Curtis Alumni and Faculty Among 2021 Grammy Nominees

The nominees for the 2021 GRAMMY Awards were announced on November 24. Among those honored are several celebrated faculty and alumni of Curtis who are in the front rank of soloists, composers, and instrumentalists worldwide.

Eric Owens, a 1995 graduate and director of vocal studies and the Curtis Opera Theatre, is nominated for Best Opera Recording for his leading role in Porgy and Bess with the Metropolitan Opera. 

Faculty member Richard Danielpour has received a nomination for Best Contemporary Classical Composition for his work, The Passion of Yeshuah. A performance of the same work by the Buffalo Philharmonic Orchestra and Chorus, with opera alumna J’Nai Bridges as a soloist, is also nominated for Best Choral Performance.

Penelope P. Watkins Ensemble in Residence the Dover Quartet is nominated for Best Chamber Music/Small Ensemble Performance in recognition of its recording, The Schumann Quartets.

Several Curtis alumni are also members of the ensembles nominated for Best Orchestral Performance and the ensembles in supporting roles across many categories.

The Philadelphia Inquirer summed up other musicians representing the Philadelphia area in a recent article.

Congratulations to all of the nominees!

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Curtis students, alumni, and faculty, are making remarkable accomplishments in the music world and beyond. Learn more about Curtis in the News.

 

Updates on Restructuring

As you may recall, President Díaz shared news with alumni in early August about a restructuring of the administration. As he wrote, “I believe that this structure in the long term will help Curtis become an organization that responds to today’s realities and better prepares artists for the future in an ever-evolving field…The restructuring addresses the near-term effects of COVID-19, responds to important needs in the Curtis learning environment, and aligns the administration with my vision for Curtis, which rests upon three foundational legs: education, touring, and technology.”

Here is an updated summary of the key changes and progress that has been made towards these goals:

  • Improved administrative support for education: The Dean’s office will now be supported by three administrative teams focused on curriculum, musician lifecycle, and production.
    • Curriculum: Dr. Jeanne M. McGinn took on the additional role of senior associate dean of academics in September. She now oversees the school’s academic programs and faculty as well as the library resources that complement our students’ work throughout their enrollment.
    • Musician lifecycle functions: Curtis’s strategic plan calls for the school to implement a process through which any musician engaging with Curtis—applicants, students, and alumni—can be supported in an inclusive, data-driven, and continuous cycle of engagement.
      • Student Affairs: Patricia Carpino has transitioned to a new role as senior associate dean of student affairs. Her team will tend to student support functions, including residence life, the registrar’s office, and financial assistance. Also part of this team is Shea Scruggs, who joined us in September as director of institutional research and musician experience/chief enrollment officer. His duties include coordinating Curtis’s program of institutional research, overseeing admission, and engaging alumni in the development of current and prospective students.
      • Community Equity and Belonging: In his new role as senior associate dean and special advisor to the president for strategic engagement, Nicholas Lewis is empowered to work across departments of Curtis to advance equity and promote inclusion both inside and outside our community.
    • Production: Because the pandemic has curtailed the viability of live performance at this time, we have eliminated the Department of Artistic Programs and Performance and created a smaller team under Colleen Hood, senior director of production. This team oversees the piano workshop, chamber music, master classes and recitals, orchestral concerts, and opera production, and reports to the Dean’s office.
    • Artistic Programming: David Serkin Ludwig continues to advise the president, the dean, faculty, and senior administration on Curtis’s artistic and educational programming to reflect our institutional priorities and help shape the artistic direction of the school.
  • Department of Digital Strategy and Innovation: To better integrate technology across different elements of our operations and show leadership in the intersection of music education and technology, a new department of Digital Strategy and Innovation has been created. An expert in the field will be announced shortly to lead the department and Ali King has also joined the team as director of marketing and business development. This department will oversee audio/visual production, information technology, and digital marketing, cooperating across departments to achieve educational, artistic, communications, and fundraising goals.
  • Curtis support functions: Changes are being made to respond to ongoing advice from external experts on administrative best practices and focus fundraising efforts on a trajectory toward the 2024 centenary.
    • Human resources: Curtis is conducting a thorough search for a director of equal opportunity and chief Title IX officer. To ensure maximum impartiality and to maintain compliance with new federal guidelines, Curtis will be outsourcing investigations and hearings. An Ombuds Office, consisting of Dean Lewis and Ms. Carpino, has been created and serves as a neutral and accessible point of contact for members of our community to resolve differences and explore matters of concern.
    • Institutional Advancement: Christopher Mossey continues to lead this department, focused on fundraising and constituent engagement. A critical part of the department’s work will be a comprehensive campaign to raise funds for the endowment, the physical campus, and the annual fund.
    • Communications: Patricia K. Johnson reports directly to the president as senior director of communications and public affairs.
  • Cross-institutional working groups: Three high-functioning, cross-departmental working groups have begun to meet regularly. These working groups are focused on student, staff, alumni, and faculty well-being; institutional messaging and market segmentation; and concert and opera production.
  • President’s Cabinet: President Díaz has formed a new cabinet comprised of staff members from across all departments. This cabinet meets regularly with the president and works in smaller groups to address issues as they arise.

