SMU Concert Band to debut Jewish composer’s work
Judith Lang Zaimont to share talents with SMU, Winona musicians
WINONA, Minn. — Internationally recognized composer Judith Lang Zaimont is the most recent winner of the fourth Saint Mary’s University Concert Band Kaplan Commissioning Project. She composed “Israeli Rhapsody” for the band during the summer of 2006 after visiting the campus and meeting the band members last May.
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Lang Zaimont will share her talents with Saint Mary’s music students during her residency March 7-11 and will introduce the premiere performance at a 3 p.m. concert on Sunday, March 11, in Page Theatre, located in the SMU Performance Center. Concert goers will have an opportunity to meet the composer following the concert during a reception in the Toner Student Center.
Of “Israeli Rhapsody,” Lang Zaimont wrote, she is “paying tribute to the complicated, thoughtful and joyous aspects that come together and do indeed characterize the people who flourish in that dramatic land.” Lang Zaimont thinks of Israel as a cultural wellspring and the homeland of her religion. Fragments of well-known Israeli melodies flow through the complex piece, which ends clearly as a joyful dance.
A grantee of both National Endowments, a Guggenheim Foundation Fellow and Aaron Copland Award winner, Lang Zaimont currently holds a 2005 Bush Foundation Artist Fellowship. She recently retired after three decades of teaching in higher ed. (at the Peabody Conservatory, CUNY, Adelphi University and University of Minnesota). For additional information, see her web site, www.jzaimont.com.
The SMU Concert Band commissioned “Israeli Rhapsody” through the Helen and Sam Kaplan Foundation Commissioning Project. Lang Zaimont is the fourth composer to participate in the Kaplan Commission. The Helen and Sam Kaplan Foundation supports performances and activities led by Jewish artists and scholars that are designed to increase cultural and religious understanding at Saint Mary’s. Her visit is funded in part through Meet the Composer’s Creative Connections program.
Lang Zaimont will share her talents with Saint Mary’s students during class and concert band rehearsals. She also plans to visit with Winona Senior High School students.
The concert band, under the direction of Dr. Janet Heukeshoven, will also perform works by Franco Cesarini, Philip Sparke, John Zdechlik, J. Michael Roy, Travis Cross, and John Philip Sousa. For additional performance details, contact Dr. Heukeshoven at jheukesh@smumn.edu or (507) 457-1675.
Tickets are $6, $4 for students and senior citizens and are available at the Performance Center box office (507) 457-1715 from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. weekdays, online at www.pagetheatre.org or at the door.
