May 14, 2009
Ethnomusicology students in the spotlight for concert Saturday, May 16
The more informal side of the UW School of Music will take a turn at the annual concert of the Ethnomusicology Student Association. The concert is set for 7:30 p.m. Saturday, May 16, in Brechemin Auditorium.
The evening will showcase the many talents of students of the Ethnomusicology Program, which combines academic coursework with performance taught by visiting artists reflecting the world’s great musical traditions. Many of the performers will play music they came to know through their own research and lessons with these visiting artists.
“It’s a different atmosphere, and the audience is always fun and appreciative,” said Shannon Dudley, associate professor of music. “It’s more like what you’d call a jam session.
“You have 10 different acts on the program, and it’s sort of like they are all playing for each other. It’s not like anybody’s worried about whether they give a Carnegie Hall-style performance.”
This year’s concert will feature traditional Venda reed pipe music and dance from South Africa, steel pan sounds from Trinidad, horse head fiddle playing from Mongolia, music and dance from Ghana and traditional music from Mexico’s Huasteca region.
Also on the bill is “Scotch-Irish-Whiskey music” from a group called Fields Under Clover and Jewish folk music from the recently formed UW Klezmer Band.
Ethan Chessin, a UW music education major, leads the UW Klezmer Band, which offers Jewish music from Eastern Europe as seen through the lens of the American Jewish experience.
Chessin said he grew up around his father’s klezmer group when his family was living in Chapel Hill, N.C. “It was one of the only klezmer bands in that part of the country,” he said. “It was called South of Delancey” for the street in New York. And truly, “It was pretty far south of Delancey,” he said with a laugh.
Chessin said klezmer music, folk music of Eastern Europe, rose to popularity in America with the immigration boom of the early 20th century. It bears the influences from Russian, Ukrainian, Polish, Hungarian and even music of the Roma, or Gypsies. “Jewish musicians in Eastern Europe played the same role as Roma did,” he said. Swing-era star Benny Goodman and the brilliant composer George Gershwin also both had roots in klezmer performance.
The UW Klezmer Band, Chessin said, is always willing to accept new members, including faculty and staff. “It’s an opportunity to step outside the heavy classical and jazz tradition,” he said, “and in addition, it’s just a lot of fun.”
He said the group also acts as a lab where he can apply concepts he is learning in class. Saturday will be the klezmer band’s first big concert together.
Student Kim Carter Muñoz and her group Trio Lucero del Norte will perform son huasteco music, traditional sounds from the Huasteca region of Mexico.
“It is fast-paced 6/8 rhythm that alternates between strummed and accented beats” Muñoz wrote in an e-mail. “The son huasteco dance is zapateado, tapped percussive dance, that adds to the rhythmic sound of the music. We hope that some members of the audience will join us on stage and dance.”
Muñoz added, “I began playing son huasteco as part of the preparation for the research for my Ph.D. dissertation … examining the lost history of women in son huasteco and the changing role of women in the current revitalization.”
She said samples of her trio’s music are available online through MySpace.
Several of the performances are linked to the teaching of this year’s visiting artists. They are Li Bo, a master of the Mongolian morin khuur, or horse head fiddle, and Mudzunga Junniah Davhula, who teaches song and dance from the Venda culture of South Africa.
Here is a complete list of performers for Saturday’s concert.
- Ghanaian music and dance. Bartholomew Komoah will lead the Ghanaian Bawaa ensemble, featuring Bree McConnell and Michael Di Roberts on Dagarti Gyil xylophone.
- Jewish music from Eastern Europe: The UW Klezmer Band performing Jewish music from Eastern Europe as seen through the lens of the American Jewish experience.
- Scotch-Irish-Whiskey music by Fields Under Clover, featuring ethnomusicology and music education graduate students Erin Maloney, Dylan Chernov and Michael Di Roberts.
- Traditional Mexican son huasteco from Trio Lucero del Norte, featuring Jose Hernandez, ethnomusicology graduate student Kim Carter Muñoz and Modesto Antonio Hernandez.
- Mongolian Morin Khuur by ethnomusicology graduate students Leah Pogwizd and Erin Maloney.
- Venda song, reed pipe, and dance by students of UW visiting artist Mudzunga Junniah Davhula, from the Limpopo Province of South Africa.
- Trinidadian steel pan music by The UW Steel Pan Ensemble.
Tickets are $5, cash or check at the door. For more information on the concert or the School of Music, call 206-685-8384 or visit online at music.washington.edu.
