professionally, and as much as possible I try to approach my everyday professional life creatively. I always strive to think about things through a creative lens, to question things, experiment, discover new ways of doing things. Music and creativity are also central to my teaching, both in my teaching at Williams College, as well as in outreach programs and visits to elementary schools. Wherever I am, I try to think creatively about how we approach music. That is especially important in the face of so many restrictions these past 9 months. It has provided a way to go forward, and we've discovered new ways of making music, new ways of listening (which is even more important), and new ways of sharing sound.
Beyond that, music is an important part of my family life. I have two kids, one of whom is seven and the other just turned 11. While they take violin and piano lessons and sing, music as part of our family life is not about training or hopes I might have for them to be professional musicians. I'm pretty confident I'm not pushing them toward that in any way. I do want music to be something they have access to and can be part of their everyday lives-not something they compete in or necessarily have careers in, but something that's part of the everyday texture of life. To that end, I practice with them, sit down at the piano with them, and when they are playing violin, I grab a violin and try to play along. I have never taken a violin lesson, but it's fun to try to teach myself from their lesson books and play along and learn with them. The same goes for the drum set and the marimba and any of the noisemakers I have in my studio-we all experiment and have fun. We may learn a song on one instrument and then try to play it on every other instrument. Sometimes it can be hard to be a professional musician, so to have the opportunity to just have fun with it--with people you want to spend time with--is wonderful. Music as part of family life is just as important to me now as music in my professional life.
What is a non-musical hobby that's part of your life?
I have a feeling this is widespread right now, but I started cooking during the pandemic. It's not that I didn't know how to cook before--I could apply heat to things--but I had never followed a recipe. In a way, I was very creative with my cooking, because I didn't know any techniques and didn't follow a recipe. I would improvise, and mostly it worked out, although there were some disasters. These past few months I've been following recipes, trying to learn new techniques and how ingredients and flavors work, and that's really exciting. Then as I become comfortable with a technique, I can start to depart from recipes and apply what I've learned in new ways. In that way, it's much like music--you learn your instrument, you learn techniques, you learn theory, and at a certain point you start making interpretive decisions and improvising. At a time I have fewer rehearsals and I'm not traveling, it has been really gratifying to make something others enjoy, or even something just for myself. More than anything, I've been spending time with chickpeas, and I'm quite proud of my hummus. I want to share with everyone my recent discovery of aquafaba, the liquid that canned chickpeas are soaked in. It makes the hummus incredibly smooth and creamy, so I could not be more excited about aquafaba.
What is your hope or dream for Walden's future?
It's really simple: that everyone can return. Often in organizations or ensembles, there is constant talk of growth and expanding. Maybe that's the case with Walden, I don't know, but my sense is that Walden is doing really well, and it's just important to get back to Dublin and get everyone back together. I don't think Walden needs to be other than what it is--it does what it does so well.
My other hope, personally, is that I would like to see one or both of my kids attend YMP in the not-too-distant future. I'd like it to be there for them and for them to be part of it. To have that experience, to be part of that community--I think they would connect with it really deeply and they would learn so much. It's just a special experience that is outside of what they can have at home and something they could carry with them. I also want that experience not just for my kids, but really for everyone who would benefit from that community. I hope the opportunity is there for all kids, and for a long time. So that's both my institutional hope and my personal one.
Community Events
Tomorrow, December 1, is Giving Tuesday! Giving Tuesday is a global day of generosity, supporting our communities and the organizations we love. Walden's amazing donor community keeps us thriving--thank you.
On December 1, 7 million dollars in matching funds will be available to those who donate on our Facebook page. The first $7million donated across all of the Facebook pages with active fundraisers will be matched. In order to access that $7million, you might have to wake up very early on December 1!
On #GivingTuesday, we're trying to raise $2,021 to help Walden get to 2021, which cannot happen too soon! Please join us by donating through Walden's Facebook fundraiser or at waldenschool.org/donate. Any amount helps and Facebook does not charge any fees against your donation, so 100% of your contribution goes to support Walden students, artists, faculty, staff, and programs.
WOW! Walden Online Workshops!
On November 15, we had the first of our Walden Online Workshops (WOW), a wonderful introduction to synthesis in VCV Rack, led by Walden alumnus and faculty member Alex Christie. We are excited to continue sharing this series of lectures, demonstrations, classes, and presentations on a variety of musical topics, presented over video call by The Walden School's teaching faculty, artists, and special guests. Alumni of CMR, YMP, OYME, OCME, TTI, and JCC, parents, donors, faculty, staff, and artists are especially encouraged to attend WOW presentations. Members of the general public are also welcome to join.
Metamorphosis 
Led by Caroline Mallonee, Director of Walden's Creative Musicians Retreat (CMR)
Wednesday, December 2, 7-9 pm Eastern
How do you imply the impossible? What parallels can be drawn between visual art and music? What inspiration do we find in optical and auditory illusion?
In this 90-minute workshop, we will discover parallels between mind-blowing works by the Dutch artist M. C. Escher and mind-blowing music by György Ligeti, Steve Reich, Charles Ives, Ruth Crawford Seeger, J. S. Bach, and Guillaume Machaut. This will be an interactive presentation; in addition to looking at scores and listening, we will have group discussions and do some creative work. Learn more and register here.
This event is nearly "sold out", so don't delay if you would like to attend. You can always add your name to the waiting list, in case someone who has registered decides not to attend.
For more information and to learn about future workshops, visit waldenschool.org/wow.
