Award Recipients

Ryan Urato is a conductor and violinist and has played in various orchestras at Brown and in the New England area. He also directed orchestras for several student groups at Brown, including Brown Ballet Company's The Nutcracker. Recently, he conducted a string orchestra for my capstone concert in Tchaikovsky's Serenade for Strings, and had the tremendous opportunity to guest conduct the Brown University Orchestra in the most recent concert cycle with Ginastera's Estancia suite.

Ryan played violin since the age of 7, and always had a fascination with classical music in general. He became interested in conducting in high school, but became inspired after conducting real ensembles at Brown! He plans to continue studies in conducting after graduation and will apply to Master's programs in the fall.

2023 - Ryan Sawyer '23

Ryan Sawyer is a marimbist and composer who plans to graduate in the Fall of 2023 with concentrations in Music and Applied Math. As a performer, Ryan prefers to label himself as a marimbist, although he also regularly performs on timpani, percussion, organ, or piano. He has participated in the Brown University Orchestra as a percussionist, and additionally performed Paul Creston’s Concertino for Marimba and Orchestra as a marimba soloist. Other playing engagements include Brown Wind Symphony, Percussion Ensemble, and Chamber Orchestra on percussion, as well as performances with the Brown Chorus on timpani. In addition to his participation in ensembles, Ryan has enjoyed learning a wide range of solo marimba repertoire throughout his time at Brown.

Ryan is additionally interested in composition, a passion he developed early in his playing career. Through his works, he seeks to explore the versatility of percussion by incorporating and featuring it in various settings. Inspired by the works of Cecil Taylor, he further hopes to engage performers in a manner that allows them to “think like a percussionist.” He has enjoyed sharing his passion for music with others, both as a teaching assistant in multiple music theory courses and as a leader in the Music Departmental Undergraduate Group. He looks forward to pursuing a capstone project in composition in the fall.

2022 - Maya Polsky '22

2021 - Tomi Madarikan '21

Tomi Madarikan is a student from Lagos, Nigeria who concentrated in both Computer Science and Music while at Brown. She has been a singer since she was 7 years old and watched ‘The Sound of Music’ for the first time. After that, she starred in school musicals every year, partook in and directed choirs, and performed at charity events in Hong Kong. In all four years at Brown, Tomi was an active member of Shades of Brown, an a capella group rooted in the African American musical tradition. In the summer of her freshman year, she was invited to collaborate with a M.E.M.E concentrator in a recording studio on campus. This was her first time being in a recording studio and she fell in love with it immediately. This experience prompted her to form a band on campus, ‘Kids with Curls’, a musical collective called ‘The Curly People Collective’, and to concentrate in Music at Brown with a focus on production. Her honors project, titled ‘Lineage’, explores her cultural, and musical influences. These are, primarily, her Nigerian heritage, the many places that she has lived, and her affinity for musical theatre, Afrobeats and R&B with some folk influences. She wrote, recorded and produced the eight songs, weaving together a sonic narrative that both questions and asserts adulthood, personal fulfillment, and belonging.

2020 - Sofia Frohna '20

Sofia Frohna is a composer and vocalist who was enthusiastically involved with the Music Department during her time at Brown. Throughout her undergraduate career she led the Music Departmental Undergraduate Group, worked as a teaching assistant for the Introduction to Composition class, and sang in Brown Chorus. Outside of the department she also participated in student-run theater as a music director and actor, played in and managed travel and communications for the Brown University Band, and helped run the Brown University Folk Festival. For her honors thesis, a half-hour long orchestral piece Plastic Orchestra, she recruited 20 friends to play plastic instruments as a way to explore, timbre, materiality, and alternate sources of beauty through a creative group effort. She currently plans to become established in the Los Angeles contemporary classical music scene, particularly composing choral music and film scores, and hopes to eventually pursue further graduate study.

2019 - Julian Gau '19

Julian Gau graduated with a Bachelor of Arts in Music and a Bachelor of Science in Mathematics. His musical journey started at a young age with the piano and continued on to conducting and playing the cello as a soloist. During his time at Brown, he was an assistant conductor to the Brown University Orchestra, as well as conductor of the Brown University Chamber Orchestra, an entirely student-led ensemble. He also conducted for various theatre shows, including West Side Story, Orpheus in the Underworld, The Soldier's Tale, and Into the Woods. He was an active member of the music community, serving on the board of the Brown University Orchestra and the Music DUG (Department Undergraduate Group). Julian studied Stravinsky's The Soldier's Tale for his honors thesis project, analyzing its motives and narrative in their historical context.

2018 - Joshua Gaines '18

Joshua Gaines is an aspiring music educator and theorist. He has grown up participating in many kinds of music making from orchestral double bass, to a cappella singing, to musical theater, to Ghanaian drumming, to composition, to Javanese Gamelan. He has enjoyed supporting his fellow musicians by helping run student composer concerts with Brown’s club Fermata. While at Brown, he dedicated much of his time to helping other undergraduate music students as a Teaching Assistant for Theory of Tonal Music and Intro to Composition. Following graduation, he will pursue a Master of Arts in Music Theory at University of Maryland, College Park.

