Capitol Hill Arts Workshop (chaw) Launches Lecture Series October 27, 2007

The Board of the Capitol Hill Arts Workshop (CHAW) will debut the first in a series of lectures on the arts, Music and the Historical Imagination, presented by composer Robert Convery on Saturday, October 27th, 11:30 AM-1:00 PM at CHAW, 545 7th Street SE. Admission is $10 and reservations can be made by calling 202-547-6839. Space is limited.
Convery’s presentation is part of a musical celebration of CHAW’s 35th Anniversary Year which also includes “Where Every Voice Is Heard,” a community, concert on Sunday, October 28th, 6 PM, at the Capitol Hill Presbyterian Church (CHPC), 4th and Independence Avenue SE. Both CHAW and CHPC are within easy walking distance of the Eastern Market Metro. CHAW will wrap up the celebration of its 35th Anniversary Year with an Arts Ball, Friday, November 2, 2007, at St. Mark’s Episcopal Church.
Convery’s lecture, Music and the Historical Imagination, presents a dynamic and lively survey of western music’s language, its purposes and stylistic evolutions, citing key events, influences, composers and works which, through imagination and accomplishment, have led to the diverse musical languages of today. The interactive lecture will include examples of opera, cantata, oratorio, symphony, concerto, chamber music, song, piano, and choral music from works by Palestrina, Gesualdo, Monteverdi, Schutz, J.S. Bach, Mozart, Beethoven, Chopin, Brahms, Debussy, Wagner, Stravinsky, Vaughan Williams, and Bartok.
Robert Convery is among the handful of composers writing effectively for the voice today. His music is expressed in a distinctly personal voice of lyricism, rhythmic vitality, a keen harmonic sense, and transparent textures. Convery has written five one-act operas, twenty-seven cantatas, Mass for choir and orchestra, choral works of every description, twelve song cycles, and more than two hundred songs for voice and piano. Convery’s fifth opera, Clara, based on the life of Clara Schumann, was commissioned by the University of Maryland and was produced in 2004 at The Clarice Smith Performing Arts Center at Maryland. Convery’s song cycle, Five Settings of Robert Louis Stevenson, and a short comic opera, The Owl and the Nightingale, were premiered in February 2007 at Weill Recital Hall in New York City under the auspices of Center for Contemporary Opera.
Ingrid Catron, Chair of the CHAW Board’s Lecture Series, commented, “The Board of CHAW is delighted to initiate its lecture series by hosting Robert Convery. In the coming season, we will be offering lectures by distinguished experts in the fields of photography, visual arts, writing, and dance. The series is part of our mission of building community through the arts and it will make the arts accessible to an even wider audience than CHAW currently serves. The Board views the series as a unique opportunity to reflect on the various disciplines grounding the arts.”
For more information about Music and the Historical Imagination, “Where Every Voice is Heard,” and CHAW, click on www.chaw.org or call 202-547-6839.
The Capitol Hill Arts Workshop (CHAW) is a non-profit multi-disciplinary arts education facility whose mission is building community through the arts. CHAW offers a tuition assistance program. CHAW was recognized as a featured charity in the 2006-2007 Catalogue for Philanthropy. For more information, visit: www.chaw.org.

ROBERT CONVERY is among the handful of composers today writing effectively for the voice. His music is expressed in a distinctly personal voice of lyricism, rhythmic vitality, a keen harmonic sense, and transparent textures. Mr. Convery has written five one-act operas, twenty-seven cantatas, Mass for choir and orchestra, choral works of every description, twelve song cycles, and more than two hundred songs for voice and piano. In the non-vocal repertory he has written Variations and Fugue for large orchestra, Lyric Essay, Elegy for Strings, Organ Concerto, a string quartet, various chamber works and piano solo works. His operas have had performances with Spoleto Festival U.S.A., Festival Dei Due Mondi, Lake George Opera Festival, Glimmerglass Opera, Juilliard Opera Center, Eugene O’Neill Theater Center, and The Curtis Institute of Music Opera Theater where Mr. Convery’s one-act opera Pyramus and Thisbe was staged and conducted by Boris Goldovsky. Performances of other works have been with The Philadelphia Orchestra, Orchestra del Teatro Verdi di Trieste, Charleston Symphony Orchestra, Richmond Symphony, Musica Sacra and New York Festival of Song. His music has been broadcast on Voice of America, National Public Radio’s Performance Today, and numerous radio stations across the United States. Mr. Convery’s cantata Songs of Children received its Washington D.C. premiere in 1993 as part of the celebration of the opening of The United States Holocaust Museum. The cantata’s entire performance was filmed by ABC Television for inclusion in a documentary on the Holocaust Museum. Making Art, an award-winning documentary for PBS Television on the creation and performance of Mr. Convery’s Christmas cantata The Nativity of Our Lord, was produced in 1993. Mr. Convery’s fifth opera, Clara, based on the life of Clara Schumann, was commissioned by the University of Maryland and was produced in 2004 at The Clarice Smith Performing Arts Center. Mr. Convery’s song cycle, Five Settings of Robert Louis Stevenson, and a short comic opera, The Owl and the Nightingale, were premiered in February 2007 at Weill Recital Hall under the auspices of Center for Contemporary Opera. Mr. Convery is currently composing a program of five song sycles.

Robert Convery holds degrees from The Curtis Institute of Music, Westminster Choir College and The Juilliard School where he received his doctorate. He has studied composition with David Diamond, Richard Hundley, Vincent Persichetti and Ned Rorem. Mr. Convery has received commissioning grants from the National Endowment for the Arts, The Rockefeller Foundation, The Pew Charitable Trusts, Opera America, The New York State Council on the Arts, and The Reader’s Digest Fund. His awards include the Charles E. Ives Award from the American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters, Meet The Composer Awards, ASCAP Awards and The Samuel Barber Award. Mr. Convery has held artist residencies at YADDO and the Rockefeller Foundation’s Study Center in Bellagio, Italy. He has received composer residencies from many universities and colleges across the United States and given master classes on his songs at The Juilliard School and a seminar on words and music at Columbia University. Mr. Convery’s works are published with E.C. Schirmer Publishing, Boosey & Hawkes, Inc. earthsongs, and National Music Publishers. He is included in The New Grove Dictionary of Opera and The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians. Mr. Convery was born in 1954 in Wichita, KS, was raised in San Francisco, CA, and currently resides in New York City.

Official Website: http://www.chaw.org