Community News
Premiere of Felix Jarrar's new micro-opera
On Halloween, Barn Opera/Social Distance Opera presented the world premiere production of Patience & Pearl, a "micro-opera" by Felix Jarrar. Patience & Pearl is Felix's 7th opera, with a libretto by Bea Goodwin. The work is loosely based on the story of Pearl Curran, a real 20th-century medium who channeled the words and poetry of her supposed ghost Patience Worth. In this updated, contemporary filmed production, Pearl is a blogger that enlists the help of the supernatural to assist with her earthly responsibility. Felix is a CMR alumnus.
Dana Jessen and Eli Stine collaboration 
through a fragile traverse, a collaboration between Dana Jessen and Eli Stine was premiered on November 18. through a fragile traverse travels through unexplored terrain with mesmerizing visuals and other-worldly sounds, all largely informed through themes of vulnerability and impermanence. Dana, a past Walden faculty member and frequent visiting artist, composed and performed the music. Eli, a Walden alumnus, created the video. You can watch a short excerpt of the piece here. The online premiere and release was part of Brooklyn's Soup and Sound series, in partnership with Continuum Culture and Arts.
Concert of works by Max Johnson
On November 17, Roulette presented Transformations, a livestreamed concert of works by Max Johnson. The concert featured seven of Max's pieces, including two world premieres: Nine O'Clock When the Streets Were Quiet and Transformations, a piece commissioned by Roulette. The performers included past visiting Walden visiting artists pianist Steven Beck, percussionist Matthew Gold, flutist Laura Cocks, and violinist Lauren Cauley, among others. Max attended the Creative Musicians Retreat. You can watch a video of the premiere of Nine O'Clock When the Streets Were Quiet here.
New release from Scott Lee 
Through the Mangrove Tunnels, a work by Scott Lee, was released on November 13. This album-length work is inspired by Scott's experiences growing up exploring the swamps and bayous of Florida, and features the JACK Quartet with pianist Steven Beck and drummer Russell Lacy performing eight genre-straddling movements. Scott is an alumnus of the Creative Musicians Retreat. Steven Beck is a past visiting artist at CMR and YMP, and JACK Quartet includes violinist Austin Wulliman, also a past visiting artist at Walden.
Zola Saadi-Klein named Luna Composition Lab Fellow
Kaufman Music Center has selected the 2020-21 Luna Composition Lab Fellows, and Zola Saadi-Klein is one of the six Fellows. Zola is an alumna of Walden's 2020 Online Young Musicians Experience. Luna Lab addresses the gender gap in the field of classical music by inspiring young self-identifying female, non-binary and gender nonconforming individuals to compose. Zola and the five other composers will be mentored by established composers: Valerie Coleman, Kristin Kuster, Tamar Muskal, Gity Razaz, Ellen Reid, and Alex Temple.
New album by D. J. Sparr 
On November 13, a new album by Walden alumnus and faculty member D. J. Sparr was released. The album, Hard Metal Cantüs, is described as "a nod to Frank Zappa and Henry Cowell," features pieces composed by D. J., performed by artists including Del Sol String Quartet, Third Coast Percussion, Lubbock Chamber Orchestra, Kimberly Sparr, and D. J. himself, among others. Del Sol is a past ensemble-in-residence at Walden, and Kimberly Sparr was a 2020 OCME visiting artist.
Tamsin Waley-Cohen concert at Wigmore Hall
On November 16, violinist Tamsin Waley-Cohen performed a concert from Wigmore Hall in London with pianist Huw Watkins. The concert featured the world premiere of Huw Watkins' Sonata for Violin and Piano, commissioned by Wigmore Hall and Sir Vernon Ellis. You can watch a recording of this livestreamed event here. Tamsin is a past visiting artist at Walden. This was also Tamsin's last concert for a while, because she is expecting her first child. Congratulations, Tamsin!
Pamela Z online concert 
On November 18, Pamela Z performed A Secret Code, a live concert of solo works for voice and electronics, followed by moderated discussion. The concert was presented by Rutgers Mason Gross School of the Arts, and was streamed live via Zoom. Pamela Z is a composer/performer and media artist making works for voice, electronic processing, samples, gesture activated MIDI controllers, and video. She is also a past visiting artist and Concert Series performer at Walden.
We want to hear from you!
What's been going on? If you have a recent or upcoming premiere, publication, award, new job or program, or a celebratory life event, please share the news. Email your news to alumni@waldenschool.org.
Stay in Touch
You can like The Walden School page on Facebook and join The Walden School private group to hear about events and opportunities throughout the year, including upcoming regional alumni Composers Forums and Holiday Parties. You can also find us on Instagram, Twitter, YouTube, bandcamp, and at waldenschool.org.
eNews: InterNetzo – October 2020
Message from Seth Brenzel, Executive Director
Dear friend,
I hope you will enjoy this October edition of InterNetzo. Read our "In the Spotlight" section to hear from Kittie Cooper, Walden faculty member and mastermind of Halloween-in-July, a beloved part of Walden summers over the past several years. You can also learn about the Walden Online Workshops (WOW) series, free educational online programs presented by our outstanding Walden faculty members and visiting artists. Also be sure to check out the Community News section to read about some of happenings in the lives and careers of fellow Walden community members.
Thanks for reading this issue of InterNetzo, participating in Walden, and lending your support and enthusiasm for our favorite summer music program. Happy Halloween!
Sincerely,
Seth
In the Spotlight
Kittie Cooper 
Kittie Cooper composer, performer, and educator based in Charlottesville, Virginia. She makes art that incorporates feminism and explores the spectrum between silliness and seriousness. Her work has been called "highly original and wonderfully fun." She is interested in text and graphic scores, improvisation, and DIY electronic instruments. She is also a driving force behind a much-beloved and relatively new Walden tradition, Halloween-in-July.
How did you get connected to Walden, and what has your involvement been since then?