2017 - Erin Reifler '17

Erin J. Reifler graduated Brown University with a Bachelor of the Arts in Music Theory, History, and Composition. She grew up in musical theater playing trombone but gradually moved towards music directing and writing. As a musician, she has played trombone in classical, jazz, and musical theater settings. At Brown she received praise as musical director for A Chorus Line, Little Women, and Urinetown. Her one-act musical Goldilocks made its New York City debut at the Thespis Theater Festival in the summer of 2016 and her 10-minute musical The Trombone Lesson was voted the Winner of Manhattan Repertory Theatre's 10-Minute Play Contest. She went on to attend the NYU Tisch Graduate Musical Theatre Writing Program.

2016 - Peter Enriquez '16

Peter Enriquez graduated Brown University with a Bachelor of the Arts with Honors in Music. An accomplished multi-instrumentalist, Peter has performed with various bands throughout the country and internationally in a variety of styles ranging from pop to jazz and everything in between. He became increasingly more involved in recording engineering and music production at Brown, and in 2013 started a two man production team based out of Providence, RI with bandmate and friend, Grant Meyer, called Cookie Thief. Cookie Thief provided recording, mixing, mastering, and production services to artists spanning genres from Puerto Rican hip-hop to nu-jazz. Peter was also the founder of a benefit concert series, "Heal Haiti," based out of Newburgh, NY, which supported the rebuilding of a music school in Port-au-prince, Haiti (Holy Trinity) after the earthquake in 2010. His first solo project, What Do You Think? was released May 13th 2016. He went on to pursue his Masters in Jazz Guitar Performance at New York University's prestigious Steinhardt School of Culture, Education, and Human Development to hone his skills as a performer, composer, producer, and engineer.

2015 - Akshaya Avril-Tucker '15

Akshaya Avril-Tucker is a composer, cellist, dancer and choreographer. She graduated magna cum laude with a B.A. in Music (Theory/History/Composition) and went on to pursue her Masters in Composition at the University of Texas at Austin. She received an Honorable Mention at both the Hildegard Competition (National Sawdust) and Morton Gould Young Composer Awards (ASCAP) in 2018. In 2018, she received a Rainwater Innovation Award from the University of Texas Austin for her collaboration with Hindustani Vocalist Saili Oak on her Master's Thesis, Three Songs for Hindustani Vocalist, Soprano and Sinfonietta (2018) which was premiered in March, 2018.

2014 – Morgan Lee '14

Upon learning she would be awarded the Madeira Scholarship for 2014, Morgan wrote:

“I am honored to be this year’s recipient of the Jean and Francis Madeira Prize. I would like to thank you and the rest of the Brown Club of Rhode Island for funding this award. Supporting aspiring professional musicians at Brown is an incredibly important task and I am humbled to be among the recipients of such a prestigious award.”

During her time at Brown, Morgan continued to foster her lifelong commitment to classical piano. She began studying piano at age four and since then has competed and performed in many venues. She recently was awarded second place in Eastern Music Festival’s Young Artists Piano Competition and performed at the Kennedy Center as part of their Millennium Stage Series. She also was a finalist in EMF’s concerto competition. Morgan enjoyed collaborating with other musicians in the music department through accompanying and chamber music, and she also accompanied musical theater at Brown. Following graduation, she will pursue a Master of Music in piano performance at Mannes College of Music in New York City.

2013 – Matthew Block '13

Matthew Block is a musician and composer hailing from Kennett Square, PA. He started playing trumpet at age 10 and became heavily involved with jazz in the Philadelphia area. Matt played in the Brown Jazz Band throughout his years at Brown, and was the leader of the trumpet section. He also started and ran the Wednesday Night Jazz Jams in the Underground, a reflection of his dedication to growing the presence of a jazz community at Brown. Matt interned for Human Music and Sound Design in New York, a company that composes and produces original music for advertising, TV, Film and interactive media. He will be pursuing a life of music, focusing on expressing his ideas through composition and through his trumpet. He completed his thesis entitled “Walking on Ice”, a collaborative audio–visual exhibition with Brown–RISD dual degree student, Nazli Ozerdem. The thesis was based on his research supported by a grant from Brown, which allowed Matt to travel to Iceland in the summer of 2012 to study Icelandic folklore and landscape. The work can be found at: http://cargocollective.com/MattBlock

2012 - Liam Hynes, Music and East Asian Studies double concentration

2011 – Benjamin Nicholson, Computer Music and Literary Arts double concentration

2010 – Jacob Greenberg (composer)

2009 – Vinay Parameswaran (percussionist/pianist/conductor)

Graduate School – Curtis Institute of Music, class of 2012 – Conducting

Excerpt from the article: “Nashville Symphony’s new assistant conductor Vinay Parameswaran will lead the orchestra’s youth concerts" (click here for its full text)

The job of jet–setting superstar symphony conductor is surely among the most glamorous and lucrative occupations in the world. Most conductors, however, don’t start at the top. They begin their careers working as assistant conductors — basically, glorified apprentices who must spend years conducting Star Wars marches and Little Mermaid songs at Saturday morning youth concerts. Like everyone else, would–be maestros must pay their dues.

Vinay Parameswaran, the Nashville Symphony Orchestra’s newly minted assistant conductor, will certainly lead his fair share of education and outreach performances. Indeed, he’ll be on the stage of the Schermerhorn Symphony Center this Saturday morning conducting a concert that features, among other things, juggling and circus antics. For Parameswaran, that’s just fine.

“The Nashville Symphony Orchestra devotes a lot of resources to education and outreach,” he says. “The orchestra’s serious commitment to educational programming is what attracted me to Nashville.”

