College of Musical Arts 2023-2024 academic year in review
A Message from the Dean
The first band at BGSU was formed during the 1923-1924 academic year, with approximately 15 members led by a volunteer faculty member. One-hundred years later, BGSU Bands consists of 3 concert ensembles and the Falcon Marching Band, enrolling nearly 500 students from all majors across campus. We welcomed back 470 band alumni at Homecoming and another 130 alums this past April for the 100th Anniversary Gala Weekend to perform and celebrate a Century of Bands.
Like BGSU Bands, the College of Musical Arts has seen significant transitions and milestones this year. Five long-serving faculty announced their retirement this year, with 151 combined years of service to the CMA and BGSU – extraordinary! Five new faculty will join the CMA next fall and bring new energy, experience, and ideas for the future of the college (see their stories below). Graduation and enrollment rates have returned to pre-pandemic levels, and we are excited to welcome a new class of undergraduate and graduate students in the fall. The college’s combined mixed choirs presented a moving performance of Mozart’s Requiem with the Toledo Symphony, and the Collegiate Chorale and Percussion Ensemble travel to Spain this summer for touring and festival appearances.
We celebrate the achievements of our alumni and friends, whose contributions to the world of music continue to make us proud. In December, alumnus Lt. Col. Ryan Nowlin (’00, ’04) was installed as the Director of the President’s Own United State Marine Band and was awarded an Honorary Doctorate from BGSU at graduation in April.
As we look forward to the coming year, we remain committed to fostering a vibrant and inclusive community where creativity and innovation can thrive. We are deeply grateful for the support of our donors and partners, whose generosity make a difference in the lives of students and the CMA.
Thank you for being a part of our journey this past year. Please enjoy this review of the sights and sounds 2023-2024 in the College of Musical Arts.
Warmest regards,
William Mathis
Dean, College of Musical Arts
Welcoming New Faculty for the 2023/24 Academic Year!
Originally from Bangkok, Piyawat Louilarpprasert is a Thai composer/artist who works interweave of composition, visual art and technology. Piyawat has been awarded commissions and prizes including Fromm Foundation Commission, Harvard University (USA), Hellerau Europäisches Zentrum der Künste Commission (Germany), Impuls Composer Commission 2025 (Graz), International Coproduction Fund (IKF)—Goethe Institut, ISCM/Asian Composer League Prize 2022 (New Zealand), and more. In 2019, his “Smelly Tubes” was featured in CNN News World: “Young and Gifted”. His recent work, “Ohm-Na-Mo” was commissioned by Donaueschinger Musiktage for 100 years celebration in 2021.
Piyawat’s music explores possibilities of creating the amalgamation of sonic and visual arts, including integrating multimedia and music, deconstructing instruments’ s mechanism and physicality with sound production method, and involving Thai traditional music elements in new compositions. Louilarpprasert’s compositions have been performed more than 20 countries in Asia, Europe and United States. His music has drawn attention in numerous music festivals such as Darmstadt New Music Festival (Germany), Lucerne Festival (Switzerland), MUSIIKIN AIKA – Time of Music (Finland), and more.
Piyawat Louilarpprasert holds a DMA in composition from Cornell University where he was awarded the Don Michael Randel Research Fellowship to conduct his new music course: P.I.Y. (Perform it Yourself) as well as degrees from Royal College of Music (M.M.), London and College of Music, Mahidol University (B.M.), Bangkok. Piyawat was previously a faculty member at Cornell University and Ithaca College.
Violist Hannah Levinson is an in-demand performer of contemporary and classical music. She has recently been featured as a soloist and chamber musician at Carnegie Hall, The Stone, 92Y, Miller Theater, Willamette Valley Chamber Music Festival, June in Buffalo, and the Andy Warhol Museum, and at international festivals including the Kroch Festival (Stockholm), Musikprotokol Festival (Graz), Projektgruppe Neue Musik (Bremen), and Festival Musica (Strasbourg). Dedicated to working with living composers, Hannah has commissioned and premiered over 40 chamber and solo works.
Hannah is a founding member and Executive Director of the violin/viola duo andPlay, described by I Care If You Listen as “enthusiastic champions for new music and collaboration.” andPlay’s most recent album, Translucent Harmonies (2023), was released in September 2023 on the UK-label, Another Timbre. Featuring works by Catherine Lamb and Kristofer Svensson, the album was included on Bandcamp’s “Best Contemporary Classical: September 2023” and Steve Smith’s “2023, for the record.”