I started working for Walden in 2014 because Eliza Brown, a longtime Walden community member, was my freshman year Music Theory professor. She made an announcement to the class that Walden was hiring, and a friend and I both worked at YMP that summer. So it was all because of Eliza!
At the Online Young Musicians Experience (OYME) this year I was on faculty, and I was Director of Composers Forums. My role at Walden has changed every year. I started out on staff, and I've been slowly morphing through different phases and roles.
Outside of Walden, how are music and/or creativity part of your life?
I feel like creativity and music are part of every area of my life. When I'm not at Walden, I'm composing and building instruments. I perform around Charlottesville solo and with a few groups during the year. With my day job teaching, I feel that gives me a lot of creative energy and drive to make music, rather than taking away from it. I think even when I'm doing things that aren't musical on the surface, I'm approaching them with a creative point of view, and collaborating with people like I would collaborate with other artists. I think those things have just been part of my life for so long that they touch everything that I do.
Could you describe a favorite Walden memory?
I had a really hard time narrowing this down. Can I say every Walden dance? I look forward to them every year. I think it's a really special way to see the community coming together every summer. At the beginning of the summer, there are always kids who love dancing and are immediately outgoing, but by the end of the summer, you see every student finding their place-maybe it's playing in the band, or musical chairs, or maybe they secretly love dancing but felt too uncomfortable at the beginning of the summer. I love the dances.
What is something that surprised you about the online programs this summer?
When I started getting emails in the spring about the leadership team figuring out what Walden 2020 was going to look like, I didn't know what to expect. I have immense faith in the leadership team and faculty and staff to put on great programs, but I also know how difficult it is to do an online program that's not just classes, but is also a festival and a summer camp. I went into it with positive expectations, but I was surprised by how successfully it felt like Walden. OYME felt like summer camp, and for both programs (OYME and the Online Creative Musicians Experience), how much we created a community just on computer screens.
I think that says a lot about the students and the participants-they came in with so much energy and positivity. With the OYME students, many of whom had been in online school since March, it seemed like they were just really excited to do something they cared about, or some were really excited about activities; it was different for everyone, but they came in with an energy that made it still feel like summer camp. There were still goofy announcements and crazy activities, and the classes were still very Walden-y. Everyone somehow managed to combine all of the school and camp and festival parts of Walden in a way that was really refreshing and meaningful. It gave me a lot of hope and energy for remote learning for the rest of the year.
You've been described at Walden as the President of Halloween. Why do you love Halloween?
I've loved Halloween since I was really young kid, and I think a lot of it is the magical element, having a day when we all do make-believe things and dress up in costumes. I've always loved the creative aspects of it too-making decorations and costumes. I love the creativity and self-expression of it, and I also just love spooky stuff.
I don't remember exactly how Halloween in July started at Walden. I think some faculty and staff were talking about how we have winter holidays in July, and we were kind of joking that we should have Halloween in July. I really wanted it to happen though because it sounded really fun, so I kept bringing it up and asking people to help so we could make it happen. At OYME we still had Halloween in July with a Halloween puppet-making activity that Doug and I led with a lip-syncing contest to spooky music.
Community Events
WOW! Walden Online Workshops!
We are thrilled to announce Walden Online Workshops (WOW), a series of lectures, demonstrations, classes, and presentations on a variety of musical topics, presented over video call by The Walden School's teaching faculty, artists, and special guests. Alumni of CMR, YMP, OYME, OCME, TTI, and JCC, parents, donors, faculty, staff, and artists are especially encouraged to attend WOW presentations. Members of the general public are also welcome to join.
Introduction to Synthesis in VCV Rack
Led by Alex Christie, Walden's Director of Electronic Music
Sunday, November 15, 4-6 pm Eastern
In this workshop, participants will learn to use the computer software VCV Rack (free!) to build virtual modular synthesizers that will allow you to explore new and exciting sound worlds. No experience is necessary to participate! This workshop is free, but limited to 15 participants. Learn more and register here.
Metamorphosis
Led by Caroline Mallonee, Director of the Creative Musicians Retreat
Wednesday, December 2, 7-9 pm Eastern
How do you imply the impossible? What parallels can be drawn between visual art and music? What inspiration do we find in optical and auditory illusion?
In this 90-minute workshop, we will discover parallels between mind-blowing works by the Dutch artist M. C. Escher and mind-blowing music by György Ligeti, Steve Reich, Charles Ives, Ruth Crawford Seeger, J. S. Bach, and Guillaume Machaut. This will be an interactive presentation; in addition to looking at scores and listening, we will have group discussions and do some creative work. Learn more and register here.
For more information and to learn about future workshops, visit waldenschool.org/wow.
CO-19 Project presented by Playground Ensemble
Beginning in April, nineteen composers, from eight states, ranging in age from 20 to 80, collaborated online to compose a contemporary classical music string quartet. The result is a continuous collage of styles, emotions and forms, each about 30 seconds long that reflects our collective response to the pandemic.
The CO-19 Project will be presented by the Playground Ensemble's String Quartet during an online event on November 7, between 1:30 and 2:00 pm Mountain Time. The event will also feature a conversation with Bob Bassett and Quentin Marchetti, CMR alumni and organizers of the CO-19 project.
Presenting the CO-19 project will be part of the ensemble's online fundraiser, "Stream-a-thon: A Virtual Music Experience," on November 7, 1-5 pm Mountain Time.
The collaborators, almost all Walden alumni, are: Bob Bassett, Ross Beresford, Shawnee Boyd, Deb Dyko, Brett Austin Eastman, Emma Eliason (Audio Engineer), Michael Frank, Evan Ghislin, John Ivers, Lukás Janata, Judd Janes, Drew Kravin, Caroline Mallonee, Quentin Marchetti, Emil Margolis, Steve Messner, Samara Rice, Sarah Rose Stiles, and Adam Waite.