Of course, even assistant conductors get to bask in the limelight of celebrity from time to time. Parameswaran will get that chance on March 18, when he leads the Nashville Symphony in a performance of Beethoven’s Violin Concerto with world–renowned violinist Itzhak Perlman.

“It would be an understatement to say I was blown away when I found out I’d be conducting Itzhak Perlman,” he says. “That’s not the kind of opportunity I’d expect to get this early in my career.”

2008 – Eli Fieldsteel (composer/percussionist)

Eli Fieldsteel (b. Middletown, CT, 14 July 1986) is an American composer, conductor, arranger, and percussionist with a particular interest in large ensemble music and computer programming. His works have been performed in a number of venues across the country.

Eli became seriously interested in composition in 2002, when he joined the Wesleyan Wind Ensemble as a percussionist. Over the next three years, the group performed and recorded six of his compositions for wind band. Eli received his Bachelor’s degree in music from Brown University in 2008, where he studied composition, orchestration, and counterpoint with Gerald Shapiro. In 2005, he became the student conductor of the Brown Wind Symphony and conducted several of his new works. Eli has studied with David Bithell, Cindy McTee, and Jon C. Nelson at the University of North Texas, where he received his Master’s degree in 2010. He is currently a doctoral composition student at the University of Texas at Austin.

Eli’s recent work reflects an emerging interest in technology and electroacoustic music as well as a continuous desire to refine and personalize his rhythmic and tonal vocabulary. In 2009, Fantasy for Wind Symphony was selected as a finalist in the second Frank Ticheli Competition. In the same year, his orchestral work, Cordillera, was selected for performance by the UNT Symphony Orchestra in the annual Concerto Competition. In 2010, Fantasy for Wind Symphony was selected as the winner of the Bandmasters’ Academic Society of Japan competition and was performed in Tokyo by the Kawagoe Sohwa Wind Ensemble.

www.elifieldsteel.com

2007 – Christopher Whitten Bernard (composer/music scholar)

Christopher received a Fulbright award in 2007–2008.

2006 – Christopher Lowrey (vocalist)

Countertenor Christopher Lowrey, originally from the United States, holds degrees from Brown University, St John’s College, Cambridge, and the Royal College of Music. While at Cambridge, he was a choral scholar with Trinity College Choir and was fully supported by the Keasbey Memorial Scholarship. He is currently on the advanced opera course at the Royal College of Music International Opera School, supported by the Hilary Fabian Award and the Josephine Baker Trust.

Christopher won the London Handel Society’s Michael Oliver Prize as runner–up in the 2010 Handel Singing Competiton. He was a finalist in the 2008 London Bach Society Competition, the 2006 Fulbright Scholarship competition, and in 2005 was awarded first prize at the Rhode Island competition of the National Association of Teachers of Singing. Currently, he is a voice student of Derek Lee Ragin, and has previously studied with Ashley Stafford and Pierre Masse. He holds a full–time singing post at St Peter’s, Eaton Square, London, and performs regularly with the professional choral outfits of London, including Polyphony and English Voices.

Christopher made his solo international debut with Bach Collegium Japan under Masaaki Suzuki in Handel’s Messiah and returned to Japan this season to perform Goffredo in a concert version of Rinaldo. Here and abroad his reputation is growing, and this year he will make his debut with various ensembles around the world.

His recent roles include Mirtillo in Handel’s Il Pastor Fido as part of the 2010 London Handel Festival, Oberon in the RCM’s production of Britten’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream, the title role in Handel’s Alessandro as part of the 2009 London Handel Festival, and Orpheus in Gluck’s Orfeo ed Euridice. Concert appearances include a celebration of Handel’s music with the Aldeburgh Music Club; Bach’s Magnificat and Vivaldi’s Gloria with the Ecclesia Consort of New England; Handel’s Dixit Dominus with Caius College Music Society; Handel’s Messiah, Mozart’s Requiem, and Handel’s Coronation Anthems with the Trinity Singers; David in Boston University’s production of Handel’s Saul; Purcell’s Jubilate Deo, J S Bach’s Missa Brevis and St John Passion, Purcell’s Dido and Aeneas and Charpentier’s Te Deum with the Brown University Chamber Choir; and several Bach Cantata concerts with Musica Maris.

Christopher is featured as a soloist on recordings of Handel’s Dettingen Te Deum and a disc of choral music entitled Baltic Exchange, both with Trinity College Choir, on the Hyperion label. He is also involved in a wide range of consort groups. He is the founder and director of The Cambridge Clerkes, a group specializing in sacred music of the English Renaissance, and directs Ensemble Altera, an American–based early music ensemble.

christopher-lowrey.com

2005 – Eric Sedgwick (pianist)

www.facebook.com/eric.sedgwick

2004 – Roman Testroet (vocalist)

Graduate Student at Duke University. Research Interests: Renaissace music, Spanich villancico tradition, Eucharist, theology, liturgy, popular unbelief, music as religious mediation

http://fds.duke.edu/db/aas/Music/grad/roman.testroet

2003 – Bradley Naylor (vocalist)

Bradley writes on 01/03/2012:

“I remember several things about my winning the award at the end of my senior year. The first was that the award was announced at the Music Department graduation ceremony, in the presence of my family and respected colleagues and faculty. More than the university–wide celebration (which was in the middle of a downpour in 2003), this intimate moment and my receiving the Madeira Award were the perfect summation to my undergraduate years of work. A concert that night by Harry Connick, Jr., at which I was an honoree having won the Madeira prize, was an incredible end to the special day.

