September 28, 2010
Contact: Sara R. Leonard
Concert and Production Manager
413/542-2195

AMHERST, Mass. – On Sunday, Oct. 24, at 4 p.m. in Buckley Recital Hall in the Arms Music Center at Amherst College, the school’s Department of Music will present a concert of recent compositions by alumni Richard Beaudoin ’98, Gregory Brown ’98, Eric Wubbels ’01 and Pulitzer Prize-winner and Professor Emeritus Lew Spratlan honoring Spratlan’s career, mentorship and influence on the next generation of composers. The concert will be performed by the alumni composers, as well as Constantine Finehouse, piano, and Eliot Gattegno, alto saxophone. This event is open to the public at no charge; seating is by general admission.

Beaudoin, Brown and Wubbels, all of whom are former students of Spratlan’s, are currently serving as lecturers at Harvard University, Smith College and Amherst, respectively. As composers, their works have been performed throughout the U.S., Europe and Asia. Spratlan won the 2000 Pulitzer Prize in Music for his opera Life is a Dream. His Toccapsody, which will conclude the concert on Oct. 24, was premiered during Spratlan’s tour of Russia and Armenia as a guest of the Soviet Composers’ Union.

The Oct. 24 concert will include the following works: Beaudoin’s 2004 composition *Qui tollis* and the premiere of Étude d’un prelude IX – And they talked about Chopin again, both written for piano and performed by Constantine Finehouse; Brown’s  Studies 1 & 2 for Vibrabalneoäves, a composer-made electro-acousitc instrument, Sonatina No. 1 for Two Radio Stations and Small Aircraft, and an excerpt from Subduction; and Wubbels’ This is This is This is for alto saxophone and prepared piano, performed by the composer and Eliot Gattegno. The concert will conclude with Spratlan’s Toccapsody, performed by Eric Wubbels.

For more information, contact the Amherst College Concert Office at 413/542-2195 or concerts@amherst.edu.

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