We look forward to continuing to update you on our reorganization progress in the weeks ahead.

Michelle Cann Named Inaugural Eleanor Sokoloff Chair in Piano Studies at the Curtis Institute of Music

PHILADELPHIA—November 17, 2020—The Curtis Institute of Music announces that Michelle Cann will join its faculty as the inaugural Eleanor Sokoloff Chair in Piano Studies, effective immediately. Ms. Cann, a 2013 graduate of the institution, will hold a new named chair created in honor of pianist Eleanor Sokoloff, who passed away in July 2020 after serving on Curtis’s faculty for 84 years.

Lauded as “a compelling, sparkling virtuoso” (Boston Music Intelligencer), Ms. Cann is in-demand as a soloist, recitalist, and music educator. She enjoys a long relationship with Curtis, first as a student and Community Artist fellow, and most recently as a collaborative staff pianist.

“Curtis has been my second home since I enrolled in 2010,” says Ms. Cann, who holds an Artist’s Diploma from the school. “A decade later I am honored to continue my connection to this great institution as a member of the piano faculty. I have learned a lot throughout my life about the importance of mentorship and the value of being a musician citizen with meaningful relationships to our communities. I am excited to mentor the students who I work with, inspiring them to shape careers for themselves that will encompass all they have to offer as musicians while connecting with audiences in an impactful way.”

Ms. Cann, who is based in Philadelphia, will work with Curtis students in individual lessons as well as chamber coachings, utilizing remote instruction while the school operates online due to the COVID-19 pandemic. She will be among a renowned roster of performers, pedagogues, and artist-citizens teaching at Curtis, including Robert McDonald, with whom Ms. Cann previously studied.

“Michelle Cann is a musician and pianist of exceptional integrity and skill,” says Mr. McDonald, the Penelope P. Watkins Chair in Piano Studies. “Her outstanding gifts as a performer and the degree of dedication, vision, and experience she offers as an educator will make her a much-valued addition to the piano department at Curtis. She is a wonderful example of what it means to be a vital, fully engaged citizen of our profession and, as such, a role model for aspiring pianists to both admire and emulate.”

The Eleanor Sokoloff Chair in Piano Studies honors the memory of the school’s longest serving faculty member, the esteemed Eleanor Sokoloff, who passed away on July 12, 2020 at the age of 106. Mrs. Sokoloff graduated from Curtis in 1938 and educated generations of piano students during her 84 years on the faculty. Known as an “institution within the institution,” Mrs. Sokoloff was an integral part of the entire school and a personification of venerable tradition, excellence, and dynamism. The new chair, to be held in perpetuity only by an exceptionally gifted and forward-thinking female pianist, is made possible through the generous leadership support of alumnus William A. Horn, M.D. (Piano ’70) and the Sokoloff family and was created to fulfill Mrs. Sokoloff’s desire to see more women added to the Curtis faculty.

“We are humbled by the generosity and vision that allows for the creation of this chair,” says President and CEO Roberto Díaz. “Eleanor’s incredible years of enthusiastic teaching will not, nor should not, be soon forgotten. This new position extends her important legacy by ensuring that women have a prominent place among our faculty and I am excited for Michelle to share her immense talents and musical voice with our students for years to come.”

Pianist Michelle Cann made her orchestral debut at age fourteen and has since performed with various ensembles including the Florida Orchestra and the New Jersey, Cleveland Institute of Music, and Sphinx symphony orchestras. She has appeared as guest soloist with the Knoxville Symphony and The Dream Unfinished orchestra and will perform with The Philadelphia Orchestra in its debut of Florence Price’s Concerto in One Movement in early 2021.

Ms. Cann regularly appears in recital and as a chamber musician throughout the U.S., China, and South Korea. Notable venues include the National Centre for the Performing Arts in Beijing, the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington, D.C., and the Bermuda Festival; and Walt Disney Concert Hall in Los Angeles and the Barbican in London with members of the Los Angeles Philharmonic.

