Very Young Composers to hold concert at UW-Stevens Point
A collaboration between the University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point Music Department and the Stevens Point Area School District will culminate in a concert of original compositions created by 30 area fourth and fifth grade students on Monday, Jan. 30.
The Very Young Composers of Central Wisconsin Concert will be performed in Room 221 of the Noel Fine Arts Center on the UW-Stevens Point campus. Performing the compositions will be volunteer UW-Stevens Point student musicians as well as a few of the young composers. The first half of the concert will be performed from 4:15–5:15 p.m., followed by a reception, with the second half performed from 5:30–6:30 p.m., followed by a reception. The free concert is open to the public.
As part of the second year of the Very Young Composers of Central Wisconsin project, the grade school composers have been meeting three days a week in an after-school class since January 3. Volunteer UW-Stevens Point students are working with them as teaching artists, helping translate the “invented” musical notation of the grade school students’ compositions into standard musical notation.
“In this process, the teaching artists perform the role of a scribe being acutely sensitive to faithfully represent the musical ideas as imagined by the young composer,” says Robert Rosen, professor emeritus of music who is directing the project.
The compositions were written for a varied combination of violin, viola, flute, trumpet, horn, euphonium, percussion and piano. In a second phase of the project, some of the young composers will have their pieces fully orchestrated for symphony orchestra or wind band. These pieces will be performed this spring by the Stevens Point Area High School Orchestra and Wind Ensemble.
In addition to Rosen, Stevens Point elementary school teachers Sandra Weyers, Emily Osby, Schulyer Gardner and Cassie Lemons provide expertise, lead group exercises and act as teaching artists. Professor Charles Young, director of music theory and composition at UW-Stevens Point, supervises the use of the university’s Computer Music Center and provides support and expertise during the phase two orchestration process.
Modeled after the Credit Suisse Very Young Composers (a part of the School Partnership Program of the New York Philharmonic Orchestra), the Very Young Composers of Central Wisconsin is sponsored by the Wisconsin Arts Board, UW-Stevens Point and the Stevens Point Area Public School District. Additional funding was provided by the Sentry Insurance Invitation to the Arts, sponsored by the Sentry Insurance Foundation.
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