The Playground Ensemble is dedicated to presenting chamber music as a living art form. Collaboration is at the heart of the Playground's artistic vision. In residence at Metro State University of Denver, Playground commissions new works by living composers, and regularly works with dancers, poets, spoken word artists, visual artists, and multi-media artists, finding inspiration across disciplines and exploring new, hybrid artistic forms.
BMI opens 2021 scholarship season
The BMI Foundation announced that it is now accepting online applications for its 2021 scholarship season, open to students attending colleges and universities nationwide.
The Foundation will administer five distinct songwriting and composing scholarship competitions, judged by panelists of international musical acclaim. These annual programs include the BMI Future Jazz Master Scholarship, BMI Student Composer Awards, John Lennon Scholarship, peermusic Latin Scholarship, and the Nashville Songwriting Scholarship. In addition, the Foundation administers two scholarship competitions outside the area of music creation: the BMI Founders Internship Program for broadcasting students, and the Woody Guthrie Fellowship for scholars pursuing topics or themes related to the American folk music progenitor.
Most program applications must be completed online no later than January 2021, and applicants should visit the company's website for specific deadlines for each program. For details and to apply, visit bmifoundation.org/programs.
Community News
Lisa Bielawa's Voters' Broadcast premieres
Lisa Bielawa's Voters Broadcast is "a transformative Election Year musical work for online and/or socially distanced ensembles," with text from Sheryl Oring's I Wish to Say. Voters' Broadcast was premiered in three virtual events on September 30, October 14, and October 28, and co-presented by the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor and Kaufman Music Center in New York. The live world premiere took place outdoors and distanced on October 24, co-presented by Kaufman Music Center and Brooklyn Public Library, as part of the Library's crowd-sourced 28th Amendment Project. Lisa was Composer-in-Residence for the 2020 Online Creative Musicians Experience.
Verdant Vibes season features Anuj Bhutani
Walden alumnus Anuj Bhutani is among the composers featured on Verdant Vibes' sixth season. Short performances and conversations featuring pieces chosen from our call for scores, guest artists, and collaborators. The virtual concert series will feature short performances and conversations featuring pieces chosen from our call for scores, guest artists, and collaborators. Verdant Vibes is a new music collective and concert series based in Providence. Anuj participated in the 2020 Online Creative Musicians Experience.
George Brandon premieres at Digital Divergent Symposium 
In late September, Longy School of Music of Bard College hosted Digital Divergent, a two day online contemporary music symposium. CMR alumnus George Brandon is one of the Divergent Studio composers. On September 27, works of George's were premiered, including "Two Dream Poems" for soprano and piano and an excerpt from "Little Suite for Oboe and Percussion" composed for the Alone Together virtual collaborations. These events were free and open to the public.
Washington Master Chorale opens virtual season 
Washington Master Chorale has transitioned to an entirely virtual season, opening Friday, October 30. The first program, Illuminations, celebrates the music of Baltic and Scandinavian composers: Latvian Eriks Esenvalds, Norwegian Ola Gjeilo, and Estonian Cyrillus Kreek, among others. The livestream event features a full virtual chorus as well as a socially distanced chamber choir performing in the Church of the Epiphany in Washington D.C. The broadcast took place at 7 pm Eastern, and is available to stream all weekend. The next program is Splendid Jewel on December 18. Thomas Colohan is the Artistic Director of Washington Master Chorale, a Walden alumnus, and a frequent visiting artist at Walden.
NSO@Home features Matthew Cummings 
On October 4, The National Symphony Orchestra (NSO) featured Matthew Cummings on its NSO@Home series. Matthew performed both a Bach cello movement from the Third Suite for Solo Cello as well as his own original composition, Some Floating Island, for cello and pre-recorded effects. Matthew was also interviewed by the concert series host, NSO principal second violinist Marissa Regni. The weekly NSO@Home concerts are broadcast via Facebook Live and YouTube, and feature NSO musicians performing live from their homes, and also feature a Kennedy Center NSO Youth Fellow. You can watch the entire concert on YouTube here. Matthew was a 2020 OYME student.
Isabel Lepanto Gleicher performance and premiere
On October 27, flutist Isabel Lepanto Gleicher performed as part of the International Contemporary Ensemble's Tues@7 series. The event also featured the world premiere of Izzy's piece, Orchestrated Thoughts. Izzy was joined by joined by composer, drummer, educator and scholar Jessie Cox, and revolutionary freedom artist MC Spiritchild for an evening exploring new ways to collaborate and develop sound. "In highlighting each artist's practice, the evening culminates in a new collaborative work developed in an exquisite corpse style, layering improvisations, sounds, and abstract views of the outside world." Izzy has been in residence at Walden with the International Contemporary Ensemble for the past three summers.
Cara Haxo and Brian Fancher married
Cara Haxo and Brian Fancher got married on October 10. Cara spent six summers as a YMP student, and is now a faculty member and Academic Dean. Brian joined the Walden staff in 2017, and is now on faculty. When not at Walden, Brian is High School Vocal Music, Limited Edition, and Musical Director for Mayfield High School in Ohio. Cara earned her Ph.D. in Composition at the University of Oregon, was awarded the 2019 International Alliance for Women in Music Libby Larsen Prize, and her music often incorporates stories, poetry, and artwork. Congratulations, Cara and Brian!
