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OBERLIN COLLEGE APPOINTS MUSIC CRITIC AND HISTORIAN JAMES KELLER TO LUCE PROFESSORSHIP OF THE EMERGING ARTS
NOVEMBER 12, 2003—Music critic and historian James M. Keller, a 1975 graduate of Oberlin College, has been named the College’s new Henry R. Luce Professor of the Emerging Arts, effective July 1, 2004. This is a faculty position in both Oberlin’s Conservatory of Music and the College of Arts and Sciences.
"Besides
being engaging and stimulating, James Keller brings to this important
professorship an enormous breadth of interests and knowledge," says
Dean of the Oberlin Conservatory of Music Robert Dodson in announcing
the appointment. "The Dean of the College
of Arts and Sciences [Clayton Koppes] and I believe that Mr. Keller’s
broader academic interests beyond music will help build interdisciplinary
bridges between the Conservatory and the College."
Preparing students to make contributions to the arts in today’s technologically enhanced and genre-crossing environment demands new, interdisciplinary models of arts education and an exploration of the intellectual framework supporting it. The Luce Professorship of the Emerging Arts, by examining the concepts, ethics, and aesthetics of the moment, aspires to bridge contemporary art making with academic scholarship.
A prolific writer, Keller is program annotator and frequent lecturer for both the New York Philharmonic and the San Francisco Symphony orchestras, positions that he will maintain while assuming his new responsibilities at Oberlin. He was awarded the ASCAP-Deems Taylor Award for feature writing about music in Chamber Music magazine, for which he is contributing editor. From 1990 to 2000 he served as music editor of the New Yorker magazine, writing weekly columns about classical and popular music, record reviews, and events listings. He frequently covered film and the visual arts for the magazine as well.
Keller believes his experience in observing and writing about the rapidly changing arts and culture scene suits him to a teaching position that is, itself, experimental.
"I’m a historian by training and bias," Keller says. "I believe that new creations are born out of traditions, and I want to place them in a context that makes them approachable. I have also spent a lot of time living in the real world, so to me ‘music’ doesn’t mean just Beethoven and Wagner, but also the orchestras that play the music, the buildings they play it in, the marketers, fundraisers, philanthropists, unions, media—the whole process whereby artistic presentations are brought into being and made available to audiences.
"I’m interested in the design and construction of theaters, concert halls, museums, and arts centers. I think it would be interesting, for example, to look at New York’s Lincoln Center as a case study. How well has it held up over the years? Is it still fulfilling its purpose as well as it should? Has it adapted its mission to changing cultural realities or the evolving nature of new artworks? Should it? How have ensuing arts centers followed or departed from its model?"
Keller looks forward to developing an undergraduate curriculum and teaching courses that are "heavily concentrated on what’s happening now," he says. His emphasis will be on learning how to approach, evaluate, and communicate about new works in a meaningful way and from a critical perspective, rather than on actually creating and performing works incorporating new forms and technologies. His curriculum will not therefore duplicate such courses as are offered as part of the music composition major, the studio art major, and TIMARA (Technology in Music and Related Arts). Keller also hopes to harness the interest of fellow faculty members in both the Conservatory and the College in developing symposia and collaborative projects.
Keller earned bachelor degrees in 1975 from both the Oberlin Conservatory and Oberlin College, majoring in music history in the former and French and music in the latter. He was also awarded a certificate in French language and literature from the Sorbonne, Paris; a Master of Philosophy in music history from Yale University; and a certificate from the Careers in Business Institute at New York University’s Graduate School of Business Administration.
He has worked as an oboist, specializing in early music and historical performance; as a theatrical music director for productions of the American Shakespeare Festival, Yale Drama School, and East Lynne Company for Historical American Theatre; as a university teacher; and as a business consultant.
He wrote the books column for Seaport: New York’s History Magazine, from 1991 to 1998, and has contributed articles and reviews to many other publications, among them Opera News, BBC Music Magazine, Le Monde de la Musique, Travel & Leisure, The New York Times, and Newsday. He has contributed articles to several books, including the Encyclopedia of New York City (Yale University Press, 1995) and American Mavericks (University of California Press, 2001).
Recently a combination of hobbies—gardening, cooking, and wine collecting—led him to branch out into writing feature articles on cuisine for Bon Appétit.
Oberlin College and its Conservatory of Music jointly initiated the Luce Professorship of the Emerging Arts in 2000 with funding from the Henry Luce Foundation, which, since 1968, has encouraged academic innovation and creativity through integrative and interdisciplinary approaches to teaching and research in American private higher education. The Luce Professorship of the Emerging Arts is funded for six years; art curator and author Linda Weintraub held the post from 2000 to 2003.
Media Contact: Marci Janas
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