Committed to both contemporary and classical repertoire, Hannah is also a member of the Talea Ensemble (“a crucial part of the New York cultural ecosphere” New York Times), Fair Trade Trio, and the Albany Symphony Orchestra, and a former member of the Pittsburgh Opera Orchestra. She frequently performs with NYC ensembles including the International Contemporary Ensemble, either/or, counter)induction, Heartbeat Opera, Cantata Profana, Contemporaneous, and The Rhythm Method Quartet.
A strong believer in sharing her artistic practice with her local community, Hannah is committed to audience engagement events through “andPlay (in) conversation,” a free series in Upper Manhattan that provides opportunities for audiences to look inside the collaborative process of creating music, and through performances with organizations including “Music for Autism.”
Before her appointment at BGSU, Hannah was Music Artist Faculty at NYU Steinhardt and at the Manhattan School of Music Precollege. She earned her degrees at Oberlin College and Conservatory (BM in Viola Performance, BA in Russian East European Studies), Manhattan School of Music (MM in Contemporary Performance), and NYU Steinhardt (PhD in Performance). Her primary teachers include Karen Ritscher, Martha Strongin Katz, and Nadia Sirota. Her research explores how interactions between composers and political structures affect the creation of new music.
Katherine Pracht Phares, mezzo-soprano, comes to BGSU with twenty years of professional singing experience in opera, recital, and oratorio performances. She champions contemporary opera and much of her recent professional activity is in this genre. Katy is currently a student in the DMA in Contemporary Music program at BGSU.
The 2022-23 season featured several premieres for the busy mezzo. Pracht performed Madeleine in Jake Heggie’s Three Decembers with Opera on the Avalon, returned to West Edge Opera for her first Cornelia in Giulio Cesare, and workshopped two new operas, Bulrusher, and Laura Kaminsky’s February. She then debuted Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony with the Quad-City Symphony, as well as the role of Mary Johnson in Virginia Opera’s production of Fellow Travelers. In October, Pracht creates the role of Helen in Kaminsky’s next world premiere opera February at Opera on the Avalon in St. John's, Newfoundland; and she looks forward to another exciting announcement coming soon!
2021 engagements included a world premiere and cast recording as Horatio in Joseph Summer’s Hamlet at the Dohodno Zdanie Theater in Ruse, Bulgaria, and a reprisal of the title role in Kevin Puts’ opera, Elizabeth Cree with West Edge Opera. Katy also won outstanding reviews as Miss Jessel in Britten’s The Turn of the Screw with IlluminArts in Miami. The 2019 season also had important role debuts: Charlotte in A Little Night Music with Madison Opera, Ottavia in L'incoronazione di Poppea with Florentine Opera, Kate Julian in Britten’s rarely heard Owen Wingrave with Little Opera Theatre of NY, Duruflé’s Requiem with the Washington Chorus, and Prokofiev’s The Love for Three Oranges with Opera Philadelphia.
Other recent credits are Glenda (cover) in We Shall Not Be Moved with Opera Philadelphia; Philip Glass' Symphony No. 5 for Trinity Wall Street; Lady Wang in Bright Sheng’s Dream of the Red Chamber in Changsha, Beijing, and Wuhan, China; Prokofiev’s Alexander Nevsky with York Symphony; and her premiere as Elizabeth Cree with Chicago Opera Theater, where the Chicago Tribune said “Katherine Pracht brought a mezzo of size and quality, and confident dramatic presence, to the complicated title role.”
Ms. Pracht appeared as Mariam in the AOP-sponsored workshop of Sheila Silver’s opera, A Thousand Splendid Suns, sang A Bernstein Marathon and Arias & Barcarolles with Steven Blier and Michael Barrett (New York Festival of Song) at the Lyric Opera of Kansas City’ Karl Jenkins’ The Armed Man and the world premiere of Sing! The Music Was Given at Carnegie Hall, and Stravinsky’s Requiem Canticles with The Orchestra NOW at the Bard Festival under the baton of Leon Botstein. She returned to that Bard Festival in Rimsky-Korsakov’s From Homer with the American Symphony Orchestra, and as Dunyasha in The Tsar’s Bride. Katy performed Bernstein’s Arias and Barcarolles with Bright Sheng and Michael Barrett for The Intimacy of Creativity 2017 Festival in Hong Kong. Her Kennedy Center debut was as Mezzo soloist in Philip Glass' Symphony No. 5 with the Washington Chorus.