Julie Herndon joins faculty at SFCM 
Julie Herndon has joined the Faculty in Technology and Applied Composition at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music. Julie Herndon is an Oakland-based composer and performer. Her work explores the body's relationship to the self, to performance, and to tools like musical instruments and personal technologies. She is also an alumna of the Creative Musicians Retreat, and is engaged to be married to fellow Creative Musicians Retreat alumnus, John Ivers.
Mabel Kwan new album with Restroy
Restroy's new album, Sketches, was released on September 25. Chicago-based jazz ensemble Restroy is led by bassist Chris Dammann, with Avreeayl Ra on drums, Paul Giallorenzo and Mabel Kwan on keys, Kevin Davis on cello, and James Davis on trumpet. Mabel was the pianist for the 2020 Walden School Players, and premiered a number of solo pieces written by students of the Online Young Musicians Experience. On Sketches, Mabel performs on piano, synthesizers, and clavichord.
Matthew Levy releases Sum of Its Parts 
On October 9, Matthew Levy released a world premiere recording, Sum of Its Parts, music for tenor saxophone and electronics. This is Matt's first solo recording on XAS, and features works by Emma O'Halloran and Jacob Walls. Matt is a founding member and executive and co-artistic director of PRISM Quartet, a past visiting artist at Walden, and continues to partner with Walden through the annual PRISM Quartet/Walden School Young Composer Commissioning Award, which culminates in PRISM premiering a work by a Walden student each spring.
Screening of Anna Lindemann's work The Colony
On October 18, the film version of Anna Lindemann's art-science performance The Colony was screened as part of the 13th Imagine Science Film Festival. Anna joined Imagine Science for a conversation about the show following the screening. The Colony is a show about sisterhood and the evolution of communication in two of the most social creatures on earth: humans and ants. Informed by scientific research on ant colonies, The Colony ventures into speculative fiction and includes projected animations and imagery alongside live spoken and musical performance. Anna is a composer, biologist, animator, performer, educator, and an alumna of the Young Musicians Program.
Ted Moore and Katie Balch married 
Ted Moore and Katie Balch are now married! They met while they were both serving on the faculty at the Young Musicians Program. Katie is a composer, whose music "captures the magic of everyday sounds, inviting audiences into a sonic world characterized by imagination, discovery, and a rich diversity of styles." She is also a 2020 Rome Prize winner. Ted is composer, improviser, intermedia artist, and educator. His work focuses on fusing the sonic, visual, physical, and acoustic aspects of performance and sound, often through the integration of technology. Ted Congratulations, Ted and Katie!
Brent Morden works on new musical, Infernal
Brent Morden is composing, arranging, and music directing Infernal, a new musical created by Misha Mullany. The show is based on Dante Alighieri's Inferno. The New York-based show will premiere in December. Brent is based in New York, and is a composer, arranger, conductor, singer, and educator. He is also an alumnus of the Creative Musicians Retreat.
National Sawdust 2020 New Works Commission winners
National Sawdust has announced 20 commissions from its Digital Discovery Festival open call commission for emerging composers residing or working in the United States. Among those commissioned are Walden faculty Ted Moore and past visiting artist Rajna Swaminathan. Their works will be premiered by
JACK Quartet on Friday, December 11. Austin Wulliman, one of the audiences together with artists, continue artist development during quarantine, and compensate artists in the hope that we can help each other build community while physically distancing.members of JACK Quartet, is also a past visiting artist at Walden. The Digital Discovery Festival is a weekly program of live performances, interviews, and artist development designed to bring audiences together with artists,
continue artist development during quarantine, and compensate artists in the hope that we can help each other build community while physically distancing.
Steve Parker awarded Rome Prize 
Steve Parker, a past visiting artist at Walden, has been named a Rome Prize Fellow for 2021. Steve has been awarded the Cynthia Hazen Polsky and Leon Polsky Rome Prize for his project, Futurist Opera. These highly competitive fellowships support advanced independent work and research in the arts and humanities. Each winner receives a stipend, workspace, and room and board for a period of four to seven months at the Academy's eleven-acre campus in Rome, beginning in January 2021. In Rome, Steve will design a series of novel instruments and sound suits to be used in a new form of participatory opera. You can read more here.
Piece by Krishan Rai premiered on MATA Jr.
Krishan Rai's piece, Revolving Images, was one of eight pieces premiered on October 18 as part of MATA Jr. The concert featured the Bergamot Quartet, and was livestreamed from Scholes Street Studio in Brooklyn. Founded in 2014 as the educational arm of MATA, MATA Jr. is a collaborative learning experience, connecting pre-college composers from around the world with MATA artists and performers. Over the course of several months, six pre-college composers work with MATA Jr.'s composer-mentors as they write new works, culminating in an evening of world premieres. Krishan attended YMP in 2019.
Noah Stein wins 2020 NAfME Student Composers Competition 
Noah Stein is one of four students named winners of the 2020 National Association for Music Education (NAfME) Student Composers Competition. The NAfME Student Composers Competition spotlights original music written by student composers. Noah's piece, Riparian Reeds, was one of two pieces selected at the High School level. You can listen to all of the winning and honorable mention student compositions here, including Noah's. Noah has been a YMP student for two summers, and was an OYME student in 2020.
Livestreamed concert with Stenberg|Cahill Duo
The Stenberg|Cahill Duo, composed of violinist Kate Stenberg and pianist Sarah Cahill, performed a concert at Old First Church in San Francisco on October 11. The concert featured works by Somei Satoh, Lili Boulanger, Samuel Coleridge-Taylor (arr. Maud Powell), Germaine Tailleferre, Ruth Crawford Seeger, Johannes Brahms, and world premieres by Ronald Bruce Smith and Mary D. Watkins. The concert was streamed live, and you can learn more about the performers and Old First Concerts here. Kate is a past visiting artist at Walden.