“The citation on the award references the recipient’s showing promise for a career in music. And in that way as well, the award has been significant to me.

“Immediately following graduation in May 2003, I enrolled in the Master of Music program at Indiana University’s Jacob’s School of Music, graduating with an MM in Choral Conducting in 2005. As co–head of the music department at the Middlesex School from 2005–2007, I directed numerous musical ensembles and taught multiple music courses, in addition to the cornucopia of duties assigned to boarding school faculty. In the fall of 2007 I enrolled in the doctoral program in choral conducting at the Yale University School of Music, finishing coursework in May, 2009. I continue to conduct choral ensembles at churches and at the collegiate level, and sing in many professional choral organizations all over the country.

“While I’ve watched many of my fellow 2003 music majors chose varied and wonderful careers, I’ve remained fixed on my career as a choral and vocal musician. I won’t say that without the Madeira Prize I wouldn’t have sung Bach’s B minor Mass in the Forbidden City Concert Hall in Beijing in 2009, for instance. But winning the prize, along with the countless other encouragements from family, professors, and colleagues, has shaped and continues to shape the musician I am today.”

Bradley Naylor has been Minister of Music at Duke Memorial since September of 2010. As Minister of Music, he oversees all of the musical events in the life of the church: he directs the Sanctuary Choir and Wesley Singers children’s choir, works with co–pastor Roger Owens in the planning of congregational music for worship, and coordinates with the lay leaders of the Bethany Bells and Sacred Dance groups as they prepare music and dance for worship. Bradley looks forward to including more instrumental music in worship, as well as the development of a Youth Ensemble for musicians from 6th to 12th grade.

http://dukememorial.org/music/

2002 – Nathan Stumpff (composer)

02/14/2012 – Nathan writes:

“To this day I feel honored to have been awarded the Medeira Award in my senior year at Brown. It was humbling to be recognized by such a fantastic faculty as Browns, and I remember feeling a certain responsibility that came with the award, as if they were saying “Pretty good so far, now go do something GREAT.” My career in music since Brown has had its detours and changes of course, but it isn’t difficult to see that most every meaningful musical experience in my adult life is created in the context of my experiences at Brown and its generous and supportive faculty.

In the end it is ultimately the people and the relationships that the Madeira Award represents to me that has the most meaning, and for that I will be forever grateful.”

01/06/2012 – From his web site:

Nathan J. Stumpff (born 1978) is a musician, builder and part–time homesteader from Freedom, Maine, currently living and working in Fairbanks, Alaska. Nathan recently completed the degree of Master of Music as a Jack Kent Cooke Foundation Fellowship recipient at Manhattan School of Music, where he studied with Nils Vigeland and Julia Wolfe. As a Fulbright Scholar, he taught and worked with composer Mist Borkelsdittir at the Listahiskili Islands (Iceland Academy of the Arts) in Reykjavik, Iceland. Mr. Stumpff completed his undergraduate degree with honors at Brown University, where his principal teachers were Gerald Shapiro and Elaine Bearer.

Recent commissions include those by The Esoterics choir from Seattle, WA. As 1st Prize winner in the 2006 Washington International Prize for Composers, Nathan’s string quartet The Righteous and the Wicked was premiered by the Peabody Quartet at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington, DC. Other recent honors include 1st prize in the 2006 Cappella Gloriana Competition for Composers for his a cappella choral work Four Rumi Songs, and residency with the California E.A.R. Unit in Arcosanti, AZ, where his work Subtleties Lost: prelude and fugue for orchestra was selected for the 2002 Minnesota Orchestra Composer’s Institute and Reading Sessions.

An active performer and conductor, Nathan has recently been guest artist with the Manhattan School of Music Percussion ensemble under Steven Schick, and with the new music ensemble TACTUS, playing the hammered dulcimer in a performance of George Crumb’s Quest. Recent conducting engagements include numerous premieres by New York composers, including appearances at the 2007 DUMBO Dance Festival in Brooklyn, NY. Nathan is a regular guest on keyboards of the Jackson, Maine based rock band Steel Toe Booty, most recently performing in the Burlington, Vermont area.

http://lostloonmusic.com/

2001 – Jason Yust

2000 – Katherine Schroeder (hornist)

1999 – Matthew Garrett (vocalist)

Matt wrote us on 01/03/2012:

“I went to Brown intending to major in a science, probably Biology, and becoming a doctor like my dad. Over the course of four years, music classes became my focus, and I left Brown with a music degree and Honors in Orchestral Conducting. The Madeira Award was incredibly special for me — it was Brown’s affirmation of my talents and potential to become a professional musician. Even after five years of operatic training at Juilliard, I still hold Brown’s belief in me deepest in my heart, and consider Brown the foundation upon which my career as a professional musician has been built.

“On a side note, I had the unforgettable privilege to visit with astronaut John Glenn during the Madeira Award ceremony. He was at Brown receiving an Honorary Degree at the same time. He’s a hero of mine!"

