Posted on Feb 21, 2008

Carly Aimi ’08 was in the audience at last year’s Commencement when it was announced that a scholarship was being established to honor the father of the speaker, ABC World News anchor Charles Gibson.

Now, just months from her own Commencement in June, Aimi has learned she is the first recipient of the new award.

“I feel honored to be awarded this scholarship,” said Aimi, an Anthropology major from Hartford, Vt. “I’m very grateful to Mr. Gibson for his generosity in helping me pursue my education at Union.”

Gibson worked with College officials to create the scholarship in memory of his father, Burdett Gibson, Union Class of 1923. The award will be given each year to a student in financial need.

In his Commencement remarks, Gibson told the graduating class: “…you have a Union education. It served my father well, and it will do the same for you.”

At Union, Aimi played ice hockey, participates in dance and choreography and is a member of Sigma Delta Tau sorority.

“I can remember the days of applying to college; the stress, the money, the unanswered applications,” she said. “Union not only answered these anxieties, but also gave me the chance to seize so many opportunities available on campus.”

After graduation, Aimi hopes to do humanitarian work in a developing country. Her senior thesis is titled “A Cross Cultural Perspective on Women’s Rights in Fiji and Mexico,” and she spent several weeks in December conducting research in cities and villages along the Mexican-American border.

“As a senior, I am getting ready to enter another transitional phase of my life,” Aimi said. “But I know with my experiences and education I have received at Union, I will be able to handle it.”

Posted on Feb 21, 2008

The final episode in the “30 Days Series” for the winter term airs Monday, Feb. 25 at 6:15 p.m. followed by a discussion at 7:45 p.m. in the Richmond Basement Lounge. “Minimum Wage” challenges Morgan Spurlock, and his fiancé, Alex, to survive for 30 days earning minimum wage.

Academy Award nominee and director of “Super Size Me,” Spurlock created the “30 Days Series” to address topics such as homophobia, religion and binge drinking and fosters frank discussions of cultural awareness, diversity and tolerance. Joe Martel ’08, a Mechanical Engineering major and West College head RA, was instrumental in bringing the program to campus last year.

The show will also be aired ahead of time on TVUC to enable more students to participate in the discussions, which are facilitated by faculty and Residence Hall Advisors (RAs).

More than 150 students and faculty have come together to watch and discuss seven different episodes during the last two terms. Additional episodes are slated for the spring.

The “Series” is sponsored by the Office of Residential Life. For more information, contact Martel at martelj@union.edu

Posted on Feb 20, 2008

Six-time Grammy Award-winning pianist Emanuel Ax will perform a classical repertoire of Beethoven and Schumann selections Friday, Feb. 29 at 8 p.m. in Memorial Chapel.

Ax is currently on a solo recital tour in Europe and North America that will take him to celebrated venues such as London’s Wigmore Hall, Amsterdam’s Concertgebouw and New York’s Carnegie Hall. In his third Concert Series performance, he will perform Beethoven’s Sonata in A Major, Op. 2, No. 2 and Sonata No. 23 in F minor, Op. 57, “Appassionata.” Selections from Schumann will include “Humoreske” in B-flat Major, Op. 20 and “Papillons,” Op. 2.

Born in Lvov, Poland, Emanuel Ax moved to Winnipeg, Canada with his family when he was a young boy where he studied at The Juilliard School through the Epstein Scholarship Program of the Boys Clubs of America. Ax captured public attention in 1974 when, at age 25, he won the first Arthur Rubinstein International Piano Competition in Tel Aviv. In 1975, he won the Michaels Award of Young Concert Artists and, four years later, took the coveted Avery Fisher Prize.

Recording exclusively for Sony Classical since 1987, Ax won Grammy Awards for his second and third volumes in the recording cycle of Haydn Piano Sonatas. Performing with Yo-Yo Ma, he’s won three Grammy Awards for the Beethoven and Brahms sonatas for cello and piano; the pair also teamed with Richard Stoltzman for a Grammy Award-winning album of clarinet trios.