Trash Cats perform as part of Telemetry Music Series 
Trash Cats, a duo composed of Walden faculty members Alex Christie and Kittie Cooper, performed on October 14 as part of the Telemetry Music Series. The event was streamed live on Twitch. Telemetry is an unconventional music series, showcasing bold new musical compositions, new instrumentation, and unique collaborations across space and genre. Each performance is free and open to the public.
Yarn/Wire features Sam Pluta and George Lewis
On October 22, Yarn/Wire featured Sam Pluta and George Lewis on Episode 18 of their series, Feedback. With Feedback, Yarn/Wire hopes to offer some unique answers to the question: "What is creative music?" For Yarn/Wire, it is a relationship between musicians, composers, artists, coupled with a dedication to making work that is meaningful, challenging, impactful, varied, and relevant. Each episode of Feedback features live video interviews with composers, musicians, and Yarn/Wire members covering a wide ranging set of topics, including our repertoire built over the past 15 years, as well as new works in progress. Yarn/Wire is a past visiting artist at Walden. Sam Pluta is a longtime Walden faculty member, and George Lewis is a past visiting artist, most recently as the CMR Composer-in-Residence in 2019.
In Memoriam
Leon Fleisher 
Described as "one of America's most beloved and resourceful pianists," Leon Fleisher died in August at the age of 92. He debuted at Carnegie Hall with the New York Philharmonic at age 16, and at age 23, became the first American to win the Queen Elisabeth Piano Competition in Brussels. At age 36, he lost the use of his right hand. Leon increased his teaching, began a conducting career, and focused on performing music written specifically for the left hand only. Leon taught for over 60 years at the Peabody Institute, and was a longtime member of Walden's Advisory Council and teacher to many Walden faculty and visiting artists over the years. He is deeply missed, and we are grateful for his legacy.
We want to hear from you!
What's been going on? If you have a recent or upcoming premiere, publication, award, new job or program, or a celebratory life event, please share the news. Email your news to alumni@waldenschool.org.
Stay in Touch
You can like The Walden School page on Facebook and join The Walden School private group to hear about events and opportunities throughout the year, including upcoming regional alumni Composers Forums and Holiday Parties. You can also find us on Instagram, Twitter, YouTube, bandcamp, and at waldenschool.org.
eNews: InterNetzo – September 2020
Message from Seth Brenzel, Executive Director
Dear friend,
I hope you will enjoy this special autumn equinox edition of InterNetzo, reflecting on this summer unlike any other. We had a number of exciting events during the Online Creative Musicians Experience and the Online Young Musicians Experience, concluding with a wonderful final concert by flutist Claire Chase.
If you tuned in to Giving Day on September 9, I hope you enjoyed the many video highlights from our summer. You can read more below, and if you are on Facebook, you can watch all the videos here.
Our Summer of Creativity Create-a-Thon has come to a close, and you can still check out these fascinating projects. I am so grateful for these creative individuals and their incredible projects who have inspired so much generosity toward Walden this summer.
Be sure to check out the Community News section to read about some of happenings in the lives and careers of fellow Walden community members.
Thanks for reading this issue of InterNetzo, participating in Walden, and lending your support and enthusiasm for our favorite summer music program. We look forward to being in touch in the weeks and months to come.
Sincerely,
Seth
Community Events
Giving Day
Walden's second-ever Giving Day took place on Wednesday, September 9.
Throughout the day, we shared video highlights from our summer, including concerts, composers forums, student activities, and Create-a-Thon reflections. If you are on Facebook, you can watch all the videos here.
We set a goal of raising $3,800, to help Walden return to New Hampshire for our 38th summer at Dublin School. With everyone's help, we raised more than $9,100. Thank you.
We are so grateful to everyone who donated to support Walden's transformative music programs, and who tuned it to see glimpses of Walden's summer.
To close Giving Day, we shared this video of group singing during the Online Young Musicians Experience, led by students Ash, Noah, Graham, and Marco, along with staff member Francesca.
Summer of Creativity
Walden's Summer of Creativity Create-a-Thon took place from June 27 to September 14, and to date raised more than $7,400. Members of the Walden community engaged in creative projects of their choosing to support Walden's programs and to engage with one another creatively and collaboratively. Not all of the projects involved composing, or even music for that matter. The Summer of Creativity was a way to celebrate all the ways our Walden community is creative, and to provide nourishing creative connection while we spent the summer physically distanced from one another.
Although the Create-a-Thon has officially come to a close, you can still check out these 14 amazing projects and even make a contribution (through September 30) if you are so moved.
Katie's Jewelry Design and Creation
Danielle's Blessing for Patients
David's Walden Impressions
The Runnymede Singers' Virtual Choir
Gaela's Travel Journal Labyrinth
Joel's Voyage
Peter's Sunday Haiku
Matthew's Rags to Riches
Josh's Jazz and Folk Forays
Liam's Compositionally-Constrained Electronic Music
Theo's bitKlavier Song Cycle
Ruth's Family Opera
Sarah's Novella
Rachel's Pathway Garden
Claire Chase performs to benefit Walden
On Saturday, August 1, Walden alumni, faculty and staff, board members, families, and friends gathered by video call an online concert to benefit and celebrate Walden, featuring flutist Claire Chase. In case you were not able to join, you missed her performing live from the Louise Shonk Kelly Recital Hall at Dublin School.
Claire gave a stunning performance featuring works by Dai Fujikura, Du Yun, and past Walden Composer-in-Residence Marcos Balter. A fascinating conversation with Marcos and Claire followed the performance.
We are so grateful to our host committee and all of our event donors for their generosity--we raised more than $5,400. Thank you! Your support helps ensure creative musicians find a home at Walden for generations to come.
