Richelle Meiss, Aaron Shand, Holly Burnell

For the last several seasons graduates from the UA Acting & Musical Theatre programs have been hired as members of the Intern Acting Company in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. In August this tradition continued with graduates Richelle Meiss (BFA Musical Theatre) and Aaron Shand (BFA Acting).

The first graduate of the BFA Design & Technology program to benefit from this connection was Holly Burnell. Holly graduated with a dual emphasis in stage management and lighting design and will serve as the Stage Management Apprentice for the Rep’s 2008-2009 season.

These successes are a direct result of the School’s Showcase of Talent, an annual event held in January, highlighting the work of student performers, designers, technicians, stage managers and dramaturgs. Many casting directors and theatre professionals from around the country attend this event. In past years, students have secured agent representation in New York and Los Angeles and jobs with such organizations as the Utah Shakespearean Festival, PCPA Theatrefest and Hartford Stage Company.

(L to R): Prof. Ed Reid, Christopher Moller, Daniel Kirk, Jason Carder, Michael Flory, Jackie Berger, Matthew Miersch, Catherine Rutta, Prof. Jeff Haskell

Seven UA School of Music trumpet students and two faculty members, Ed Reid and Jeffrey Haskell, traveled to Baniff, Alberta, Canada in June to perform at the International Trumpet Guild Conference. The group presented two world premieres compositions entitled "Gatherings" and "Tysomedia" by UA faculty members Pamela Decker and Jeffrey Haskell, respectively.

Jason Carder, a DMA candidate in Performance, played with two other groups in addition to being the featured artist in Jeff Haskell’s work “Tyspomedia."

Audience members were thrilled listening to the UA group and immensely enjoyed the new Decker and Haskell compositions. The students were able to attend, in part, because of financial assistance from the Dean’s Fund for Excellence.

The UA Archive Ensemble appeared in its debut concert that featured the music of Artie Shaw with special guests The Swing Cats and soloists Ben Tevik (Clarinet) and Dan Puccio (Tenor Sax). The UA Jazz Combo performed in the same concert but focused on music by Bud Powell, Sonny Rollins, Lee Morgan, George Gershwin, and many more.

The UA Jazz Combo, which is under the direction of Professors Jeff Haskell and Moisés Paiewonsky, and Graduate Teaching Assistant Jason Carder, opened the concert and featured some of the UA's finest music students: Robert Gibboni (woodwinds); Dan Puccio (woodwinds); Paul Deemer (trombone); ArcoIris Sandoval (piano); Evan Runyon (bass); and Kyle Jenkins (drums).

The UA Archive Ensemble is under the direction of the UA School of Music’s jazz and popular music archive curator and instructor Keith Pawlak. The concert presented a rare glimpse into the music of a 1930s “swing” band by highlighting the career apex of one of the Swing Era’s most popular icons, Artie Shaw. The music, which was part of the UA School of Music’s vast collection of jazz and popular music manuscripts includes a variety of styles, popular hits, and unrecorded arrangements by several prominent American musicians such as, Artie Shaw, Les Baxter, Nelson Riddle, Paul Horn, Robert Drasnin, Paul Weston and Jo Stafford.

Nosh-e Jan (Bon Appetit), A Video by Gazelle Samizay

Gazelle Samizay, a graduate student in photography, traveled to Jordan this summer with Assistant Professor Sama Alshaibi to assist in teaching a photography course at Darat al Funun and to collect materials for her own work. Gazelle received grants from the Medici Circle, the CFA Small Grants, and the Graduate and Professional Student Council. The trip would not have been financially possible, however, without the support of the Administrative Associate to Dean Sevigny Susan Underwood who generously donated her "Beyond the Call of Duty" award, to Gazelle when she fell short on funds.

John Shadeck

John Shadeck, an Art & Visual Culture Education (AVCE) graduate student and a spring 2008 Medici recipient, recently gave a presentation at the state art educators' conference that grew out of his Medici
experience. It was well received and he has been asked by some teachers in the state to come to their schools to conduct workshops. This is a
wonderful example of the growth of professionalism and of university outreach that our students and the AVCE program in general are doing.

John received a Medici grant to travel to Rhode Island to teach pinhole photography to elementary aged children. He also received an internship to work in UA optical scientist Charles Falco's lab next year. Falco, along with David Hockney, proposed the Hockney-Falco Thesis about the use of optical instruments to create perspective in historical paintings. John will work in the lab from the artist's point of view.

The Barlow Endowment for Music has commissioned American composer Daniel Asia to write a substantive work for The Czech Nonet. The Czech Nonet Ensemble, the longest continuously performing chamber ensemble in the world founded 1924, has had over 300 works written for it by composers such as Prokofiev, Lutoslawski, Martinu and others.

The work from Daniel Asia will mark only the third work from an American composer written for the Nonet. Mr. Asia's work will have been preceded by American works of Pulitzer prize winner Robert Ward and Peter Sacco (Mannes College of Music, NYC).

The Czech Nonet Ensemble will come to North America in October 2009 in celebration of its 85th Anniversary. Sole agent for the Czech Nonet in North America is Stanton Management, a company that provides management services for international artists. It is this company that is responsible for the Czech Nonet Ensemble's return to touring in North America after a 25 year hiatus. Since its return in 2002, the Czech Nonet has visited over 70 venues in North America.

Therese Martin, Associate Professor of Art History, spent most of the summer working at the medieval archbishop's palace in Santiago de Compostela, Spain, supported by a CFA Research Incentive Grant. Her previous research on medieval structures built of fine-grained limestone did not fully prepare her for the difficulties of studying walls of very coarse granite. This palace was built mainly in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, but over the centuries multiple additions were made, walls were pierced by doors and windows, vaults were raised or lowered, and staircases were added. Even worse, some areas were left uninhabited, and so roofs collapsed and walls became covered by moss or were torn down altogether. It was under these circumstances that she moved systematically and painstakingly from space to space, recording all the mason's marks and trying to make sense of a most confused architectural history. She is now analyzing the data that she collected and making comparisons between the marks in the palace and those in the adjacent Romanesque cathedral.

This past summer Tohono O’odham youth were taught how films are produced and had the chance to make their own films through a workshop offered on the reservation.

The UA Jack and Vivian Hanson Arizona Film Institute held a six-day Native Youth Filmmaking Workshop on the Tohono O’odham Nation for 14 students between the ages of 14 and 19. “One of the Hanson Film Institute’s focuses is on professional development for students and emerging filmmakers,” said Vicky Westover, the institute’s program director. Westover, who developed the idea for the workshop, said the institute has a special focus on American Indian and Hispanic films.

She also said tribal members and leaders had been asking for such an outreach program. Students received expert advice while learning about the work of indigenous filmmakers around the world, media literacy and how to produce a film – writing, shooting and editing – from experienced filmmakers from both coasts. Students were lent digital cameras and worked with Final Cut software to produce their own films individually and in group settings.