Katy has performed and workshopped many roles in new works: Florence Williams in Susan Kander’s The News From Poems, Hester Prynne in Eric Sawyer's The Scarlet Professor; Eve in Julian Wachner and Cerise Jacobs’ Rev 23 for the Prototype Festival, Sharon Falconer in Elmer Gantry with Florentine Opera and Ariel in the world premiere of Joseph Summer’s The Tempest for The Shakespeare Concerts in Boston recorded by Albany Records. In concert she sang Mahler’s Das Lied von der Erde with the York Symphony, and Lieberson’s Neruda Songs with Grand Rapids Symphony. Pracht made her Carnegie Hall debut as Alto Soloist in Verdi's Requiem, her debut with Opera Philadelphia as Third Lady in Die Zauberflöte, twice sang Der Trommler in Der Kaiser von Atlantis for Central City Opera with the Colorado Symphony and for Chicago’s New Millennium Orchestra, sang Meg in Little Women directed by David Gately for Opera on the James, and two concerts with the Georgia Symphony Orchestra and Chorus singing John Corigliano’s Fern Hill and Prokofiev’s Alexander Nevsky.
Before his appointment as Associate Professor of oboe, Dwight Parry had been the principal oboist of the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra since his appointment in 2007. Previously, he held the same position with the San Diego Symphony and was a Fellow with the New World Symphony. He has performed as guest principal oboist with groups including the New York Philharmonic, the Chicago Symphony, the San Francisco Symphony, the Atlanta Symphony, the Korean Broadcasting Symphony, the Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra and the Deutsches Symphonie of Berlin. Originally from coastal Southern California, he found his passion for music studying piano, voice, and jazz saxophone. It was not until late in high school, however, that he began playing the oboe, taking lessons from Joel Timm, and truly found his calling. He received his Master's Degree from the Cleveland Institute of Music with John Mack and his Bachelor's Degree from the University of Southern California with Allan Vogel and David Weiss, a gentleman who also taught him to surf!
Mr. Parry performs and teaches internationally in concertos, recitals, masterclasses, and chamber music. Past appearances have featured the works of Mozart, Goossens, Haydn, Bach, Strauss, Vivaldi, Albinoni, Barber, Francaix and Marcello.
Mr. Parry was Adjunct Assistant Professor of Oboe at the Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music. Additionally, he has served as interim faculty or guest lecturer at the University of Michigan, Ohio University, and the University of Nevada, Las Vegas. He also teaches privately and gives masterclasses at schools and festivals throughout the year. His summer activities include faculty positions at the Interlochen Academy for the Arts and the Stellenbosch Festival in South Africa. He was a judge and featured performer in the 2018 Sony International Oboe Competition held in Tokyo, Japan.
When not performing, you'll often find Mr. Parry in the audience for concerts and shows, including broadway, jazz, and bluegrass as well as opera and symphony performances. He spends the rest of his time hiking, running, volunteering, tossing frisbees, reading and creating curiosities in the kitchen.
Mr. Parry is a Loreé Artist.
Event Highlights
Faculty Highlights
Student Highlights
Alumni Highlights
CONGRATULATIONS GRADUATES!
Spring 2024 class of undergraduate music students
Spring 2024 class of graduate music students
Congratulations Retiring Faculty and Staff!!!
At the end of the spring semester, we celebrated the retirement of five fabulous faculty members: Dr. Penny Thompson Kruse, Dr. Mark Munson, Dr. Bruce Moss, Dr. Mary Natvig, and Professor Myra Merritt. Thank you all for your service to the university, the College of Musical Arts, and BGSU students. We are very grateful for you, and we wish you the best of luck in this new chapter!
From left to right: Dr. Penny Thompson Kruse, Dr. Mark Munson, Dr. Bruce Moss, Dr. Mary Natvig, Professor Myra Merritt
On July 1st Norine McElroy, our wonderful Administrative Sr. Secretary, will be retiring. We are so grateful for Norine's service and dedication to our CMA faculty, staff, and students. Thank you, Norine, for all you do, and best of luck in this new chapter. We will miss you!
Welcoming New Faculty for the 2024/25 Academic Year!
Soprano Sarah Luebke has appeared on opera, musical theater, and concert stages throughout the United States. This spring she made her Carnegie Hall debut singing Vivaldi’s Magnificat and Martini's Domine, Ad Adjuvandum Me Festina with Mid-America Productions in 2023. She recently appeared in Sibelius’ The Tempest with the Buffalo Philharmonic Orchestra and Irish Classical Theater Company under JoAnn Falletta.
A trail-blazing interpreter of 21st century vocal repertoire, she recently performed for composer Chen Yi at her residency at the Chautauqua Institution, appeared in the Buffalo Philharmonic Chorus’ presentation of James Whitbourn’s Annelies, and has worked directly with Missy Mazzoli and Benjamin Moore as Isabelle Eberhardt in Songs from the Uproar and Masha in Enemies: A Love Story.