2020 Summer Programs
Online Young Musicians Experience
The Online Young Musicians Experience (OYME) brought together 33 talented and creative young people from around the country and beyond. Though physically distanced, students had ample opportunity to connect with a larger community of peers, mentors, and friends, through creative extracurricular projects, social gatherings, weekly concerts, and participation in some of Walden's beloved traditions.
Our faculty team included Alex Christie, Kittie Cooper, Brian Fancher, Danny Felsenfeld, Cara Haxo, Doug Hertz, Michael Kropf, Nate May, Sarah Riskind, and Dennis Sullivan, a brilliant group of composers and educators ready to mentor, support, and inspire OYME students. Many thanks, also, to staff members Sammi Stone, Francesca Hellerman, and Lila Meretzky for their tireless work behind the scenes. Our visiting artists--Aurora Nealand and friends, the International Contemporary Ensemble, thingNY, and The Walden School Players--gave incredible performances on our online concert series. Each concert was free and open to the public (with an internet connection).
Festival Week included four Composers Forums, July 27-30, on which all 33 OYME students had a piece premiered. These pieces were performed by the six members of The Walden School Players--Laura Cocks, Erica Dicker, Dana Jessen, Mabel Kwan, Tawnya Popoff, and Chris Wild--as well as past faculty member Erin Cameron. Every piece was followed by discussion with the composer, moderated by faculty members and Composer-in-Residence Mario Diaz de Leon. Mario brought a warm, thoughtful, and supportive voice, and also shared a fascinating presentation about his journey as a composer.
Students also participated in a variety of physically-distanced camp fun, including a cooking class from Neil at Dublin School, building their own synthesizers with faculty members Alex and Kittie, juggling with Walden alumni parent Susan Lord, group singing from home, and two open mic nights.
Throughout the summer, our faculty, staff, visiting artists, and students showed incredible adaptability. It is inspiring to see the Walden community harness constraints to fuel composition, creating music that embraces digital spaces in mind- and ear-opening ways and responds to our time with poignant, arresting sounds.
Online Creative Musicians Experience
The Online Creative Musicians Experience (OCME) was an amazing nine days immersed in music-making! The OCME community was spread across two countries, four time zones, fifteen states and the District of Columbia, but we made use of the technology available to come together to form a warm and inspiring community.
OCME included a word of the day each morning, drinking a lot of coffee, and an academic curriculum that would make Grace Cushman proud. OCME had a full slate of offerings, including classes in musicianship, electronic music, and contemporary topics; workshops in digital synthesis, the contemporary string quartet, found object percussion, and choral commissioning; and an incredible opening concert with Mivos Quartet.
Our teaching faculty included veteran faculty members Loretta Notareschi, D. J. Sparr, Alex Christie, and Renée Favand-See and OCME Director Caroline Mallonee. We were pleased to welcome back Mivos Quartet (Olivia De Prato, Victor Lowrie Tafoya, Maya Bennardo, Tyler J. Borden) as well as our other artists-in-residence, Thomas Colohan, Matthew Gold, and Eric Huebner.We were so fortunate to have Lisa Bielawa as our Composer-in-Residence. In addition to being a thoughtful and insightful forum moderator, Lisa invited us to be a part of her large-scale project, Broadcast from Home. OCME participants, faculty, staff, and artists contributed recordings that were incorporated into Chapter 11. You can listen to it here, and you may even recognize some of the voices.
The final weekend included two composers forums with sixteen world premieres, a virtual open mic session, and reflecting on the online week together. We are grateful to our participants for their creativity and enthusiasm, and we hope to see everyone in person soon!
Help Walden Get Ready for next summer
2020 has certainly changed the world. And, although it brought many unexpected challenges, 2020 has also brought us wonderful community events, engaging online experiences, stunning new music in virtual performance spaces, and more. These have inspired us, filled us with gratitude, and kept Walden's community thriving. Visit waldenschool.org/2020 to learn more about the summers many successes.
The generosity of our donors makes all that we do possible, and we are so grateful for their steadfast support. As we reflect on summer 2021, we are also looking ahead to summer 2021. We can hardly wait to return to New Hampshire, and we need your help.
If you would like to make a gift to support Walden's transformative programs, you can donate online through this link, or send a check payable to "The Walden School" to our administrative office, 30 Monterey Blvd., Suite E, San Francisco, CA 94131. Gifts must be postmarked by September 30 or made online by 11:59pm PDT on September 30 to count toward Walden's 2020 fiscal year. Thank you for your consideration.
News and Goods
Amazon Smile
Do you find yourself shopping on Amazon.com more often these days? Do you have "back" to school shopping to do? If you're shopping on Amazon, don't forget to use AmazonSmile! A portion of every sale will be donated to Walden.
Go to smile.amazon.com and select "Walden School" (listed in San Francisco, CA) as your charity. You'll know it's us, because it includes our mission and our programs.
Mission: The Walden School inspires artistic expression and personal growth through experiential music programs.
Programs: Young Musicians Program, Creative Musicians Retreat
Community News
Katie Balch named Rome Prize winner 
On July 23, the American Academy in Rome announced the new Rome Prize Winners and Italian Fellows. Past YMP faculty member Katie Balch was awarded the Elliot Carter Rome Prize in Musical Composition. These highly competitive fellowships support advanced independent work and research in the arts and humanities. Each winner receives a stipend, workspace, and room and board for a period of f our to seven months at the Academy's eleven-acre campus in Rome, beginning in January 2021.
Anuj Bhutani wins Cerddorion Competition
Walden alumnus Anuj Bhutani won first prize in Cerddorion Vocal Ensemble's Eighth Annual Emerging Composers Competition. Anuj was selected for his piece Moments (poem by e.e. cummings). Cerddorion will premiere the first and second prize winning compositions in Spring 2021. Anuj participated in the 2020 Online Creative Musicians Experience.
Michael Daugherty tribute to Woody Guthrie 
This Land Sings: Inspired by the Life and Times of Woody Guthrie is past CMR Composer-in-Residence Michael Daugherty's musical tribute to the singer-songwriter and political activist Woody Guthrie. Naxos released the world-premiere recording, featuring performances by the Albany Symphony's Dogs of Desire, conducted by David Alan Miller, and vocal soloists Annika Socolofsky and John Daugherty.
Del Sol String Quartet premieres with Library of Congress
Del Sol String Quartet is participating in the Library of Congress' Boccaccio Project, a series of new commissions inspired by the current situation. Violist Charlton Lee teamed up with composer Luciano Chessa on the piece 1462 Willard Street, and cellist Kathryn Bates worked with improviser-composer Miya Masaoka on Intuit. Del Sol is a past visiting artist at Walden.
Rebekah Griffin Greene performs online concert 
On July 24, Rebekah Griffin Greene performed on an online concert, the second in the Bloomingdale School of Music's summer concert series. Rebekah is on faculty at the Bloomingdale School of Music, and the concert also featured fellow faculty member Tereasa Payne. The performance also featured Terry Greene, Rebekah's husband. Rebekah is a Walden alumna, and both Rebekah and Terry are past YMP faculty members.
Felix Jarrar joins Brooklyn Music School faculty
Felix Jarrar has joined the faculty at Brooklyn Music School as the pianist/coach for the Virtual Summer Vocal Arts program. Felix has also launched a YouTube channel, sharing his art songs and excerpts of his operas. Felix is a Brooklyn-based composer and pianist, and an alumnus of the Creative Musicians Retreat.
Camara Kambon writes music for John Lewis documentary
Walden alumnus Camara Kambon wrote the music for "John Lewis: Get in the Way," a documentary film about the late Congressman John Lewis. There was a national PBS broadcast of the film on July 23 with an introduction by Henry Louis Gates, Jr. The film was streaming on PBS through the middle of August. Camara attended the Young Musicians Program.
Albert Kim featured on SF Piano Festival
Albert Kim was featured on the San Francisco International Piano Festival, with an interview and retrospective performance on August 21. In conversation with artistic director Jeffrey LaDeur. The interview explored tradition and innovation, the formats through which we share and receive music, illusions of the classical music industry, and how young musicians are leading the way forward. The performance featured works by Ravel, Pierre Jalbert, and Beethoven. Albert is an alumnus of the Young Musicians Program. You can watch the performance and discussion here.
Tyson Laa Deng graduates Master of Science 
YMP alumnus Tyson Laa Deng has graduated with a Master of Science in Information Technology from Southern New Hampshire University. Tyson has accepted a job as an Information Security Engineer at PayPal, Inc. Congratulations, Tyson!
Tawnya Popoff performs online concert
Tawnya Popoff performed an online concert on July 23, part of a series hosted by Weekend of Chamber Music (WCM). Tawnya performed music by Melia Watras, Garth Knox, Milton Barnes, Stravinsky, and Gershwin. Violist Tawnya Popoff is a longtime member of The Walden School Players. You can watch the concert here.
Debut album from Dennis Sullivan and Erin Rogers
Composer/percussionist Dennis Sullivan and composer/saxophonist Erin Rogers make up the duo Popebama, which just released their debut album, Nation Building. The album includes four original works,a nd is described as "a 40-minute guide to forging your own sound world." Dennis is a YMP/OYME faculty member, and Erin was a 2020 OYME visiting artist with thingNY.
Tamsin Waley-Cohen performs online concert
Tamsin Waley-Cohen was featured on Ryedale Festival's Ryestream, their new online concert series. Tamsin, a violinist, collaborated with pianist Christopher Glynn on a program of works by Edward Elgar, including the Sonata and the Chansons de Matin and de Nuit, which we recorded in All Saints Church in Helmsley, North Yorkshire. Tamsin is a past visiting artist at Walden. You can watch the performance here.
Article from Claudia Wallis in Scientific American 
Claudia Wallis published an article in Scientific American entitled "Why Some People Get Terribly Sick from COVID-19." The article explores the complex and overlapping factors that can make an individual more susceptible to serious illness from COVID-19. Claudia is an award-winning science journalist, and the mother of YMP alumnus Nat Osborn.
Chris Wild virtual cello recital
Cellist Chris Wild gave a virtual recital on August 16 to benefit Musicians Foundation's CV19 Emergency Relief Aid Grant Program. Chris performed Benjamin Britten's Suite No.1 for Solo Cello, Drew Baker's Age of the Deceased (Six Months in Chicago), and Marcos Balter's memória. If you are on Facebook, you can still watch the performance here. Chris also shares content on his YouTube channel, Great Moments in Orchestral History. Chris is a member of The Walden School Players.
Evan Williams joins Lawrence University Board of Trustees 
Evan Williams, a past YMP faculty member, has joined the Lawrence University Board of Trustees as a Recent Graduate Trustee. Evan is a composer and assistant professor of music and director of instrumental activities at Rhodes College. He graduated from Lawrence with a bachelor's degree in music theory and composition and holds a DMA in composition with a cognate in orchestral conducting from the College-Conservatory of Music at the University of Cincinnati and a masters of music in composition from Bowling Green State University.
We want to hear from you!
What's been going on? If you have a recent or upcoming premiere, publication, award, new job or program, or a celebratory life event, please share the news. Email your news to alumni@waldenschool.org.
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