Lecture / Discussion:“The Musical Death Masks of Gérard Grisey,” Benjamin R. Levy
2023-03-30 16:30 - 18:30 (America/Detroit) | Off Campus Location - https://umich.zoom.us/j/97327821283
A Carrigan Lecture presented by the Department of Music Theory
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The Musical Death Masks of Gérard Grisey
Obituaries and official remembrances of the composer Gérard Grisey (1946-98), tend to emphasize his fascination with sound, study of acoustics, and the focus on temporal process in his music. In many ways they stay close to the composer’s own rhetoric, especially in his early manifestos propounding these very features as the aesthetic foundation of spectralism, declaring, “we are musicians and our model is sound” (Grisey 1984, 22). But what can we learn from musical tributes written in his memory? In this paper, I analyze a set of three musical remembrances of Grisey that show different sides of his compositional persona: Philippe Hurel’s Tombeau in memoriam Gérard Grisey (1999), György Ligeti’s Hamburg Concerto (1998/99, revised 2002), and Kaija Saariaho’s Message pour Gérard (2000). At first glance, these works are remarkable for their differences, representing varied personal connections to the composer himself and a wide range of strategies to emphasize certain musical features as essential parts of his legacy. Upon closer examination, however, they also reveal an unexpected through line, all referencing Grisey’s fascination with non-western musical traditions, including those of Southeast Asia, Oceania, and Central Africa. Grisey’s latent multiculturalism is often ignored or relegated to a fleeting aside in his obituaries, but once brought to light, it raises questions about the full range of Grisey’s creative thought and his theoretical work, as well as about spectralism’s place in the political landscape of post-1968 France and the ways in which this musical movement took shape and spread in its influence and scope.

Benjamin R. Levy is an Associate Professor of Music Theory at the University of California, Santa Barbara. His research interests focus on modernist and contemporary music and on connections between music, literature, and the arts. He has published widely on the music of György Ligeti, including the monograph Metamorphosis in Music: The Compositions of György Ligeti in the 1950s and 1960s. He is currently working topics related to the interdisciplinary contexts of spectral music as well as on English translations of The Schoenberg-Webern Correspondence: Selected Letters, for inclusion in Oxford University Press’s series, Schoenberg in Words.

Other:Sally Fleming Master Class Series: Angela Cheng, piano
2023-03-30 16:30 - 18:30 | Off Campus Location
Pianist Angela Cheng works with students as part of the Sally Fleming Master Class Series; Free and open to the public.
Consistently praised for her brilliant technique, tonal beauty, and superb musicianship, Canadian pianist Angela Cheng is one of her country’s national treasures. In addition to regular guest appearances with virtually every orchestra in Canada, she has performed with the symphonies of Saint Louis, Houston, Indianapolis, Colorado, Utah, San Diego, and Jacksonville, as well as the philharmonic orchestras of Buffalo, Louisiana, Rhode Island, London, Israel, and Minas Gerais in Brazil.
Recent performances include a debut with the Fort Worth Symphony, performing Rachmaninoff’s “Variations on a Theme of Paganini,” under the baton of Robert Spano, and a return to the Vancouver Symphony, performing Ravel’s Concerto in G with Otto Tausk. Next season will include the Boulder Philharmonic, Newfoundland Symphony, Okanagan Symphony, Saskatoon Symphony, Saguenay Symphony, and the Symphony of Northwest Arkansas.
As a recitalist, soloist and chamber musician, Cheng has performed at Carnegie Hall, the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C., New York’s 92nd Street Y, and Wigmore Hall in London. A member of the Zukerman Trio and Chamber Players, she has also appeared at Vienna’s Musikverein, the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam, Buenos Aires’ Teatro Colon, Mariinsky Concert Hall in St. Petersburg, and the Sydney Opera House. Festival appearances include Verbier, Edinburgh, Miyazaki, Stars of the White Nights in St. Petersburg, and the George Enescu Festival in Romania.
Cheng also appears regularly on concert series throughout the United States and Canada and has collaborated with the Takács, Colorado, and Vogler quartets. North American festival performances include Banff, Chautauqua, Colorado, Great Lakes Chamber Music, Vancouver, Toronto, and the Festival International de Lanaudière in Quebec.
She is regularly invited to give master classes at schools throughout North America and in Asia and has appeared at the Royal Conservatory of Music in Toronto, Hong Kong Academy for the Performing Arts, Taichung University in Taiwan, Indiana University, University of Michigan and the University of Texas. She has also served on the jury of many competitions, including the Cleveland International Piano Competition, Esther Honens International Piano Competition, Montreal International Piano Competition, and the Gina Bachauer International Piano Competition, among others.
Cheng was awarded the Gold Medal at the Arthur Rubinstein International Piano Masters Competition and was the first Canadian to win the prestigious Montreal International Piano Competition. She has also been honored with the Canada Council’s coveted Career Development Grant and the Medal of Excellence for outstanding interpretations of Mozart from the Mozarteum in Salzburg, Austria.
A native of Hong Kong, Cheng studied extensively with Menahem Pressler at Indiana University and with Sascha Gorodnitzki at The Juilliard School. She is currently on the artist faculty of the Oberlin Conservatory of Music, where she was honored with the 2011-12 Excellence in Teaching Award.

Careers / Jobs:Citi Investment Banking 101 - Shareholder Advisory Group and Data Science
2023-03-30 17:00 - 18:00
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