Chesebro adjudicates Masters Performance Recital

SPRING, 2012

Robert Chesebro was invited to adjudicate the Masters Performance Recital held in North Charleston in February. The event was sponsored by the South Carolina Band Directors Association. Clarinetist Richard Li, a Southside High School student of Chesebro’s, won first place in the Music Teachers National Association Senior Woodwind Competition held at Bob Jones University in November. Hugh Floyd taught in Arezzo, Italy, as part of the department’s study abroad program, made his conducting debut in New York City’s Carnegie Hall with the National Festival Chorus in March, and has been invited to deliver the commencement address for the University of Delaware School of Music and Theater. Under Floyd’s direction, the Furman Singers toured South Carolina, Alabama and Florida this spring, and will be traveling to Vienna, Salzburg and Prague during May to sing concert programs, including a Mass at St. Stephens Cathedral in Vienna. Anna Joiner was guest viola clinician in January for the South Carolina American String Teachers Association Workshop at the South Carolina Governor’s School. At February’s Gwinnett County Public School Ensemble Festival in Georgia, she was guest clinician and worked with more than 250 public school string students and teachers. Thomas Joiner completed a five-year cycle conducting the complete symphonies of Beethoven with the Hendersonville Symphony Orchestra, which he has served as music director & conductor for the past 14 years. On March 10, under Joiner’s baton, the HSO, Asheville Symphony Chorus and four soloists from North Carolina presented Beethoven’s Symphony No. 9 “Choral” at the Blue Ridge Community College Conference Center Hall in Hendersonville. Mark Kilstofte’s music continues to hit the West Coast. New Music Works (Santa Cruz) performed his “Ballistic Etude 3.1” and the Riverside Philharmonic Orchestra, under the direction of Tomasz Golka, presented “NewsFlash!” Closer to home, Charleston native Jade Simmons and Collide featured Kilstofte’s Sonata for alto saxophone and piano during her ARTech residency at the Ferst Center for the Arts at Georgia Tech. Matt Olson was selected to present a jazz master class in March at the North American Saxophone Alliance biennial conference, held at Arizona State University in Tempe. Olson also performed with his jazz quartet at the conference. At the Highland High School Jazz Festival in Arizona in March, Olson was an adjudicator. He also performed with the Arizona State University Jazz Ensemble and renowned jazz musicians Joe Lovano and John Fedhock. Olson served as a judge at the Western North Carolina Jazz Festival in Hickory in April and appeared with Johnny Mathis at the Peace Center in Greenville on April 7. Charles Tompkins performed a recital at St. Peter’s Episcopal Church in Charlotte, North Carolina, on the church’s new C.B. Fisk organ in February. St. Peter’s decision to purchase the Fisk organ was based primarily on a visit to Daniel Chapel to see Furman’s organ. Tompkins performed a recital at Notre Dame University in March and presented a master class for the Notre Dame undergraduate and graduate organ students. In a performance for the American Choral Directors Association regional convention in Winston-Salem, Tompkins accompanied the choir of First Baptist Church, Greenville in March. He also accompanied the Furman Singers on their spring tour.