Olivia DrakeThe Wesleyan and local community participated in "MiddletownRemix: Hear More, See More," a festival of art and sound, on May 11 in downtown Middletown. After a year of exploring, sharing, and remixing the sounds of Middletown on the MiddletownRemix website, event attendees celebrated the city's acoustic identity at the festival, which featured four commissioned world premieres, three live DJ sets, two art/sound installations, a laptop orchestra, food trucks, graffiti art, a gallery walk and a flash mob. "MiddletownRemix" was presented by Wesleyan's Center for the Arts and Green Street Arts Center and made possible with support from the Connecticut Office…
Yeran Zhou '15 created this video on Middletown Remix, an ongoing project in collaboration with Wesleyan's Music and Public Life program, to engage the university and broader Middletown community in discovering, sharing and repurposing the sounds around them. Learn how to participate in this video: [youtube width="640" height="420"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bPi2K6wz1J8[/youtube]
Influential experimental music composer, writer and artist John Cage (1912-1992), famous for his avant-garde music, was affiliated with Wesleyan from the 1950s until his death in 1992. During his 37-year relationship with Wesleyan, Cage collaborated with members of the Wesleyan music faculty, composed and performed on campus, and was a fellow at the Center for Advanced Study in 1960–61 and 1969–70. Wesleyan University Press published several of his books. To honor Cage's time and achievements at Wesleyan, the university is celebrating the centenary of Cage by focusing on his understanding of music as a social process through a collection of events.…
More information on the 11th Annual Shasha Seminar is online here. (Photos by Dat Vu '15)
Lauren RubensteinThe 11th Annual Shasha Seminar for Human Concerns, featuring keynote speaker, ethnomusicologist Anthony Seeger, will be held on Nov. 8-9. Endowed by James J. Shasha '50 P'82, the seminar is an educational forum for Wesleyan alumni, students, faculty and friends that provides an opportunity to explore issues of global concern in a small seminar environment. The focus of this year's seminar is Music and Public Life. It is part of a year-long celebration of Music and Public Life taking place at Wesleyan over the 2012-13 academic year. The full schedule is online here. Seeger's keynote address, to be delivered at 8…
Benjamin TraversOn Friday, Sept. 7, The MASH, inspired by Fete de la Musique, also known as World Music Day, highlighted the student music scene at Wesleyan University and kicked off the year-long campus and community-wide Music & Public Life program. The event opened with Wesleyan President Michael Roth joining the faculty and staff band Mattabassett String Collective for a short set at the Usdan University Center. Three outfitted stages -- located at the West College Courtyard, Usdan Huss Courtyard and Olin Library lawn -- provided students with both the opportunity to listen to some of Wesleyan's most popular student bands and…
Cynthia Rockwell(more…)
During the 2012-2013 academic year, Wesleyan will celebrate and study the sounds, words and spirit of music in public at the local, national and transnational levels through concerts, workshops, gatherings and courses, all designed to cross disciplines and to engage both the campus and regional communities. Wesleyan's new Music and Public Life series, presented by the Center for the Arts and Music Department, has a global scope and features performances and lectures by scholars and artists from nine different countries. Events during the fall semester include the New England premiere of “Voices of Afghanistan” (Sept. 28) and concerts by Noah…