School of Music
2023-24 Awarded Amount: $11,120
Title: Something Old, Something New, Something Borrowed: New Musical Visions Of The Old Balkan Folk Songs
Vedrana Subotic, PhD (piano) and Paul Sherrill, PhD (music theory) were awarded the amount of $11,120 to commission renowned pianist and arranger Christopher O’Riley together with Subotic to create new and original transcriptions of traditional Balkan folk songs. Also, to engage engineer Michael Carnes to record and produce the new works. Due to Carnes' health concerns, Subotic contracted engineer Sergei Kvitko to complete the recording project.
Subotic, Sherrill, and O’Riley presented their project expertise in three lectures (O’Riley pre-recorded video lectures). These lectures took place on April 01 and April 08 during Dr. Sherill’s MUSC 3560 Form and Analysis; and, the School of Music Student Convocation on April 09.
All three lectures were recorded and will be uploaded to Dr. Subotic’s YouTube channel by the end of June 2024, along with Mr. O’Riley’s video lectures.
Additionally, Dr. Subotic discussed the creation of the newly commissioned works with the students in MUSC 4100/6100 (Career Development I) and MUSC 4101/6101 (Career Development II). Students registered for ten of Subotic's applied piano lessons courses were also directly engaged in direct-learning via this project.
Overall, approximately one hundred (100) students were directly impacted, with that number increasing once the commercial recording is released.
Subotic premiered the three commissioned works in various pairings during Dr. Sherill’s classes on April 01 and 08, and during the April 09 Student Convocation; as well as in her faculty recital in Libby Gardner Concert Hall on May 01, 2024 which was free and open to the public, as well as live-streamed.
Subotic completed the recordings of the three commissioned works on June 04 and 05.
The album is slated for Fall 2024 commercial release on Blue Griffin label.