The tenor Matthew Garrett is a 2005 graduate of the prestigious Juilliard Opera Center in New York City. During the 2010–2011 season, he sings Ossipon in the world premiere of Michael Dellaira’s The Secret Agent with the Center for Contemporary Opera (later touring to Hungary), Prunier in La Rondine with the Opera Company of Middlebury (Emmanuel Plasson conducting), and tenor solos in Puccini’s Messe di Gloria with the Brooklyn Symphony, Honegger’s Jeanne d’Arc au Bûcher with the Little Orchestra Society, Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony with Monmouth Symphony, Kalabis’ Canticum Cantoricum with the Church of St. Ignatius Loyola, and Carmina Burana with Coro Lirico and Texas State University Orchestra.

In the 2009–2010 season, he sang Ferrando in Mozart’s Cosi fan tutte with the Jacksonville Symphony, and served as tenor soloist in Orff’s Carmina Burana with Tulsa Opera and Ballet, Mendelssohn’s Paulus at Carnegie Hall with the Oratorio Society of New York, Mozart’s Mass in C minor at Carnegie Hall with Musica Sacra, Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony and Carmina Burana at Avery Fisher Hall with the National Chorale, Handel’s Messiah with the Syracuse Symphony, the premiere of John Tavener’s Requiem at St. Ignatius Loyola, Bach’s St. Matthew Passion with the Berkshire Choral Festival, Carmina Burana with the Northeastern Pennsylvania Philharmonic and Riverside Choral Society, Bach’s St. John Passion with the Pioneer Valley Symphony, CPE Bach’s Auferstehung und Himmelfaht Jesu with the Grand Tour Orchestra, the title role in Britten’s St. Nicolas with the Richmond Choral Society, and as recitalist in the Jours des Arts festival in Montreux, Switzerland.

Recent seasons include leading roles at Scottish Opera, Houston Grand Opera, Glimmerglass Opera, Connecticut Opera, Chicago Opera Theater, Opera Omaha, Syracuse Opera, Eugene Opera, Merola Opera, Miller Theater at Columbia University, and the Cincinnati May Festival. Mr. Garrett has also been a featured soloist with the Los Angeles Philharmonic, Las Vegas Philharmonic, Opera Orchestra of New York at Carnegie Hall, Orpheus Chamber Orchestra, Israel Chamber Orchestra in Tel Aviv, Basel Festival Orchestra, Arion Ensemble under Bernard Labadie, Ann Arbor Symphony, Virginia Symphony, and New World Symphony. He has presented solo recitals in Merkin Hall and Paul Hall in New York, including a complete Die Schöne Müllerin of Schubert.

Mr. Garrett was recently a World Finalist in the Montreal International Musical Competition. Other awards include 2nd Prize in the Young Concert Artists International Competition, 2nd Prize in the Eastern Regional Finals of the Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions, 2nd Prize in the Dupont Voice Competion at Opera at Florham, and encouragement prizes from Opera Index, the Licia Albanese–Puccini Foundation, and the Giulio Gari Foundation.

Operatic performances include Ferrando (Cosi fan tutte), Don Ottavio (Don Giovanni), Belmonte and Pedrillo (Die Entführung aus dem Serail), Don Basilio (Le Nozze di Figaro), Ernesto (Don Pasquale), Lensky (Eugene Onegin), Apollo (Orfeo), Jenik (The Bartered Bride), Imeneo (Imeneo), Zen (What Next, Carter), Soldat (Der Kaiser von Atlantis), Sam Sharkey (Paul Bunyan), Le Petit Vieillard (L’Enfant et les Sortilèges), Harry (La Fanciulla del West), the Prologue (Turn of the Screw), the wistful John Styx (Orphée aux Enfers), Little Bat (Susannah), Gomatz (Zaide), and Lysander and Flute (A Midsummer Night’s Dream).

Past teaching engagements include three years as a Teaching Fellow in the Ear Training Department at the Juilliard School, and at the Metropolitan Opera as a music theory teacher to the Lindemann Young Artist Development Program. Originally trained as an orchestral conductor, he received a Bachelor’s degree from Brown University in 1999, as well as the coveted Madeira Prize and Ron Nelson Prize for musical excellence. He earned a Masters degree in Voice from the Juilliard School in 2003.

matthewgarrett.net

1998 – Alexei Doohovskoy (trombonist)

On 01/01/2011 Alexei wrote:

“It was truly an honor to receive the Madiera Award in 1998. In retrospect, it was a real point of encouragement to me as I embarked on the somewhat unpredicatable path of a musician. It was particular inspiring given the remarkable careers of both Madieras.”

Alexei Doohovskoy is an active New England area trombonist and music educator. He has performed with the Boston Modern Orchestra Project, the Boston Lyric Opera, the Rhode Island Philharmonic, the Springfield Symphony, the Vermont Symphony, as well as with the Boston Symphony and Boston Pops.

As a chamber musician, Mr. Doohovskoy has toured the United States and Canada with the Empire Brass Quintet presenting both concerts and masterclasses. With the EBQ, he has appeared as a featured performer with the Buffalo Philharmonic, the United States Air Force Band, and the Northeast Pennsylvania Philharmonic.

Mr. Doohovskoy has made recent solo appearances with the Brown University Wind Symphony and at recitals sponsored by Rhode Island College, the All–Newton Music School, and the Bay Chamber Concert Series in Rockport, Maine.

