Hilary Tann, the John Howard Payne Professor of Music, will be a featured guest of the Harvard Festival of Women's Choirs Feb. 27 and 28.
Her composition, "That Jewel-Spirit," will be performed by the Radcliffe Choral Society, conducted by Jameson Marvin. The festival features 12 choirs singing in three concerts, and includes seminars for students, conductors, publishers and composers.
On Sunday, March 1, the Harvard University Choir will give the U.S. premiere performance of "Paradise," a setting of George Herbert's poem first performed by the internationally-known choir, Tenebrae, in June in Wales.
A new release from Beauport Classical called "Metamorphosis" features two of Professor Tann's instrumental compositions, "Like Lightnings" for oboe solo and "Kilvert's Hills" for bassoon solo. Tann's compositions have been selected for preview by NetMusicWorks (www.netmusicworks.com) and she is currently Composer of the Month on Welsh Music Information Center's Web site.
The College celebrated Founders Day Thursday by recounting its role during the abolitionist movement and honoring one of the campus’s notable historical figures.
Pulitzer Prize-winning author James M. McPherson delivered the keynote address. During the hour-long ceremony in Memorial Chapel, the College unveiled a portrait of Moses Viney, a runaway slave from Maryland who escaped to Schenectady on the Underground Railroad. Viney was a coachman, messenger and constant companion of longtime Union President Eliphalet Nott, who eventually secured his freedom.
Viney’s portrait was painted by Simmie Knox, a renowned African-American artist.
To read the Daily Gazette of Schenectady's story about the events, click here (registration may be required).
The newspaper also wrote a preview about Founders Day, focusing on the life of Viney. To read the story, click here.
Thursday, Feb. 26, 7 p.m. / Yulman Theater / Dada Café: An evening of selected DaDa readings, directed by Theater and Dance Dept. Director William Finlay, performed by the Studio Company; free and open to the public
Thursday, Feb. 26 – Sunday, Mar. 1 / Mandeville Gallery, Nott Memorial / 2009 High School Regional Juried Art Exhibition
Feb. 27, 5:30 p.m. / Beuth House / First Philanthropic Night in conjunction with the Union College Kenney Community Center; gathering funds to go towards building a memorial in Washington D.C. in commemoration of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Hors d’oeuvres, entertainment, raffles for art pieces, speakers and more. Semi-formal attire and an $8 donation recommended. For information and reservations, contact Juan Canales (canalesj@union.edu)
Friday, Feb. 27- Sunday, Mar. 1 / College Park Hall / The Office of the President and the History Department present: “The Underground Railroad: Its Legacies and Our Communities”; organized by the Underground Railroad History Project of the Capital Region Inc. Visit www.ugrworkshop.com
Friday, Feb. 27, 7 p.m. / Messa Rink at Achilles Center / Men’s hockey vs. St. Lawrence (ECAC contest)
Saturday, Feb. 28, 3 p.m. / Viniar Athletic Center / Liberty League Women’s Basketball Championship: Skidmore vs. Union and RPI vs. St. Lawrence
Saturday, Feb. 28, 7 p.m. / Messa Rink at Achilles Center / Men’s hockey vs. Clarkson (ECAC contest)
Sunday, March 1, 1-3 p.m. / Mandeville Gallery, Nott Memorial / 2009 High School Regional Juried Art Exhibition closing reception
Sunday, Mar. 1, 3 p.m. / Memorial Chapel / Union College and the Community Orchestra with conductor Victor Klimash in “Winter 2009: The Big Chill.” Featured will be “Fingal's Cave Overture” by Felix Mendelssohn, in celebration of the 200th anniversary of the composer's birth; two pieces by Frederick Delius, “On hearing the first cuckoo in Spring” and “Summer night on the river”; and Beethoven's “Symphony No. 8 in F Major”
Monday, Mar. 2, 5:30 p.m. / Nott Memorial / 2009 Wold Lecture of Religion and Conflict presents Jack Miles on “Religion and the International Relations in the Obama Administration: The Aftermath and the Anticipation”
Thursday, March 5, Friday, March 6 and Saturday, March 7, 8 p.m.; March 7 and March 8, 2 p.m. / The Yulman Theater / Winter Dance Concert, “The Theatre of Worlds: The Voyage”; tickets on sale now; call 388-6545
Thursday, March 5, 12:40-1:55 p.m. / Reamer Campus Center Room 301, Sadock Women’s and Gender Studies Lounge / “Feminisms for the 21st Century,” the Valerie J, Hoffman ’75 Lecture Series presents: “Ask a Mexican: Irony and the Queering of the Category ‘Latino/a’” with Cristina Beltran, professor of political science at Haverford College
Thursday, Mar. 5, 4:30 p.m. / Schaffer Library, Phi Beta Kappa Room /
Philosophy Speaker Series presents: Alvin Goldman of Rutgers University on “Can Reliabilism and Evidentialism be Friends?”