Stage roles include Yum-Yum (Mikado), Rose Maybud (Ruddigore), La Fée (Cendrillon), Fiordiligi (Così fan tutte), Lauretta (Gianni Schicchi), Najade (Ariadne auf Naxos), Monica (The Medium), Serpina (La Serva Padrona), Nora (Riders to the Sea), Nella (Gianni Schicchi), Lucinda (Into the Woods), and Jane McDowell (The Stephen Foster Story). Dr. Luebke was as a young artist with Twin Cities’ Opera Guild and the Janiec Opera Company at the Brevard Music Festival.
Dr. Luebke’s concert work includes Fauré’s Requiem with Western New York Chamber Orchestra, Handel’s Messiah with the Buffalo Philharmonic Orchestra and Chorus, and Brahms’ Requiem with the Rochester Oratorio Society and Houghton College. She performs chamber work and recitals throughout Western New York. Her recital, Maîtresse du chant: Songs of Pauline Viardot, was nominated for the 2023 Eastman School of Music Lecture Recital Prize.
Recognized for her studio teaching, Dr. Luebke was selected for the distinguished 2022 NATS Intern Program, where she was awarded the 2022 NATS Mario Martinez Intern Prize as the most outstanding teacher in the program. She was also awarded the 2020 Teaching Assistant Prize at the Eastman School of Music. Many of her students have been named winners and finalists in the National Classical Singer Competition, the Schubert Club Competition, and state, regional and national NATS Competitions, including the first-place winner of the 2014 National NATS. Her students have been accepted into top music schools and performance programs, including The Juilliard School, Eastman School of Music, Interlochen Summer Music Program, and the Brevard Music Festival.
Dr. Luebke received the DMA in vocal performance, with a concentration in vocal pedagogy, from the Eastman School of Music. She completed her MM in vocal performance at the University of Kentury, and the BM in vocal performance with a minor in French at St. Olaf College.
Laura K. Hicken comes to us from Towson University (Towson, MD), where she taught undergraduate music education courses and graduate research courses. Hicken earned her Ph.D. in Music and Human Learning at the Butler School of Music at The University of Texas at Austin, her Master of Music degree in Music Education at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro, and her Bachelor of Music Education degree at Furman University in Greenville, South Carolina. Prior to joining the faculty at Towson, Hicken taught high school and middle school band, middle school general music, and elementary music in South Carolina and Florida.
As an active clinician, Hicken has presented sessions at state and national teacher in-service conferences and at professional development meetings for local school districts. Hicken’s research is in the area of music teacher cognition. She is especially interested in how eye movements reveal information about teacher thought processes and decision making in various teaching situations. Hicken is also interested in teacher perceptions and practices of including students with disabilities in music classes. Her research has been presented at state, national, and international conferences, and is published in The Orff Echo, The Journal of Music Teacher Education, and The Journal of Research in Music Education.
Hicken’s professional memberships include the International Society for Music Education (ISME), The National Association for Music Education (NAfME), Maryland Music Educators Association, the Society for Research in Music Education, and the Society for Music Teacher Education.
Dr. Jeremy Marks started his position as Assistant Professor of Trombone at UNC Charlotte in the fall of 2018. Prior to that appointment, he held faculty positions at the University of Louisiana at Monroe, Southeastern Oklahoma State University, Blinn College (TX), and was the Teaching Assistant for the trombone studio at The University of Texas at Austin. His students have participated in summer programs such as the Rafael Mendez Brass Institute and the Bar Harbor Brass Camp.
He has served the International Trombone Association as the Web Assistant and the state representative for Louisiana's chapter of T.A.P.A.S. (Trombone Artists Performing for Amateurs and Students), an education initiative by the International Trombone Association. In addition to teaching, he has been published in the International Trombone Association Journal and presented his research interest on bass trumpet at several conferences and festivals.
Dr. Marks was the 2nd trombonist with Opera Carolina and the North Carolina Brass Band, bass trombonist of the Asheville Symphony Orchestra, and interim principal trombonist with the Western Piedmont Symphony Orchestra. In addition, he has performed with several other symphony orchestras, including Charlotte, Virginia, Baton Rouge, Austin (TX), and Canton (OH). His doubling credits on bass trombone, bass trumpet, and euphonium can be heard on the Naxos, Mark Customs, Arcadia, and Longhorn record labels. He is a member of the 2013 International Trombone Association Quartet Competition winner, Northside Trombone Quartet. Other performing credits include several regional, national, and international venues, such as the 2018 and 2019 International Trombone Festivals and the 2017 International Women’s Brass Conference.
