AWARDS & RECOGNITION

Thanks to the generous support of donors, the Music Department grants three awards of special recognition. These awards are presented to deserving students to encourage their musical studies.

The Marion L. Ackley Music Award

This award is presented to a Principia College student in recognition of outstanding achievement in the study of music.

The Georgie Graham Ives Music Award

This award is presented to a Principia College music student in recognition of excellence in musical scholarship and performance.

Frances Van Der Meid Smith Music Award

This award is presented to that student who has done the most to stimulate interest in music on the campus during the current year either through performance or by leadership in group work.

Student Spotlight

Read the Principia Pilot's article here

The Principia College Music Department is pleased to congratulate Carson Landry, C'20, for having been awarded a Fulbright fellowship, announced by the US Department of State. He will study of carillon at the Royal Carillon School “Jef Denyn” in Mechelen, Belgium during academic year 2020-2021.

Landry is a Producer/Performer Music Studies major and has been active in carillon, voice, and organ during his tenure at Principia College. He was also selected to co-direct the College’s Public Affairs Conference (Spring 2020) and founded the Principia Carillon Guild to raise interest in the instrument. He writes, “I’m so grateful to have been introduced to the carillon at Principia, and to have my studies so generously supported by the Jean L. Rainwater Carillon Fund” which provides tuition-free lessons for study of carillon.

Principia’s carillon professor and recitalist, Carlo van Ulft, served as the primary mentor for Landry’s Fulbright research grant proposal. Van Ulft is carillonist of the Thomas Rees Memorial Carillon in Springfield, Illinois and Director of the North American Carillon School. A native of the Netherlands, he also taught at the Royal Carillon School in Belgium from 1984-1997. Van Ulft says, “Principia’s carillon program is a very unique opportunity for students to study and perform on this very rare musical instrument, the carillon . . . . With only six hundred total carillons in the world [Principia is] blessed to have one on campus to enhance the general outdoor campus atmosphere on a weekly basis, during Commencement and other college-wide celebrations."

Carillons originate in Europe in "The Low Lands" (Belgium and the Netherlands) and are usually found in high cathedral towers. Numerous carillons in that part of the world are centuries old and still play an important role in each city’s cultural life with their music. In the USA the majority of the carillons can be found in churches, parks/botanical gardens and on college campuses.

Principia’s close ties with the North American Carillon School (NACS), the only independent, nationally-recognized carillon institution in North America, gives students a special opportunity to receive internationally-recognized certification in carillon. Landry is working on the NACS performance diploma in preparation for his studies in Belgium.