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By Jacob Stockinger
In late January of this year, Jess Anderson (below) — a longtime friend, devoted musician and respected music critic – died at 85.
The Ear promised then that when more was known or written, it would be posted on this blog.
That time has come.
Jess was a polymath, a Renaissance Man, as the comments below attest to time and again.
For the past several years, he suffered from advancing dementia and moved from his home of 56 years to an assisted living facility. He had contracted COVID-19, but died from a severe fall from which he never regained consciousness.
Jess did not write his own obituary and he had no family member to do it. So a close friend – Ed Wegert (below) – invited several of the people who knew Jess and worked with him, to co-author a collaborative obituary. We are all grateful to Ed for the effort the obituary took and for his caring for Jess in his final years.
In addition, the obituary has some wonderful, not-to-be-overlooked photos of Jess young and old, at home, with friends, sitting at the piano and at his custom-built harpsichord.
It appears in the March issue of Our Lives, a free statewide LGBTQ magazine that is distributed through grocery stores and other retail outlets as well as free subscriptions. Here is a link to the magazine’s home webpage for details about it: https://ourliveswisconsin.com.
That Jess was an exceptional and multi-talented person is obvious even from the distinguished names of the accomplished people who contributed to the obituary:
They include:
Chester Biscardi (below), who is an acclaimed prize-winning composer, UW-Madison graduate, composer and teacher of composition at Sarah Lawrence College.
John Harbison (below), the MacArthur “genius grant” recipient and Pulitzer Prize-winning composer who teaches at MIT and co-directs the nearby Token Creek Chamber Music Festival in the summer.
Rose Mary Harbison (below), who attended the UW-Madison with Jess and became a professional performing and teaching violinist who co-directs the Token Creek Chamber Music Festival.
Steve Miller (below), a close friend who became a bookmaker and is now a professor at the University of Alabama.
The Ear, who knew Jess over many decades, was also invited to contribute.
Feel free to leave your own thoughts about and memories of Jess in the comment section.
It also seems a fitting tribute to play the final chorus from The St. John Passion of Johann Sebastian Bach. You can hear it in the YouTube video below. It is, if memory serves me well, the same piece of sublime music that Jess played when he signed off from hosting his Sunday morning early music show for many years on WORT-FM 89.9.
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By Jacob Stockinger
The University of Wisconsin has posted the following announcement:
For the eighth consecutive year, the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s Mead Witter School of Music will present its annual Schubertiade — a special concert celebrating the music of Franz Schubert (below).
Traditionally these concerts have been held around the composer’s birthday. This year’s concert will in fact occur on his birthday — this Sunday, Jan. 31, at 3-4:30 p.m. CST. The pre-recorded premiere is at: https://youtu.be/7sshhKiFPAg
You can also use the link to prepare for the concert before or during the concert. You will find the program with song titles, the original German texts and English translation, and biographies of the performers by simply clicking on “SHOW MORE” on the YouTube website and follow the links to PDFs.
BECAUSE THERE ARE NO COPYRIGHT ISSUES, ACCORDING TO UW OFFICIALS, THE POST SHOULD BE UP AND AVAILABLE INDEFINITELY AFTER ITS PREMIERE.
As in past years, founders and performers Martha Fischer (below left), professor of piano and head of the collaborative piano program at UW-Madison, and her husband Bill Lutes (below right), an independent piano teacher, and UW emeritus artist-in-residence, will host the program.
These concerts have been presented in the sprit of the first Schubertiades (below, in a painting by Julius Schmid) that took place during the composer’s lifetime (1797-1828) in the homes of his friends and fellow artists, poets and fans.
These were social as well as musical occasions with Schubert himself presiding at the piano, giving his audience a chance to hear his latest songs, piano duets and chamber music, as well as pieces that had already become favorites.
This year’s Schubertiade will be different in response to the restrictions imposed by the Covid-19 pandemic. It will be an online look back — or Rückblick — at past concerts, with songs chosen from performances that have been preserved in the audio and video archive.
The featured performers will include faculty members, students and alumni from the Mead Witter School of Music, along with special guests.
In addition, pianists Fischer and Lutes will give a “new” performance recorded for this occasion of the great Fantasie in F minor for piano duet. (In the YouTube video at the bottom, you can hear that work, performed by Dutch brothers Lucas and Arthur Jussen and recorded live in Seoul, South Korea.)
The songs have been chosen to reflect themes that were not only relevant to Schubert and his circle, but also to all of us in the midst of this challenging time: hope for a brighter future; the need for connection with others; remembrance of happier times; and the consolation to be found in nature.
Schubert left a vast and precious legacy of beauty — an enormous output of music that he composed in his short lifetime.
In a sense, each time his music is performed and heard, it is a journey from the past to our own time, the sounds speaking to us today as vividly and consolingly as they did when they were created 200 years ago.
Performers
Martha Fischer and Bill Lutes, pianists
Alumni:
Jamie-Rose Guarrine, soprano (below, in a photo by Peter Konerko) Emily Birsan, soprano Michael Roemer, baritone Jennifer D’Agostino, soprano Daniel O’Dea, tenor Wesley Dunnagan, tenor Sarah Brailey (alumna and current DMA student) Sara Guttenberg
Guests:
Marie McManama, soprano Cheryl Bensman-Rowe, mezzo-soprano
Faculty:
Mimmi Fulmer, soprano Paul Rowe, baritone (below) Julia Rottmayer, soprano
Staff
David Alcorn, videographer, editor, etc. Katrin Talbot, images for audio only tracks
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By Jacob Stockinger
This coming week at the University of Wisconsin-Madison Mead Witter School of Music brings two FREE chamber music concerts of flute music and brass music.
On Monday night, Oct. 14, at 7 p.m. in the Collins Recital Hall in the new Hamel Music Center, 740 University Ave., located next to the new wing of the Chazen Museum of Art, guest artists flutist Elise Blatchford (below top) from the University of Memphis and pianist Jacob Coleman (below bottom) from the University of Kentucky will perform a FREE recital.
On Wednesday night, Oct. 16, at 7:30 p.m. in the Mead Witter Foundation Concert Hall of the new Hamel Music Center, the Wisconsin Brass Quintet (below) will give a FREE performance.
Members of the 2019-20 Wisconsin Brass Quintet are Jean Laurenz and Gilson Silva, trumpets; Daniel Grabois, horn; Mark Hetzler, trombone; and Tom Curry, tuba.
Please note: In fall 2019, Daniel Grabois will be on sabbatical. His replacement will beJeff Scott (below), hornist with the Grammy-nominated Imani Winds.Read about Jeff here.
The program of modern classics includes:
“Mini Overture” by Witold Lutoslawski (heard in the YouTube video at the bottom)
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By Jacob Stockinger
The Ear has received a long and detailed announcement about the upcoming second LunART Festival. Here is Part 1 with background and participants. Tomorrow will be Part 2 with more information about new music and a schedule of events.
The LunART Festival is back for its second season from this Wednesday, June 5, through Sunday, June 9, and will continue its mission of supporting, inspiring, promoting and celebrating women in the arts.
The 2019 season brings 10 events to eight venues in the Madison area, providing accessible, high-quality, engaging concerts and events with diverse programming from various arts fields.
The festival will showcase over 100 artists this season, including many familiar local artists and performers as well as guest artists hailing from Missouri to Texas, Minnesota to Florida and as far away as Peru.
LunART’s inaugural 2018 season was a success on numerous fronts. From showcasing a wide variety of artists and arts disciplines to building lasting relationships and collaborations, LunART has distinguished itself from other arts events in Madison.
Both artists and audiences have commented that the LunART atmosphere is one of camaraderie, love and acceptance. Festival directors Iva Ugrcic and Laura Medisky (below right and left, respectively) have set this season to come back even stronger, with expanded dates and more diverse programming.
Like last year, the three ticketed evening gala concerts are centered on classical chamber music. Other art forms — including contemporary and aerial dance, poetry, spoken word and visual arts — are interwoven throughout the programs to create a unique atmosphere for performers, artists and audiences.
This year’s Grammy-nominated composer-in-residence is flutist Valerie Coleman (below), a former member of Imani Winds, who was described as one of the “Top 35 Female Composers in Classical Music” by The Washington Post.
Coleman embodies LunART’s vision by challenging norms and being a strong advocate for diversity in the arts. Her rich compositional output infuses elements of jazz and African secular music into the Western classical tradition, creating a soundscape that honors both worlds. (In the YouTube video at the bottom, you can hear Valerie Coleman playing her own composition “Fanmi Imen” at the 2018 convention of the National Flute Association.)
Coleman’s music will be featured throughout the festival among the works of other remarkable women who shaped music history, from Baroque composer Barbara Strozzi to Romantic composer Clara Schumann to living composer Missy Mazzoli.
Drawing from Madison’s rich arts scene and community, LunART 2019 features local artists including: former Madison poet laureate Andrea Musher (below); actor and theater artist Deborah Hearst; choreographers and dancers Liz Sexe and Kimi Evelyn; and aerial dancer Linda DiRaimondo.
Also featured are musicians from arts organizations such as Madison Symphony Orchestra, Wisconsin Chamber Orchestra, Fresco Opera Theatre, Arbor Ensemble, Madison New Music Ensemble and Sound Out Loud Contemporary Music Collective. Under the direction of Edgewood College professor Kathleen Otterson, Madison’s only women’s choir ARTemis Ensemble returns in greater numbers and will present a work by LunART 2018 “From Page to Stage” alum Meg Huskin among others.
Visual art will have a stronger presence in the 2019 Festival. From May 11-July 7, Overture’s Playhouse Gallery will house “Women Against Hate United by Love,” a collaborative, traveling art exhibition and multi-step “anti-hate” campaign united against bigotry, intolerance and racism, created by J. Leigh Garcia (below), Rachael Griffin and Kelly Parks Snider.
A gallery reception on Wednesday, June 5, serves as LunART’s opening event, in which Snider will give a talk about the exhibit and her use of art to educate communities about targeted issues in the hopes of shaking up the status quo. This engaging and thought-provoking exhibit is meant to provide a meaningful and hopeful community experience for all who attend.
In collaboration with Studio 84 and ArtWorking, two nonprofit art studios specializing in the creative development of people with disabilities, the final Gala concert at First Unitarian Society of Madison, 900 University Bay Drive, on Saturday, June 8, will showcase 40 artworks. This exhibit will feature 20 women artists whose works will be displayed, flanking the Atrium Auditorium stage as well as in the lobby.
Tomorrow: New music to be premiered, comedy and the full schedule of events
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By Jacob Stockinger
The LunART Festival will be part of the Arts @ First Series when it performs “A Wintry Mix Chamber Music Collective” on this Saturday night, Feb. 23, at 7 p.m. at the First United Methodist Church, 203 Wisconsin Avenue.
The concert will features the Arbor Ensemble (below) and Black Marigold.
The LunART Festival is dedicated to promoting and celebrating women in the arts through public performances, exhibitions, workshops and interdisciplinary collaboration. After a very successful inaugural season, the second LunART festival will take place in Madison, from June 6 through June 9.
While the main focus of LunART is a summer festival, LunART also presents events throughout the year, such as this midwinter collaborative concert.
The Madison-based ensembles Arbor Ensemble and Black Marigold (below, in a photo by Vincent Fuh) will perform an array of works for strings, winds and piano from the past 100 years, showcasing both historically notable women composers and introducing less familiar female pioneers of today.
The Arbor Ensemble will premiere their newly commissioned “Trio Cerulean” by Cherise Leiter (below top), in addition to their arrangement of the Piano Trio for flute, viola and piano by Germaine Tailleferre (below bottom).
Arbor members Berlinda Lopez (flute), Marie Pauls (viola) and Stacy Fehr-Regehr (piano) seek to connect with audiences through their personal sound and colorful instrumentation. Their innovative programming highlights lesser known chamber works, and the group has developed a niche promoting music of women composers.
The highly regarded, award-winning Quintet for Wind Instruments of Grazyna Bacewicz (below top) will be performed by Black Marigold (below bottom), a dynamic wind quintet known for their captivating and energetic performances. Members are Iva Ugrcic (flute), Laura Medisky (oboe), Bethany Schultz (clarinet), Juliana Mesa (bassoon) and Kia Karlen (horn).
Advocates of new music and living composers, Black Marigold fosters fresh perceptions of new music by programming pieces that are equally enjoyable for performers and audiences.
The ensembles will collaborate by mixing members and instrumentation, rounding out the program with Duo for Oboe and Viola by Hilary Tann (below top); “Doppler Effect” for flute, clarinet and piano by Adrienne Albert; “D’un Matin de Printemps” (From A Morning in Spring) by Lili Boulanger; and the Quartet for Strings, Op. 89, by Amy Beach (below bottom). You can hear the piece by Lili Boulanger in the YouTube video at the bottom.
Guest artists Laura Mericle (violin), Shannon Farley (violin) and Samantha Sinai (cello) will join Arbor violist Marie Pauls for the performance of the Beach. The quartet was a featured ensemble at the inaugural season of the LunART Festival this past summer.
NOTE: The concert by guest artists flutist Cristina Ballatori and guitarist Jonathan Dotson has been CANCELED.
At 7:30 in Mills Hall, a concert and discussion of Eastern European string music will be given by Maria Pomianowska (below top) and Seth Parker Woods (below bottom in a photo by Michael Yu).
At 7:30 p.m. in Mills Hall, UW trombonist Mark Hetzler (below top, in a photo by Katrin Talbot) and UW collaborative pianist Martha Fischer (below bottom) will perform music from their latest CD on Summit Records “Themes and Meditations.” Featured composers include Sandro Fuga, Jan Bach, Anthony Plog, Anthony Barfield and Frank Bridge.
At 7 p.m. at Oakwood Village West, 6209 Mineral Point Road, in Madison’s far west side near West Towne Mall, the UW Wingra Wind Quintet will perform a free concert. Sorry, no words on composers or pieces on the program. Members are (below, from left, in a photo by Katrin Talbot) bassoonist Marc Vallon, flutist Timothy Hagen, clarinetist Alicia Lee, oboist Aaron Hill, and hornist Joanna Schulz.
FRIDAY
At 5 p.m. in Morphy Hall, the voice students of UW professor Mimmi Fulmer (below) will perform a “Rush Hour Recital” of classical and popular songs. Sorry, no word on composers or pieces on the program.
At 8 p.m. in Mills Hall, UW cellist Parry Karp (below left), who plays with the Pro Arte Quartet, will perform a recital with longtime partner pianist Eli Kalman (below right), who did his graduate studies at UW-Madison and now teaches at UW-Oshkosh.
The program features the “Romance for Violin and Piano” by Polish composer Karl Szymanowski as transcribed by Karp; the Cello Sonata No. 2 in F major by Johannes Brahms; and the Sonata for Cello and Piano by French composer Charles-Valentin Alkan. (You can hear the original setting of the Szymanowski Romance in the YouTube video at the bottom.)
Joseph Gascho will give the Fourth Annual Mark Rosa Harpsichord Recital at 7:30 p.m. this Saturday night, Feb. 24, in the Landmark Auditorium of the First Unitarian Society of Madison, 900 University Bay Drive.
Gascho (below), who won the Jurow International Harpsichord Competition in 2002, will perform works by Johann Sebastian Bach, Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach, Domenico Scarlatti and Jean-Philippe Rameau. (Except for the three-part “Ricercar” from J.S. Bach’s “The Musical Offering” — heard in the YouTube video at the bottom — no specific works have been mentioned.)
The featured instrument is the elegant 18th-century style French double-manual harpsichord made by Mark Rosa in Madison in 1979.
Admission is at the door: $20 for the genera public, $10 for seniors and students.
In 2014, Gascho joined the University of Michigan School of Music, Theatre and Dance in 2014 as an assistant professor. Gascho enjoys a multi-faceted career as a solo and collaborative keyboardist, conductor, teacher and recording producer.
Featuring his own transcriptions of Bach, Handel, and Charpentier, his recent debut solo recording was praised in the American Record Guide for “bristling with sparking articulation, subtle but highly effective rubato, and other kinds of musical timing, and an enviable understanding of the various national styles of 17th and 18th century harpsichord music.”
As a student of Webb Wiggins and Arthur Haas, he earned masters and doctoral degrees in harpsichord from the Peabody Conservatory and the University of Maryland, where he also studied orchestral conducting with James Ross.
Recent highlights include performing with the National Symphony at Carnegie Hall, the Mark Morris Dance Group and the Kennedy Center Opera Orchestra, and conducting Mozart’s “Idomeneo” for the Maryland Opera Studio. He has also conducted numerous operas from Monteverdi to Mozart for Opera Vivente.
At the Oberlin Conservatory’s Baroque Performance Institute, Gascho conducts the student orchestra, coaches chamber music, and teaches basso continuo. A strong proponent of technology in the arts, he has used computer-assisted techniques in opera productions, in a recent recording with the ensemble Harmonious Blacksmith and percussionist Glen Velez, and in his continuo classes.
For a while, the acclaimed FREE community outreach concert series Grace Presents had folded.
But now it is back.
Grace Presents’ new coordinator Yanzel Rivera, who is a graduate student at the UW-Madison Mead-Witter School of Music, has sent the following information to post:
“Grace Presents, which offers free monthly concerts on the Capitol Square, will feature the Vis-À-Vis duo (below) of violist Brandin Kreuder and pianist Craig Jordan.
“The one-hour concert, called “Clarke and Brahms” will take place this Saturday, Jan. 13, at noon at the Grace Episcopal Church, 116 West Washington Avenue, across from the Capitol Square.
The program features: Four Pieces by British composer Frank Bridge, (1879-1941); a Sonata by British composer Rebecca Clarke, (1886-1979, below top); “Un regard dans le vide” or ‘A Look Into the Void” (2017) by American composer Christian Messier (b. 1995, below bottom), who studies at Lawrence University in Appleton, Wisconsin; and the Sonata in F Minor by Johannes Brahms (1833-1897).
ABOUT THE PERFORMERS
“Duo Vis-À-Vis aims to bring engaging and explorative chamber music performances to communities across the country and share their love for musical collaboration and expression.
“The duo is comprised of violinist/violist Brandin Kreuder, and pianist, Craig Jordan. Brandin is a native of Burlington, Wisconsin, and a 2016 graduate of Lawrence University and Conservatory (below) who holds a B.A. in Studio Art and a B.M. in Violin Performance.
“Brandin is currently in his second year of his Master of Music degree studying viola with virtuoso violist Jodi Levitz at the Frost School of Music, University of Miami.
“Jordan, from Ames, Iowa, is a junior at the Lawrence Conservatory of Music pursuing his Bachelor of Music degree in Piano Performance under the teaching of Catherine Kautsky, with an emphasis on Collaborative Piano. He is currently studying this fall semester at the Conservatorium van Amsterdam in the Netherlands with Marta Liébana Martínez.
“Since its debut in spring 2016, duo Vis-A-Vis has performed three recital tours in Wisconsin, Iowa, Florida, Missouri, Colorado and Massachusetts. Their recent tour “Reminiscence” brought the duo to their widest variety of performance locations yet. One of these performances also served as the beginning of a new chamber music series hosted by the College Light Opera Company in Falmouth, Mass.
(You can hear Duo Vis-à-Vis (below) perform the Violin Sonata by Cesar Franck in the YouTube video at the bottom.)
ABOUT GRACE PRESENTS
Grace Presents features a diverse range of music, including everything from classical and folk to jazz and bluegrass. The performers include nationally recognized musicians and exceptional young talent from Madison and beyond.
The mission is to create a premier concert series that everyone in the Madison community can enjoy. Each month it welcomes a diverse audience to its concerts, including Madison residents, students, farmers’ market shoppers, tourists, and people who are homeless.
The organizers invite audiences to bring a lunch to enjoy inside the church during our concerts.
A celebrated historic landmark established in 1839, Grace Episcopal Church (below top and bottom) is the oldest church in Madison. Known for its grand Gothic architecture and distinctive red doors, the church features hand-carved woodwork, brilliant stained glass windows–including a Tiffany window–and a cathedral organ.
Grace Presents is supported in part by a grant from Dane Arts, the W. Jerome Frautschi Foundation, the Madison Arts Commission, with additional funds from the Wisconsin Arts Board.
The series also relies on donations from sponsors and free-will offerings at each concert.
At the end of each year for the past nine years, The Ear has named a Musician of the Year.
It can be an individual, a small group or a large ensemble. But it must be a local music-maker, not just a presenter.
In past years, The Ear named the mostly amateur Middleton Community Orchestra; the long-lived and thoroughly professional Pro Arte Quartet; the recently formed and always impressive Willy Street Chamber Players (below); and the veteran and always reliable summer chamber music group, the Bach Dancing and Dynamite Society.
He has also named retired UW-Madison professor and conductor James Smith; Madison Bach Musicians founder and director Trevor Stephenson; Madison Symphony Orchestra and Madison Opera conductor John DeMain (below, in a photo by Prasad); and UW collaborative pianist Martha Fischer.
If you want to check out those postings, you can use the blog page.
Just enter Musician of the Year in the search engine. Or go to the calendar and look it up by the date it appears, which is usually Dec. 30 or 31.
To be honest The Ear already has a nominee in mind for this year.
But it is not set in stone and definite yet. And he thought it would be informative and entertaining to open up the process and ask readers for their suggestions.
So if you have a name to nominate for Musician of the Year for 2017, please use the COMMENT section to leave the name of the recipient you propose and why they deserve the honor.
This fall, University Opera is taking a short break from strictly operatic offerings – in the spring it will stage Puccini’s “La Bohème” — as it turns to the music of Kurt Weill(1900-1950).
No ordinary medley, A KURT WEILL CABARET is an organized pastiche of 21 solos and ensembles from many diverse works by Kurt Weill (below, in a photo from the German Federal Archive), and will be presented at Music Hall on the UW-Madison campus at the foot of Bascom Hill.
(One of the most famous and popular Kurt Weill songs to be performed, “Alabama Song,” once covered by the rock band The Doors in the 1960s, can be heard performed by Lotte Lenya in the YouTube video at the bottom.)
Performances are this Friday, Oct. 27, at 7:30 p.m.; this coming Sunday, Oct. 29, at 3 p.m.; and next Tuesday night, Oct. 31, at 7:30 p.m.
University Opera director David Ronis (below, in a photo by Luke Delalio) will direct the show.
Chad Hutchinson (below), adjunct professor of orchestras, will conduct.
Musical preparation will be by UW-Madison collaborative pianist and vocal coach, Daniel Fung (below bottom).
Tickets are $25 for the general public; $20 for seniors; and $10 for UW students.
Here is a link to a full-length press release from the Mead Witter School of Music at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. It has information about the performers and the program as well as historical background about Kurt Weill and how to purchase tickets.
Here is a collaborative obituary for music critic, radio host, performer and gay pioneer Jess Anderson, who died in January at 85
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PLEASE HELP THE EAR. IF YOU LIKE A CERTAIN BLOG POST, SPREAD THE WORD. FORWARD A LINK TO IT OR, SHARE IT or TAG IT (not just “Like” it) ON FACEBOOK. Performers can use the extra exposure to draw potential audience members to an event. And you might even attract new readers and subscribers to the blog.
By Jacob Stockinger
In late January of this year, Jess Anderson (below) — a longtime friend, devoted musician and respected music critic – died at 85.
The Ear promised then that when more was known or written, it would be posted on this blog.
That time has come.
Jess was a polymath, a Renaissance Man, as the comments below attest to time and again.
For the past several years, he suffered from advancing dementia and moved from his home of 56 years to an assisted living facility. He had contracted COVID-19, but died from a severe fall from which he never regained consciousness.
Jess did not write his own obituary and he had no family member to do it. So a close friend – Ed Wegert (below) – invited several of the people who knew Jess and worked with him, to co-author a collaborative obituary. We are all grateful to Ed for the effort the obituary took and for his caring for Jess in his final years.
In addition, the obituary has some wonderful, not-to-be-overlooked photos of Jess young and old, at home, with friends, sitting at the piano and at his custom-built harpsichord.
It appears in the March issue of Our Lives, a free statewide LGBTQ magazine that is distributed through grocery stores and other retail outlets as well as free subscriptions. Here is a link to the magazine’s home webpage for details about it: https://ourliveswisconsin.com.
That Jess was an exceptional and multi-talented person is obvious even from the distinguished names of the accomplished people who contributed to the obituary:
They include:
Chester Biscardi (below), who is an acclaimed prize-winning composer, UW-Madison graduate, composer and teacher of composition at Sarah Lawrence College.
John Harbison (below), the MacArthur “genius grant” recipient and Pulitzer Prize-winning composer who teaches at MIT and co-directs the nearby Token Creek Chamber Music Festival in the summer.
Rose Mary Harbison (below), who attended the UW-Madison with Jess and became a professional performing and teaching violinist who co-directs the Token Creek Chamber Music Festival.
Steve Miller (below), a close friend who became a bookmaker and is now a professor at the University of Alabama.
The Ear, who knew Jess over many decades, was also invited to contribute.
Here is a link to the joint obituary in Our Lives magazine, a free LGBTQ periodical that you can find in local grocery store and other retail outlets: https://ourliveswisconsin.com/article/remembering-jess-anderson/?fbclid=IwAR027dzv2YqRUNlYF1cF6JyXnEcQxAwcprPYbtBQCs3rYt0Nu847W_xbjpk
Feel free to leave your own thoughts about and memories of Jess in the comment section.
It also seems a fitting tribute to play the final chorus from The St. John Passion of Johann Sebastian Bach. You can hear it in the YouTube video below. It is, if memory serves me well, the same piece of sublime music that Jess played when he signed off from hosting his Sunday morning early music show for many years on WORT-FM 89.9.
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