He holds memberships with the International Trombone Association, International Tuba and Euphonium Association, and Phi Mu Alpha Sinfonia. He is an S.E. Shires Trombone Artist and exclusively performs on Greg Black mouthpieces.
Dr. Marks’s primary teaching influences include Dr. Nathaniel Brickens, Dr. Steve Wolfinbarger, Dr. William Mathis, Garth Simmons, and Charles Villarrubia. He earned his Doctor of Musical Arts degree from The University of Texas at Austin, Master of Music from Western Michigan University, and Bachelor of Music from Bowling Green State University.
Violinist Benjamin Hoffman has been heard across Asia, Europe, North America, Australia, and New Zealand as a soloist, chamber musician and orchestral leader.
He has concertized with artists such as Ani Kavafian, David Shifrin, Peter Frankl, Wolfram Christ, Jorja Fleezanis, John Adams, and Gary Hoffman at festivals such as Yellow Barn, Chamber Music Northwest, Aspen, the Ojai Music Festival, and Music Academy of the West. Benjamin has performed in many of the premier halls of the world, including Carnegie Hall, the Wiener Konzertverein, the Berlin Philharmonie, the Seoul Arts Center, and the National Centre for the Performing Arts in Beijing. He has also had the honor of performing before former UN Secretary Ban Ki Moon as a member of Sejong Soloists at the United Nations in New York.
Mr. Hoffman is an enthusiastic concertmaster and has led much of the symphonic repertoire both with and without conductor. He has also been a guest musician with the New York Philharmonic, the Baltimore Symphony, and the San Diego Symphony.
He performs frequently with pianist Irene Kim as the BrightFeather Duo (brightfeatherduo.com). As a soloist, Benjamin's repertoire spans from the solo violin works of Bach to romantic concertos and contemporary premieres.
Mr. Hoffman holds degrees from the Yale School of Music and Indiana University, where his principal mentors were Ani Kavafian and Alexander Kerr.
Kenneth Moore received his DMA from Boston University and his MA and BME from Eastern Michigan University. Dr. Moore was the music department chair and the director of bands at Dexter High School (Michigan), where he conducted the Symphonic, Concert, and Varsity Bands, the Dreadnaught Marching Band, the DHS Big Band, and fifth grade beginning woodwinds.
Prior to his appointment in Dexter in 1998, Dr. Moore was the director of bands in Dundee, Michigan and Grant Park, Illinois. His groups consistently received first-division ratings at district and state festivals and performed at numerous venues throughout the country. He has held several offices in the Michigan School Band and Orchestra Association and has been an active festival adjudicator for that organization.
His research has been published in the Journal of Historical Research in Music Education, the Journal of Band Research, and the Michigan Music Educators Journal. Honors include MSBOA District 12 Teacher of the Year (twice), the American School Band Directors Association Award of Excellence, the Eastern Michigan University Bands’ Honored Alumni Award, Who’s Who Among America’s Teachers, and the Dexter Most Influential Teacher Award (seven times).
Aidan Plank is a bassist living in Northern Ohio. He currently serves as bassist for the Cleveland Jazz Orchestra, Cleveland Jazzworks, and Dan Bruce’s Beta Collective. Aidan’s own ensemble, Pulse, explores original compositions by its members as well as a diverse range of music composed by well-known and obscure jazz composers.
As an educator Aidan served as the jazz bass instructor at Kent State University and at Cuyahoga Community College’s Jazzfest Academy. Aidan has also served as a clinician and adjudicator at the Maplerock Jazz Festival (2016) at Ashland University and at the Lakeland Jazz Festival (2018) at Lakeland Community College.
Performance highlights include performances with: Dan Wall, Joe Lovano, David Berkman, Tim Armacost, Tierney Sutton, Vanessa Rubin, Gerald Clayton, John Fedchock, Bill Dobbins, Bruce Johnstone, Joe Maneri, Steve Davis, Jamey Haddad, Michael Philip Mossman, Carl Allen, Randall Woolf, Terence Blanchard, The Cleveland Orchestra, Judi Silvano, Bruce Arnold, and others.
Aidan was featured on NPR’s “Jazz Night in America” radio show on their May 16, 2019 broadcast: “Cleveland’s Joe Lovano Comes Home”.
Aidan has performed at Carnegie Hall, Severance Hall, The Knitting Factory (NYC), Spectrum (NYC), Elastic Arts (Chicago), and Blossom Music Center.
Aidan is a graduate of Cleveland State University.
In Memoriam
This Year in Photos
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Updated: 06/10/2024 05:52PM