NewsRelease

UNCG Professor Presents Original Music
 
GREENSBORO — Audience members will have the rare opportunity to hear original contemporary classical music on Monday, Oct. 28, at The University of North Carolina at Greensboro.

Eddie Bass, UNCG professor of composition, will present a collection of his work at 7:30 p.m. in the School of Music Recital Hall. He will also give a pre-concert talk about the evening’s program at 4 p.m. in Collins Lecture Hall.

The program will feature “Sonata for Clarinet and Piano,” “Five Songs,” “Sonata for Viola and Piano,” “Variations on a Shaped-Note Hymn” and “The Good Neighbor Rag.”

Tickets are available through the UNCG box office with locations in Aycock Auditorium and the School of Music or by calling (336) 334-4849, weekdays from noon to 5 p.m. Prices are $8 for adults, $5 for senior citizens and $3 for students.

Three-time Standard Award recipient from the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers, Bass is a composer who delves into a variety of musical genres and instrumentations. “Sonata for Clarinet and Piano” is a dissonant, cat-and-mouse romp between reed and string instruments. “Five Songs” presents the various moods of love by incorporating poetry, including a passage from “Romeo and Juliet” and Sir William Devanant’s “Jealousy.” In “Variations,” Bass pays tribute to hymns popular among rural white congregations in the South in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. The program will conclude with classic ragtime in “The Good Neighbor Rag.”

Performers in the concert will consist of UNCG music faculty, including Kelly Burke, clarinet; Andrew Willis, piano; Carla LeFevre, soprano; Scott Rawls, viola; and Market Street Brass. The brass quintet includes Edward Bach, trumpet; Jonathan Woodberry, trumpet; Jack Masarie, horn; Randy Kohlenberg, trombone; and Dennis AsKew, tuba.

In 1996, Bass was recognized with the Outstanding Teacher Award from the School of Music, where he teaches courses on Berlioz and Mahler. But when it comes to writing, he is often inspired by “whatever (he) heard last.” His compositions range from works for choir and piano to medieval carols for brass quintet and songs for oboe and keyboard synthesizer. “Pas de Quatre” took first prize in a composition contest by the International Trombone Association.

Bass’s music has been performed by the New York Brass Quintet. In addition, groups have taken his compositions to venues as far away as Russia, Great Britain, the Far East, and Canada, and throughout the United States.

Kerrie Thomas, a columnist for the Raleigh “Spectator,” wrote a glowing review of Bass’s work at the North Carolina Composer’s Alliance “HERE and NOW” concerts in 1987 - “attractive, witty and colorful.”

Bass was also praised by the Greensboro “News and Record” this past spring for his involvement in “The Old Turtle.”
An adept trumpeter, Bass has played with the UNCG faculty ensemble Market Street Bass, as well as with the Greensboro Symphony Orchestra and the Charleston (W.Va.) Symphony Orchestra.

After spending 38 years in higher education, Bass will retire at the end of the current academic year. He plans to devote his time to composition, travel, volunteer work and being a grandfather.
 
 

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