A CONCERT OF RECENT MUSIC BY KARIM AL-ZAND

WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 5
Faculty Recital
Karim Al-Zand, composer
Program of recent works: Fanfare (2005; Premiere); Pattern Preludes (2005; Premiere); Violin Sonata (2005; Premiere); Four Fables (2003); Music Box Prelude (2004); The Waiting Game (2005); and Concertino for Trumpet (2004). Performers include, among others, James Ackley, trumpet (guest); Sergiu Luca, violin; Brian Connelly, piano; Shepherd School Trumpet Ensemble, Marie Speziale, director; and Calogero Di Liberto, piano.
8:00 p.m., Duncan Recital Hall

This evening of contemporary music features three world premieres and performances by guest artists, distinguished faculty, and students of the Shepherd School of Music. The unique program combines a wide variety of works and ensembles.

Karim Al-Zand

A concert highlight will be the performance, by guest artist trumpeter James Ackely, of Al-Zand’s Concertino for Trumpet (2004), a commission of the Sackler Composition Prize 2003. Craig Hauschildt will conduct a chamber orchestra of Shepherd School students. Distinguished faculty members Sergiu Luca and Brian Connelly will also present the world premiere of Imaginary Scenes (2050), a work written especially for these performers.

Pianist Calogero Di Liberto will play Pattern Preludes (2005), which also receives its world premiere on this concert. A third brand new work will feature the Shepherd School Trumpet Ensemble, directed by Marie Speziale, performing Fanfare (2005), a piece which has the ensemble surrounding the audience in Duncan Hall. Rounding out the concert will be The Waiting Game (2005), a sextet originally written to accompany dance, conducted by Cristian Macelaru; and Four Fables (2003), a composition based on animal apologues from around the world, performed by flutist Melanie Lançon, clarinetist Maiko Sasaki and pianist Kana Mimaki. The concert is free and open to the public.

Karim Al-Zand (b. 1970) is currently an Assistant Professor of Composition and Theory at the Shepherd School of Music. His music has enjoyed performances in the US, Canada and Europe and has been called “strong and startlingly lovely” (Boston Globe). Before arriving in Houston, he received degrees from Harvard University (Ph.D., 2000) and McGill University in Montreal, Canada (B.Mus. 1993). He was recently awarded the prestigious 2003 Sackler Prize in Composition.

Groups which have featured his music include the Mendelssohn String Quartet, Flux String Quartet, California E.A.R. Unit, New Millennium Ensemble, Third Angle Ensemble, North/South Consonance, Pinotage, Ensemble Noir, and Brave New Works. In 1998 String Quartet won the Salvatore Martirano Composition Competition and in 2003 his String Quartet No. 2 was honored as part of the Tampa Bay Excellence in Chamber Music Prize.

His work has received recognition from ASCAP, the Society of Composers, the National Association of Composers, and from the Massachusetts Association of Jazz Educators (for his jazz and big band arrangements). He has been a participant composer in many festivals including MusicNinetySeven, June in Buffalo, the Aspen Festival, the Wellesley Composers Conference, and the Oregon Bach Festival; he has also been a resident at the MacDowell Colony and an associate at the Atlantic Center for the Arts.

Karim Al-Zand is a member of Musiqa, Houston's contemporary music group, which presents concerts featuring new and classic repertoire of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries.