Arts in Brief

University Symphony features guest Chinese pipa soloist

The University Symphony concert on Nov. 8 will feature a guest artist, Gao Hong, who plays the pipa, a Chinese stringed instrument with more than 2,000 years of history. The concert, under the baton of William LaRue Jones, will include one piece for unaccompanied pipa, the Concerto for Pipa and Strings by Tan Dun, and two orchestral pieces by Chinese composers, Tribal Dance of Yeo by Mao Yuen and Dance of Yi by Wang Huiran. The concert, which will be held at 8 p.m. in Clapp Recital Hall, is free and open to the public.



Writers’ Workshop director awarded Miller professorship

Frank Conroy, director of the University of Iowa Writers’ Workshop, has been appointed an F. Wendell Miller Professorship. Miller, for whom these professorships are named, died in 1995 and left the bulk of his estate to The University of Iowa and Iowa State University to encourage the advancement of academic endeavors.

Miller professorships have been designated in several UI departments. In the Writers’ Workshop, they provide opportunities to honor faculty members who have helped maintain the status of the workshop as the world’s pre-eminent creative writing program. Previous appointees to Miller professorships in the Writers’ Workshop were Jorie Graham and James Alan McPherson.



Theatre arts presents one-acts by new directing students

The Department of Theatre Arts will present a two-week New Directors Festival with performances at 8 p.m., Nov. 9-11 and Nov. 16-18 in Theatre B TB. Each week the festival will present a different pair of one-act plays selected by new directing students in the department.

The Nov. 9-11 performances will feature Charles Mee’s The Constitutional Convention: A Sequel directed by Liza Williams and Israel Horovitz’s Hopscotch directed by Andrew Golla. The Nov. 16-18 performances will feature Caryl Churchill’s Heart’s Decline directed by Kristin Horton and Franz Xavier Kroetz’s Michi’s Blood directed by Jeremy Wilhelm. Tickets will be $5 ($3 for UI students, seniors, and youth) at the door.



IWP readings wrap up

The final reading in a series featuring fall 2000 International Writing Program participants will be held at 5 p.m., Nov. 5 at Prairie Lights bookstore. The reading will feature fiction writer Yves-Emmanuel Dogbe from Togo and poet Hwang JiWoo from Korea, as well as Writers’ Workshop student Sarah McCann. The reading is free and open to the public.



Happy 100th, Satchmo

Jazz trumpet star Nicholas Payton and his band will mark the 100th anniversary of Louis Armstrong’s birth in the Armstrong Centennial Celebration at 8 p.m., Nov. 17 in Hancher Auditorium. For ticket information, contact Hancher Box Office at (33)5-1160.



Japanese Kotos

The Augustana Koto Ensemble from Augustana College will perform music from Japan at 2 p.m., Nov. 12 at the Museum of Art’s Elliot Gallery. The performance features the koto, a 13-string Japanese zither. Admission to the museum and the performance are free.



Dance Gala 2000 hits Hancher

The University of Iowa Dance Company will present New Directions: Dance Gala 2000, the UI dance department’s major performance event of the 2000-2001 season, at 8 p.m., Nov. 10 and 11 in Hancher Auditorium.

The program features works by various dance faculty members: Alan Sener’s "Teeth," set to aggressive urban-contemporary funk music; Jeffery Bullock’s "Without/love/sanctuary," a provocative contemporary choreography that challenges the "identity politics of gender and race" with music from Philip Glass and Edgare Varese; Basil Thompson’s "Bailero," a new duet set to music from the Chants d’Auvergne; dance department chair David Berkey’s "White mountain," a trio set to the music of Michael Nyman, who composed the music for the film The Piano; and Charlotte Adams’s "Big bucks for Lulu," set to music by Lidya Mendoza and California recording artist George Hawke.

For ticket information, contact Hancher Box Office at (33)5-1160.



Strike up the bands at Hancher

The 32nd annual Band Extravaganza, featuring the top bands from the School of Music, will be at 7:30 p.m., Nov. 14 and 15, in Hancher Auditorium.

One of the School of Music’s most popular events, the Band Extravaganza features three ensembles: the Hawkeye Marching Band, under director Kevin Kastens; the Johnson County Landmark jazz band, directed by John Rapson; and the Symphony Band, conducted by Myron Welch.

For ticket information, contact Hancher Box Office at (33)5-1160.



Chamber Orchestra and faculty in Appalachian Spring

The UI Chamber Orchestra will feature four faculty members in a performance of Aaron Copland’s popular Appalachian Spring, one of two works to be performed under the direction of William LaRue Jones at 3 p.m., Nov. 12 in Clapp Recital Hall. Featured faculty members will be Tadeu Coelho, flute, Maurita Murphy Mead, clarinet, Benjamin Coelho, bassoon, and Shari Rhoads, piano. The other piece will be Brahms’s Variations on a Theme of Joseph Haydn. The concert will be free and open to the public.



One-fourth of Maia Quartet steps out

Violinist Timothy Shiu will become the latest member of the Maia String Quartet to take a bow apart from the ensemble this fall when he presents a free concert with pianist Mansoon Han at 8 p.m., Nov. 6 in Clapp Recital Hall. The two will play Schubert’s Duo in A Major, Ravel’s Sonata for violin and piano, and Schumann’s Sonata No. 1 in A Minor. Unaccompanied, Shiu will play the Sonata No. 4 in E Minor by the great Belgian violinist Eugene Ysaye. The concert is free and open to the public.



La Fosse celebrates Bach

Violinist Leopold La Fosse will join the worldwide observance of the 250th anniversary of the death of J.S. Bach with two recitals of Bach’s sonatas for violin and keyboard, with pianist Rene Lecuona, at 8 p.m. Nov. 5 and 12 in Clapp Recital Hall. Some of the pieces are for violin and basso continuo, which implies the addition of a cello. For these performances, cellist Amos Yang of the Maia String Quartet will join La Fosse and Lecuona. The concerts are free and open to the public.



Women’s Chorale goes global

The Women’s Chorale from the School of Music will present Around the World in Sixty Minutes, a concert featuring music from many different countries and cultures, at 8 p.m., Nov.10 in Clapp Recital Hall. The program will include settings of folk songs from such far-flung cultures as French Canada, Ireland, Appalachia, Mexico, and Serbia. The concert is free and open to the public.



Kantorei to sample American music, both old and new

From the early settlers’ hymns and the first African-American spirituals to the latest work of UI faculty, American music will provide the program for Kantorei in their first concert of the 2000-2001 season at 8 p.m., Nov. 11 in Clapp Recital Hall. The premier vocal ensemble of the School of Music, Kantorei will perform under the leadership of Timothy Stalter. Mezzo-soprano Kathryn Eberle, a member of the faculty, will be a soloist. The concert, which will feature works by Leonard Bernstein, Aaron Copland, and UI faculty member David Gompper, is free and open to the public.



Prairie Lights readings feature poets, fiction writers, critics

Indiana University professor Murray Sperber will read from his new book Beer and Circus: How Big-Time College Sports is Crippling Undergraduate Education on Nov. 6.

Poet Sally Keith, a graduate of the Writers’ Workshop, will read from her collection Design on Nov. 7. The book, her first, won this year’s Colorado Prize for Poetry.

Chad and Elizabeth Oness will read from their work on Nov. 8. Elizabeth Oness will read from her debut collection of stories Articles of Faith, which won the 2000 Iowa Short Fiction Award. Chad Oness plans to read from his poetry collection Water Becomes Bone.

Dwight Allen, a graduate of the Writers’ Workshop, will read from his first novel The Green Suit at 8 p.m., Nov. 9 at Prairie Lights bookstore.

Mona Simpson will read from her new novel Off Keck Road on Nov. 10.

All readings begin at 8 p.m. at Prairie Lights bookstore, are free and open to the public, and will be broadcast on WSUI AM 910.



Bach at Berlin concert

Baroque flutist Mary Oleskiewicz and harpsichordist David Schulenberg will present Bach at Berlin, a concert featuring music composed for the court of King Frederick the Great of Prussia, at 1:30 p.m., Nov. 12 in the Senate Chamber OC. The featured work will be one of J.S. Bach’s last and most compelling works, the Trio Sonata from the Musical Offering. The concert is free.

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