A French major at Columbia University, Ax holds an honorary doctorate of music from Yale University. Last fall, he was inducted as a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts & Sciences. He resides in New York City with his wife, pianist Yoko Nozaki.

The concert is free for the Union College community, $25 for general admission and $10 for area students. For tickets, call (518) 388-6080; for more information on the Series, call (518) 372-3651 or visit http://www.union.edu/ConcertSeries.

Posted on Feb 20, 2008

Musicians from Marlboro – “the most exciting chamber music in the United States,” according to The New York Times – will return to Memorial Chapel Saturday, Feb. 23 at 8 p.m. in a program of by Beethoven, Bartók, Brahms and Mozart.

The ensemble will perform Irish, Welsh and Scottish folksong arrangements from Beethoven; Bartók’s String Quartet No. 4; Brahms’ Zwei Gesänge, Opus 91 for mezzo-soprano, viola and piano; and Mozart’s String Quintet in D major, K. 593.

This season marks the 42nd anniversary of the touring company, which originated as an extension of Vermont’s Marlboro Music Festival, which brings together leading musicians from throughout the world at Marlboro College in Vermont each summer.

Comprising the touring company this season are: Ieva Jokubaviciute, piano; Lily Francis and Yura Lee, violins; Eric Nowlin and Maiya Papach, violas; and Marcy Rosen, cello.

Appearing with the ensemble will be mezzo-soprano Tamara Mumford, who received her training at Utah State University and Yale before being invited to join the Lindemann Young Artist Development Program at the Metropolitan Opera in 2004. In 2005-06, she made her Carnegie Hall debut with pianist Richard Goode, Marlboro Festival’s artistic director. Mumford made her Metropolitan Opera debut that same season as Laura in “Luisa Miller” and among her many engagements, she’s scheduled to cover Orfeo in a new production of “Orfeo ed Euridice” at the Metropolitan.

The concert at Memorial Chapel is free for the Union College community, $20 for general admission and $8 for area students. For tickets, call ext. 6080; for more information, call (518) 372-3651 or visit http://www.union.edu/ConcertSeries. 

Posted on Feb 19, 2008

Using the music of British rock sensation Pink Floyd, more than 10 artist/creators and 40 performers will bring performance art to the Yulman Theatre next month with “Whirled in Flux,” the annual student winter dance concert. 

The Theater and Dance Department presentation is set for Thursday, March 6 and Friday, March 7, at 8 p.m., and Saturday, March 8, at 2 and 8 p.m.  

The show will combine dance, theater, live music, visual art, computer animation and other interactive art forms of the 20th century, with a focus on the 1960s through 1980s.

“This production intends to play with what can happen in a world in flux,” said Miryam Moutillet, dance program and concert director. “It’s really about the process. We want to show how artists in the ’60s, ’70s and ’80s developed new ways of thinking about art and how it can be presented.”

Pink Floyd was chosen, she said, “for its unique sound, meaningful lyrics and historical activism…. there was a message, they put thoughts in your mind; that was the point.”

Moutillet is working closely with Professor of French Charles Batson to give a sense of  the rebellious era that promoted political and social issues, conceptual ideas “and new ways of using the stage for a journey of challenge and defiance.”

As a performer, Moutillet worked in videos and films and toured one-woman shows. She collaborated with some of the most innovative and creative artists, including avant-garde theater company Carbone 14. She also co-founded La La La Human Steps, a Montreal-based, eccentric post-modern dance company.

“We pushed boundaries of traditional theater. We were passionate about doing new things,” she said.

“Whirled in Flux” will feature works by Marcus Rogers, choreographer and rehearsal director, and dance projects by Carly Aimi ’08, Theresa Foito ’08, Joseph Hunziker ’08, Sara Jacobson ’10, Alexandra Lindsay ’09, Jamie Luguri ’10 and Brittany Prescott ’08.

Tickets are on sale at the Yulman Theatre. The cost is $10 for general admission and $7 for Union faculty, staff and students (with Union College ID) as well as area seniors.

For more information, call the Box Office at 388-6545.