Currently a Teaching Associate with the Music Department of Brown University, Mr. Doohovskoy also teaches lessons through the Instrumental Music School of Carlisle and Concord and the Performing Arts Office of the Wellesley Public Schools. His students have successfully gained acceptance to district festivals and university music programs.

He has performed on several recordings with Norman Bolter’s Frequency Band, the Boston Modern Orchestra Project, the New England Conservatory Wind Ensemble, and the Boston Pops.

From 2001 to 2004, Mr. Doohovskoy was a member of the New World Symphony in Miami, FL where he worked regularly with Michael Tilson Thomas and other distinguished conductors and composers. The South Florida Sun–Sentinel described one of his solo performances as demonstrating “fluent technique and a poetic touch.” He was awarded a fellowship to attend the Aspen Music Festival in 2003, and performed several concerts as Principal Trombonist of the Aspen Chamber Symphony and Aspen Festival Orchestra.

A graduate of Brown University, Mr. Doohovskoy also earned a Master of Music degree from New England Conservatory in Boston. He has benefited from the guidance and insight of many teachers and coaches, including Norman Bolter, Douglas Yeo, Per Brevig, and Douglas Wright.

http://mysite.verizon.net/vze108hzg/id1.html

1997 – Jonathan Greenberg

1996 – Gregory Freeman

1995 – Aaron Gelb

http://www.crcap.org/contact/

1994 – Jonathan Greenberg

A native of Brooklyn, New York Jonathan Greenberg enjoys a varied performing career as a freelance Bass Trombonist. Upon completing his trombone studies in New York, Mr. Greenberg was as a member of the Honolulu Symphony Orchestra, a position he left to return once again to New York. Mr. Greenberg has recently performed and recorded with the Manhattan Jazz Orchestra (Tour of Japan), with Keely Smith, Frank Sinatra Jr., and Toshiko Akiyoshi, among others, and is Bass trombonist with Mike Longo’s “New York Jazz Orchestra.

A founding member of the St. Luke’s Trombone Quartet, bass trombonist with Absolute Ensemble and frequent performer with Manhattan Brass, he has also performed with The Metropolitan Opera Orchestra and The Orchestra of St. Luke’s. Mr. Greenberg can also be seen in the orchestras of many Broadway musicals including Wicked, A Chorus Line and The Phantom of the Opera.

http://metropolisensemble.org/concerts/2008/remix/jgreenberg.php

1993 – Theodore Shapiro (composer)

From Wikipedia:

Shapiro was born in Washington, D.C. He is best known for his film scores, particularly for the comedies State and Main, 13 Going on 30, Along Came Polly, The Devil Wears Prada, Fun with Dick and Jane, Idiocracy, You, Me and Dupree, Wet Hot American Summer, Marley & Me, Tropic Thunder, the Jay Roach film Dinner for Schmucks and was one of the composers for Diary of a Wimpy Kid. He has also written other orchestral works.

www.theodore-shapiro.com

1992 – Catherine Cole (pianist)

On the faculty of Cleveland State University since 2004, Catherine Cole teaches undergraduate and graduate courses in music history and music appreciation. She received the Ph.D. from University of Chicago in musicology in 2003, the M.A. in ethnomusicology from University of Chicago in 1995, and the B.A. in music from Brown University in 1992. Her research specialty is in music from 1700–1900, with a focus on French opera, aesthetics, and social change during the late eighteenth century. Dr. Cole has presented her work at interdisciplinary and musicological conferences in the United States , Europe, and Canada . Most recently, she participated in the 2005 national conference of the American Musicological Society as part of the panels “Performance, Politics, and the Problem of ‘Italian Style’ in Old Regime France ” and “A Sense of Place: Music and Regional Environments, Musicology and Ecocriticism.” She has published an article in Studies on Voltaire and the Eighteenth Century. Recent support for her work has come from a Fulbright grant for research in Paris (2001–2) and a National Endowment for the Humanities summer stipend (2004). Before arriving in Cleveland , Dr. Cole was on the faculty of the University of Iowa .

http://www.csuohio.edu/class/music/facultyandstaff/bios/cole.html

1991 – Eric Hangen

Eric Hangen, AICP, brings over 12 years of community development and nonprofit experience to I². As a Management Consultant with the Neighborhood Reinvestment Corporation, Eric helped nonprofit corporations across the country develop neighborhood revitalization, strategic, and business plans. Major projects include creating an urban reinvestment strategy that has guided over $50 million of investments in Syracuse, NY, and directing the development of an innovative Home Equity Protection program that has received national acclaim in Forbes, The Wall Street Journal, and on NPR’s “Marketplace.” At Neighborhood Reinvestment, Eric also underwrote capital investments in real estate development projects and community loan funds, and served as a proposal reviewer for the CDFI (Community Development Financial Institution) Fund at the US Department of the Treasury.

Before coming to Neighborhood Reinvestment, Eric worked as the senior planning advisor for the city of Caguas, Puerto Rico, where he coordinated the development of a master plan and developed downtown and neighborhood revitalization plans. To help implement them he led the creation of three nonprofit organizations including a Community Development Financial Institution, a downtown development corporation, and a rural community association. He has also worked as a planner for the Puerto Rico Public Housing Administration, where he helped to manage a HOPE VI public housing revitalization project, and as a project manager in neighborhood economic development for the New York City Department of Business Services. Eric has a Master’s in Public Policy from Harvard University and a Bachelor’s in Environmental Studies from Brown University. He is a member of the American Institute of Certified Planners.

Eric serves as the Board President of the Aquaya Institute, an international nongovernmental organization conducting research and providing consulting services to reduce the incidence of water–related disease in the developing world. Eric is bilingual Spanish/English. He enjoys organic gardening, playing salsa and jazz piano, and spending time with his wife Heidie and daughter Iren.

http://www.i2community.org/bio.html

1990 – Gregory Dubinsky (music theorist/pianist)

1989 – William R. Katowitz (musician/composer)

1988 – Marco Beltrami (composer/film scorer)

On 01/09/2012 Marco replied:.

Though my concentration was in Urban Studies, my years at Brown were formative to my future career in music. The interdisciplinary approach gave me a context in which inspiration could blossom. The Madeira Prize gave me the freedom of time to take off from my job (I pruned trees to pay my expenses), and compose a string quartet (my first) for the resident ensemble and copy all the parts, in time to meet the deadline. I am grateful to have had this blessing.

Upon completing undergraduate study at Brown University, Marco Beltrami entered the Yale School of Music on a scholarship. His pursuit of music composition then lead him to Venice for a period of study with the Italian master, Luigi Nono and then finally to Los Angeles to undertake a fellowship with Academy Award–winning composer, Jerry Goldsmith. While learning the technical aspects of film scoring, Beltrami completed orchestral commissions for the Chicago Civic Orchestra, the Sao Paulo State Orchestra and the Oakland East Bay Symphony.

Shortly after arriving in Los Angeles, Marco landed Wes Craven’s Scream embarking on what would become the widely successful terror franchise. In his approach to scoring the film, he threw away conventional horror music clichés. Instead, he likened the film to a western and calling upon the influences of his idol Ennio Morricone went on to write one of the most unexpected and imaginative score in recent memory.

After Scream, Marco went on to write his critically acclaimed score for Guillermo De Toro’s Mimic, bringing him to the attention of the entire film music industry. This was the first of several collaborations with Del Toro, including Hellboy and Don’t Be Afraid of the Dark. Subsequently, his resume has expanded to include films ranging from epic drama to dark comedy, working with some of the most recognizable names in the industry such as Kathryn Bigelow, James Mangold, Robert Rodriguez, Luc Besson, David Goyer, Bertrand Tavernier, Alex Proyas, Jonathan Mostow, Roland Joffe, Len Wiseman, Jodie Foster, David E. Kelly and Tommy Lee Jones.

Marco has been nominated twice for Academy Awards for Best Score. First, for 3:10 to Yuma, starring Russell Crowe and Christian Bale, and shortly after for his score to 2010’s groundbreaking Best Picture, The Hurt Locker.

www.marcobeltrami.com

1987 – William Buchman (bassoonist)

Bill replied on 01/07/2012:

Thanks for your e–mail. It’s been a while since the words “Jean and Francis Madeira Award” tripped off my tongue! Your e–mail takes me back to a time when I could not even have dreamed of having the career I have enjoyed for the last 22 years. I was a physics major at Brown but had already decided by the end of my senior year that I would not be pursuing a career as a scientist. Receiving the Madeira Award was a meaningful endorsement of my desire to take a different path, and the guidance I received from the music faculty at Brown was immensely helpful in enabling me to gain admission to the best music schools. Within three years of my graduation from Brown I had won a full–time position in the Dallas Symphony Orchestra, and I’ve now been lucky to enjoy a nearly 20–year association with Chicago Symphony Orchestra, one of the finest ensembles of its kind in the world.

It’s wonderful that the foresight of the Madeiras and the continued generosity of the members of the Brown Club of Rhode Island can still give meaningful support and encouragement to undergraduate musicians at Brown. Thank you for the pleasant walk down memory lane!

William Buchman joined the Chicago Symphony Orchestra in 1992, after two seasons with the Dallas Symphony. In 1996, he was appointed to the position of assistant principal bassoon. He served as acting principal between November 1996 and August 1997 and for the CSO’s 2003–04 season.

Bill has performed and toured with the Chicago Chamber Musicians, Chicago Pro Musica and the Chicago Symphony Winds, has played chamber music with pianists Daniel Barenboim and Christoph Eschenbach, and appears regularly with Music of the Baroque. He made his debut as a soloist with the Chicago Symphony in February 2002, and was a soloist at the 1998 Mostly Mozart Festival at Lincoln Center. Bill has appeared at the Eastern Shore Chamber Music Festival in Maryland, the Grand Teton Music Festival in Wyoming and the St. Bart’s Music Festival in the Caribbean. He was awarded first prize in the 1990 Gillet Competition of the International Double Reed Society, and has performed at several IDRS conferences since then.

Bill is from Canton, Ohio, and earned a Bachelor of Science in physics magna cum laude with Honors from Brown University in 1987. With the support of a DAAD Fellowship, he continued his physics studies the following year at the Universität Fridericiana Karlsruhe in Germany. Upon returning to the United States, Bill studied bassoon performance at the Yale University School of Music with Arthur Weisberg and at the University of Southern California School of Music with Norman Herzberg, before winning a position in Dallas, where he was also on the faculty of the Meadows School at Southern Methodist University.