Ms. Cann has won top prizes in state, national, and international competitions including the International Russian Music Piano Competition, the Blount Slawson Young Artists Competition, and the Wideman International Piano Competition. In 2019 she served as the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra’s MAC Music Innovator in recognition of her role as an African-American classical musician who embodies artistry, innovation, and a commitment to education and community engagement.

Ms. Cann has appeared as cohost and collaborative pianist with NPR’s From The Top and has been featured on WRTI and WHYY-TV in Philadelphia. Her summer festival appearances include the Taos Chamber Music Festival, Yellow Barn, Perlman Music Program, and Pianofest in the Hamptons, where she served as artist in residence.

Ms. Cann has served as the director of two children’s choruses in the El Sistema-inspired program Play On Philly and was among the first class of Community Artist fellows at the Curtis Institute of Music. She served on the faculty of the Sphinx Performance Academy during its inaugural year at the Julliard School.

Ms. Cann holds bachelor’s and master’s degrees in piano performance from the Cleveland Institute of Music, where she studied with Paul Schenly and Daniel Shapiro, and an Artist’s Diploma from the Curtis Institute of Music, where she studied with Robert McDonald.

The Curtis Institute of Music educates and trains exceptionally gifted young musicians to engage a local and global community through the highest level of artistry. For nearly a century Curtis has provided each member of its small student body with an unparalleled education alongside musical peers, distinguished by a “learn by doing” philosophy and personalized attention from a faculty that includes a high proportion of actively performing musicians. To ensure that admissions are based solely on artistic promise, Curtis makes an investment in each admitted student so that no tuition is charged for their studies. In a typical year, Curtis students hone their craft through more than 200 orchestra, opera, and solo and chamber music offerings in Philadelphia and around the world.

 

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Renovations to 1726 Locust Street Restore Iconic Elegance


Think back to the first time you walked up the steps to 1726 Locust Street, pulled open the heavy doors, and stepped into the Common Room. Were you awestruck at the gleaming wood paneling? Did you catch a glimpse of the elegant Bok Room and the beautiful Blashfield mural on the ceiling? Perhaps you admired the stately paintings on the walls or followed the strains of beautiful music down the marble-floored foyer into Field Concert Hall.

1726 is our flagship, our landmark building where we audition, study, rehearse, perform, celebrate, and enjoy Wednesday Tea. As we undertake the exciting opportunity to preserve and restore its iconic beauty and elegance, we are also making sure we upgrade the infrastructure to meet the needs of a 21st-century institute of higher education and create better conditions for everyone and everything within its beloved walls.

What to expect…

We will remove the steam service, radiators, and window air conditioning units, and a new HVAC system will be installed throughout the building to provide consistent heating, cooling, and humidification. Not only will this create a more comfortable environment for our students, faculty, staff, and guests, it will enable us to better preserve and maintain all our keyboard instruments and the artwork gracing most of the rooms. More energy-efficient lighting will be installed, providing optimum lighting conditions for all the activities that take place in the building and enabling us to be better stewards of our environment by conserving energy and reducing our carbon footprint. And classroom technology will be upgraded and standardized to support our important curricular needs.

We are making important upgrades to our life safety and security systems, as well, adding card readers to separate public areas of the building from private areas, upgrading fire alarms and strobes, installing a public address system for emergency notification, and improving the fire protection system throughout the building. A new elevator, large enough to accommodate a piano (on end) will be installed, and connecting corridors and ramps will be created to enhance accessibility and facilitate easier movement of instruments, equipment, and people among all floors.

Our modernization plan also includes aesthetic improvements. We will remove the glass fire enclosure on the first and second floors to reveal the graceful main staircase and second floor balcony again, and restore the Common Room to its earlier grandeur. Restrooms will receive much-needed renovations. Windows will be replaced, improving comfort and efficiency in studios, practice rooms, and classrooms while maintaining an historically accurate appearance. More aesthetically appropriate fixtures will be integrated with our lighting upgrades.

Fast Facts

  • Adding a new 5-stop service elevator
  • Connecting the upper floors of 1726
  • Adding approximately 1,000 square feet of usable space
  • Removing the outdated fire glass in the common room to restore the entrance of 1726 back to its original splendor
  • Upgrading all mechanical, electrical, and plumbing systems throughout the building
  • Dramatically improving heating, cooling, ventilation, and humidification
  • Adding new life safety and emergency response systems
  • Replacing the exterior windows on the upper floors
  • Pre-construction work has already begun, and this portion of the 1726 Modernization Project is expected to conclude at the end of 2021.

Looking ahead…

Helping a venerable older building become more accessible, comfortable, and safe while honoring and respecting its history can be a tall order, but we are up to the challenge. There is no more fitting way to celebrate our coming centenary than by ensuring our gracious main building will meet the needs of our Curtis community for decades to come.