Institute Announces Appointment of Paul Moravec as Artist-in-Residence

PRINCETON, N.J. -- March 26, 2007 -- The Institute for Advanced Study has announced the appointment of composer Paul Moravec as Artist-in-Residence.  As the Institute's resident composer, Paul Moravec will introduce new works and lead the Institute's annual concert series.  His term begins on July 1, 2007.
    The recipient of the 2004 Pulitzer Prize in Music, Moravec has composed more than ninety orchestral, chamber, choral, lyric, film, and electro-acoustic compositions.  His music has been described as "tuneful, ebullient and wonderfully energetic" (San Francisco Chronicle), "riveting and fascinating" (NPR), and "assured, virtuosic" (Wall Street Journal). 
    "Paul Moravec comes to the Institute with a great body of achievement, which has been widely recognized," commented Peter Goddard, Director of the Institute for Advanced Study.  "He will build upon and develop our Artist-in-Residence program, which has established a strong reputation as a promoter of challenging and provocative music and music scholarship, while also utilizing this opportunity for growth in his own work."  
    "I am delighted and privileged to participate in the life of this incomparably prestigious institution," says Moravec. "In addition to directing the IAS concert series, I will be composing my first major opera as well as a new piece for the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra.  And inasmuch as I was raised in Princeton during the late ‘sixties, I regard this residency as a kind of homecoming."
    Moravec was awarded the Pulitzer Prize in Music in 2004 for Tempest Fantasy, a thirty-minute "musical meditation" on Shakespeare's play scored for clarinet, violin, cello and piano.  Tempest Fantasy was first performed by Adelphi University's ensemble-in-residence Trio Solisti and David Krakauer in 2003 at the Morgan Library in New York.
    Born in Buffalo, New York, Moravec attended the Lawrenceville School and received his B.A. in music composition from Harvard University in 1980.  After graduation, he won a Rome Prize Fellowship from the American Academy in Rome.  Upon obtaining both his master's (1982) and doctorate (1987) degrees in music composition from Columbia University, Moravec went on to teach at Columbia and later at Dartmouth and Hunter colleges.  He is currently University Professor at Adelphi University.
    In addition to the Pulitzer Prize, Moravec has earned numerous distinctions, including a Fellowship in Music Composition from the National Endowment for the Arts, a Rockefeller Foundation Fellowship in Italy, a Camargo Foundation Residency Fellowship in France, and two fellowships from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, as well as many commissions.
    Recent world premieres include Anniversary Dances with the Ying Quartet; Atmosfera a Villa Aurelia with the Lark Quartet; Mark Twain Sez with cellist Matt Haimovitz; Cornopean Airs with the American Brass Quintet; The Time Gallery with eighth blackbird at the Metropolitan Museum of Art; Morph with the String Orchestra of New York City (SONYC); Cool Fire and Chamber Symphony for the Bridgehampton Chamber Music Festival; Capital Unknowns for the Albany Symphony; Everyone Sang for Troy Cook and the Marilyn Horne Foundation; Parables for the New York Festival of Song; Vita Brevis, a song cycle for tenor Paul Sperry; Useful Knowledge, a cantata commissioned by the American Philosophical Society for Ben Franklin's tercentenary; No Words commissioned by Concert Artists Guild for pianist James Lent and the Gay Gotham Chorus; and two works for the Elements String Quartet.
    Moravec's discography includes The Time Gallery, performed by eighth blackbird and released by Naxos in February 2006; Songs of Love and War for Chorus and Orchestra on a CD featuring The Dessoff Choirs & Orchestra; Sonata for Violin and Piano performed by the Bachmann/Klibonoff Duo for BMG/RCA Red Seal; Spiritdance, an orchestral work on the Vienna Modern Masters label; an album of chamber compositions titled Circular Dreams on CRI; and Vita Brevis on Albany Records with the composer at the piano.  In February 2007, the Bachmann/Klibonoff Duo released his Double Action, Evermore, and Ariel Fantasy on a CD Red Violin for Endeavour Classics.  In March 2007, Naxos released a recording of Tempest Fantasy, performed by Trio Solisti and clarinetist David Krakauer.  Moravec's music is published by Subito Music Publishing, www.subitomusic.com.

About the Artist-in-Residence Program
    The Artist-in-Residence program was established at the Institute for Advanced Study in 1994 to create a musical presence within the Institute community and to have in residence a person whose work could be experienced and appreciated by scholars from all disciplines.
    Pianist Robert Taub was the first Artist-in-Residence from 1994 to 2001, during which time he performed the complete cycle of Beethoven Piano Sonatas over a period of three years.  Vox Classics recorded the performances in Wolfensohn Hall, the Institute's lecture hall and concert venue, producing five highly-acclaimed double-CDs.  Taub also introduced a "Musical Conversations" series that brought noted musical figures to the Institute, including James Levine and Milton Babbitt.
    As Taub's successor, the Institute selected Jon Magnussen, who has served as Artist-in-Residence since 2000.  His term ends on June 30 of this year, at which time he will take up the position of Director of Education at the Honolulu Symphony.  Magnussen, who received his doctorate in composition in 1999 from The Julliard School, introduced Recent Pasts 20/21, a four-year initiative of chamber music concerts and lectures that explored today's musical landscape and the many points of view which define it, in 2003. In addition to pre-concert lectures, Magnussen continued the "Conversations" series, bringing to the Institute such distinguished composers as Philip Glass and John Corigliano.
    While curating the concert and lecture season, Magnussen focused his time at the Institute working on his own compositions, including The Folding Cliffs, an opera based on the epic poetry of W.S. Merwin.  The Institute recently recorded Magnussen's Psalm (2002) for chorus, baritone solo, and chamber orchestra. Psalm and the previously recorded The Winged (1996), two scores Magnussen wrote to accompany ballets choreographed by the late José Limón, will be released this fall on Albany Records. 

About the Institute for Advanced Study
    The Institute for Advanced Study is one of the world's leading centers for theoretical research and intellectual inquiry.  The Institute exists to encourage and support fundamental scholarship - the original, often speculative, thinking that produces advances in knowledge that change the way we understand the world.  Work at the Institute takes place in four Schools:  Historical Studies, Mathematics, Natural Sciences and Social Science.  It provides for the mentoring of younger scholars by a permanent Faculty of twenty-seven, and it offers all who work there the freedom to undertake research that will make significant contributions in any of the broad range of fields in the sciences and humanities studied at the Institute.
    The Institute, founded in 1930, is a private, independent academic institution located in Princeton, New Jersey.  Its more than 5,000 former Members hold positions of intellectual and scientific leadership in the United States and abroad. Some twenty-one Nobel Laureates, and thirty-four out of forty-eight Fields Medalists, have been Institute Faculty, Members or Visitors. Many winners of the Wolf or MacArthur prizes have also been affiliated with the Institute.