A member of the DePaul University School of Music faculty since 1997, Bill also coaches the bassoon section of the Civic Orchestra of Chicago and has presented master classes in Ohio, Michigan, Minnesota, North Carolina, Indiana, Brazil and China. He lives with his partner Lee Lichamer in Chicago’s Ravenswood neighborhood and is an avid bridge player and bread baker.

http://music.depaul.edu/FacultyAndStaff/B/wbuchman.asp

1986 – Alison Terbell (vocalist)

1985 – Norman Ryan (pianist, clarinetist, orchestral conductor)

Norman Ryan was born in Riverhead, New York. He earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in Music from Brown University where he studied piano, clarinet, and conducting. He holds Certificates in Film from New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts and in Italian language from Università di Siena. He previously held positions at the New York City Opera, The Public Theater, in the programming department of Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts, and, most recently, at G. Schirmer, Inc. where he was Creative Director. In his roles at G. Schirmer and now at Schott Music, he has worked with many of the world’s leading composers of contemporary music and opera and collaborated on projects with such distinguished opera companies as The Metropolitan Opera, San Francisco Opera, Los Angeles Opera, Minnesota Opera, Houston Grand Opera, Royal Opera House (Covent Garden), American Opera Projects and Opera Boston, among many others. He has served as a creative consultant to the Trisha Brown Dance Company, Lincoln Center, and American International Artists and as a contributing writer toStagebill and Playbill magazines. He serves on the board of directors of OPERA America, the American Music Center, Music Publishers’ Association (MPA), American Opera Projects (AOP), The Fort Greene Park Conservancy (Brooklyn), and was formerly on the Music Advisory Board for the Estate Project for Artists with AIDS. Norman Ryan joined Schott Music Corporation and European American Music Distributors LLC in January 2005.

www.eamdllc.com

1984 – Henry Pleas

Henry Pleas was born in Chicago, and educated in Chicago area schools. He attended Brown University, and at graduation, received the school’s Madeira Prize for Excellence in Music. After Brown, he continued music studies attending the University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign and later, Northwestern University where he received a Master of Music degree.

Mr. Pleas has appeared as leading tenor in many operatic productions, including work as soloist for Lyric Opera of Chicago, Opera Grand Rapids, Skylight Opera Theater and Chicago Opera Theater. His roles have included the title role in Tales of Hoffmann, Rodolfo in La Boheme, Tamino in the Magic Flute, and Turridu in Cavalleria Rusticana, and Don Jose in Carmen. In orchestral performance he has appeared as principle tenor soloist in the Beethoven Missa Solemnis, Mozart Requiem, Handel’s Messiah, Mendelssohn’s Elijah, Haydn’s Creation, Britten’s St. Nicholas, Stravinsky’s Pulcinella, Vaughan William’s Hodie and Adolphus Hailstork’s “Done Made my Vow”.

He lived for several years in Germany, working, improving his use of the German language and coming to understand a little better a culture that gave birth to a wealth of important poets, composers and great singers. His artistic focus of late has been on increased performance in the chamber format; To date he has performed such works as Schubert’s Winterreise, Liszt’s Petrarch Sonnets, and a good deal of the song repertoire from Benjamin Britten.

More information about Mr. Pleas and his work is available from his website www.henrypleas.com

http://www.myspace.com/henrypleas

1983 – Kathryn (Katy) Roth

Kathryn (Katy) Roth, a Rhode Island native, began her study of the baroque flute while earning a bachelor’s degree in music and Renaissance studies from Brown University. Katy’s playing has been praised in the Boston Globe for “rhythmic point and subtlety” and for “lovely, graceful turns of phrase.” She has performed widely throughout the Northeast and in Europe, working with such groups as Benefit Street, the Bach Vespers, the Dryden Ensemble, Foundling, the Publick Musick, Arcadia, and the Boston Camerata. Katy also has performed frequently with groups in Washington DC, among them, the Washington Bach Consort, Opera Lafayette, Modern Musick, and the Washington National Cathedral Orchestra. She has recorded for Naxos, Erato, Elektra Nonesuch, Northeastern and Musica Omnia.

Katy is a psychotherapist as well as a musician and holds a master’s degree in social work from Boston University. Katy has a strong interest in therapies which integrate work with mind and body and is trained in Sensorimotor Psychotherapy and EMDR as well as therapeutic applications of meditation. She maintains a private practice in Providence where she sees adults and college students.

1982 – Ellen Langer (cellist)

1981 – Micah D. Rubenstein (Composer/Educator)

Originally from Brooklyn, NY, Micah Rubenstein was an Associate Professor of Music for 14 years at Kenyon College in Gambier, Ohio, where he taught theory, composition, orchestration, History of Jazz, American Musical Theater and Holocaust Studies. While at Kenyon, he helped to found their American Studies program, and wrote music for the CBS News television series, American Originals. He created a weekly one-hour radio series called the Message In Music, which aired on Sirius Satellite Radio from 2005-2007, as well as dozens of terrestrial radio stations.

In 1984, he left academia to go into corporate education, working as an Instructional Designer first at Xcelerate Media, then Cardinal Health (where he conducted their 55-piece corporate orchestra), and today is a Senior Consultant at Cordis, a global leader in interventional cardiovascular medical devices. He still composes music!

Micah moved back to Providence in 2020, and currently serves on the board of the Brown Club of Rhode Island. The constant threads running throughout Micah’s varied career are service above self, and a desire to put positive messages out in the world that inspire people to live life more consciously.

Write to him at: micahdrubenstein@gmail.com