Portrait artist Simmie Knox, left, and President Stephen C. Ainlay with Knox's painting of Moses Viney, Founders Day convocation, Feb. 26, 2009
The College celebrated Founders Day Thursday by recounting its role during the abolitionist movement and honoring one of the campus’s notable historical figures.
Pulitzer Prize-winning author James M. McPherson, in the keynote address, said the real character of the College was established by its longtime president, Eliphalet Nott. Though he never affiliated with the organized anti-slavery movement, Nott held strong anti-slavery convictions.
McPherson cited Nott’s baccalaureate adress in 1811, in which he praised the British anti-slavery leaders who had abolished the African slave trade.
Their fame, Nott said, “I had rather inherit than Caesar’s.” McPherson noted that in the same speech, Nott, whose son and grandson were named after British abolitionists, predicted that “Africa will rise if there be any truth in God.”
James McPherson, author and George Henry Davis '86 Professor of American History Emeritus at Princeton University, gives the Founders Day Address, Feb. 26, 2009
McPherson, a Civil War historian and the George Henry Davis ’86 Professor of American History Emeritus at Princeton University, paid homage to the hundreds of students and alumni who fought in the war, including 61 who died, as proof of the “devotion that the nation might experience a new birth of freedom.
“It is a record of which this institution may be justly proud.”
During the hour-long ceremony in Memorial Chapel, the College unveiled a portrait of Moses Viney, a runaway slave from Maryland who escaped to Schenectady on the Underground Railroad. Viney was a coachman, messenger and constant companion of Nott, who eventually secured his freedom.
Viney’s portrait was painted by Simmie Knox, a renowned African-American artist who painted the official White House portraits of former President Bill Clinton and First Lady Hillary Rodham Clinton and other political and cultural figures.
Jared M. Gourrier '10 gives remarks on Moses Viney at Founders Day convocation, Feb. 26, 2009
President Stephen C. Ainlay praised Knox, who used a photograph from the College’s archives to complete the portrait. Borrowing the words of Jared Gourrier ’10, who spoke about Viney before the painting was uncovered, Ainlay told Knox he captured the “integrity, capability and intelligent humility” of one of the campus’s most central figures.”
Also at Founders Day, Daniel Frio, a history teacher at Wayland High School in Massachusetts, received the Gideon Hawley Teacher Recognition Award. Frio was nominated by Priscilla Wright ’12. The award is named for the 1809 graduate of Union who was New York state’s first superintendent of public education.
Daniel Frio, left, a teacher at Wayland (Mass.) High School, accepts the Gideon Hawley Teacher Recognition Award from Therese McCarty, vice president for academic affairs, as Priscilla Wright '12, who nominated Frio, looks on.
Seniors Adrienne Hart and Alexander Schlosberg received the Hollander Prize for Music. The pair provided a musical interlude, “All I Ask of You,” from “Phantom of the Opera.”
The Founders Day convocation is the first in a series of events to commemorate Union’s role in the abolitionist movement.
The College will host “The Underground Railroad, Its Legacies and Our Communities,” the eighth annual Underground Railroad History Conference, at College Park Hall Feb. 27-29.
In addition, a Schaffer Library exhibit, “Abolitionism and the Struggle for African-American Freedom: The Union College Experience,” chronicles the College’s involvement in the struggle for African-American freedom. It will include an 18th century sermon against the keeping of “negros” by Union College President Jonathan Edwards the Younger, photographs of Moses Viney, and copies of Union’s African-American student newspapers from the 1970s.
Founders Day convocation, Feb. 26, 2009
This exhibit will be on display through March 6.
Founders Day commemorates the 214th anniversary of the granting of the College’s charter from the New York State Board of Regents.
