Women's Studies and Conservatory Host Guest Composer/Musicologist Joan Osborn Epstein on Monday, April 3 and Tuesday, April 4 Composer Celebrates Work of Carrie Jacobs-Bond Story by Linda Shockley
	RELATED Q&A with Guest Composer Joan Epstein Faculty and Guest Recital to Celebrate Work of Carrie Jacobs-Bond, Turn of the 20th Century Composer, and Guest Composer Joan Epstein, Tuesday, April 4, 8 p.m., Kulas Recital Hall Women in American History: Carrie Jacobs-Bond. by Encyclopedia Britannica		In a two-day guest residency, professor Joan Osborn Epstein, head of the music department at Eckerd College in St. Petersburg, Florida, will offer an illustrated lecture, a guitar chamber music coaching, a composition seminar, and a performance. A primary focus of the residency will be the 20th century composer/entrepreneur Carrie Jacobs-Bond and her own compositions. Professor Epstein has balanced her teaching and composition endeavors with scholarly work regarding American women in the arts at the turn of the 20th century. Research on this topic, funded by the National Endowment for the Humanities, has been presented at conferences sponsored by the College Music Society in Baton Rouge, Minneapolis, San Diego and Bloomington, by the American Music Research Center in Boulder, Colorado, and by Ohio University, Athens, as well as at Amherst and Smith Colleges as part of residencies at those schools. Epstein earned her degrees at Smith College and the Yale University School of Music. The Events: • Monday, April 3, 2000 Guitar Chamber Music Coaching, 3:30 p.m. Bibbins 339 • "Revealing Carrie Jacobs-Bond-- and Myself: A Contemporary Composer Responds to Women Musicians," Lecture by Visiting Composer Joan Osborn Epstein, on Monday, April 3, 4:30 p.m. in Wilder 112 In August 1991, Joan Epstein, head of the music department of Eckerd College, found two moldy suitcases, circa 1930, on the Music Center doormat. In it, she found sheet music, mostly 1950s pop tunes arranged for chord organ, ripe for redelivery to the Goodwill. The second held volumes of accessible piano classics as well as a single dark blue volume whose cover banner jumped out at me: America's Foremost Woman Composer. Who was making this claim? Carrie Jacobs-Bond? Epstein had never heard of Bond… And so began what Epstein describes as: "A single, chance occurrence redirected how I teach, how I write music, and most importantly, how I understand myself and the world I live in." Learn more about it on Monday, April 3, at 4:30 p.m. in Wilder 112, when composer Epstein, guest of the Women's Studies Program and the Conservatory of Music, will offer a talk, "Revealing Carrie Jacobs-Bond-- and Myself: A Contemporary Composer Responds to Women Musicians." The talk is a final event in the Women's Studies Program celebration of Women's History Month. Tuesday, April 4 • Joan Osborn Epstein Open Composition Seminar, 4:30 p.m., Bibbins 223 Composer Joan Osborn Epstein will speak about theme of nature and landscape in her work. This event is co-sponsored by the Musicology Division and the Composition Department. The seminar will focus primarily on three Epstein pieces: Cumberland For flute and guitar, Cumberland focuses on the interactions of physical environment and culture in the region known as the Cumberland Plateau. The piece incorporates traditional folk music with an influence of Bartok. Arborvitae (Tree of Life) This recent woodwind quintet works with pitch sets as if they were germs of seeds which, through the course of the piece, differentiate and expand exponentially. Prairies This recently premiered piece for solo trombone and electronics incorporates wave files of actual "nature" sounds, and sounds of nature hemmed in and homogenized by humans. • Faculty and Guest Recital, 8 p.m., Kulas Recital Hall Works by Carrie Jacobs-Bond and Joan Epstein performed by Stephen Aron, teacher of classical guitar, with his frequent collaborator, soprano JoNell Aron; Joan Epstein's Bond Revelations; and the Femme en Noire String Quartet, composed of Celeste Cleveland and Erica Dicker (violins), Amy Cimini (viola) and Robin Reynolds (cello). Stephen Aron, teacher of classical guitar, along with his frequent collaborator, soprano JoNell Aron are currently in preparation for an upcoming recording and publication of the songs by composer Carrie Jacobs-Bond. He describes her work this way: "Her work is richly romantic and unabashedly sentimental. The music possess an honesty, and a directness of expression, which is beguiling. It's music from the pre-ironic age. It's hard to do music like this without tongue-in-cheek. But we do it deadly serious. I remember one recording that seemed to have been done with a wink, and it was dreadful. Some people might hate the sentimentality, but I think an audience member who arrive with an open mind, will become a fan." He adds, "The pieces lie beautifully on the guitar. She composed at least two songs that everyone will know - "I Love you Truly" and "The End of A Perfect Day" which was a huge WWI hit - but those aren't her best songs." Her best songs. Well, hear them at the concert.
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