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Newman-Oltman Guitar Duo, Lafayette’s Pesky Artists-in-Residence for 2002-2003, will perform in concert at Mannes College of Music 8 p.m. Monday at Mannes Concert Hall, 150 West 85th Street, New York, N.Y. Admission is free.
The duo will perform music from its critically acclaimed CDs for MusicMasters/BMG and Sheffield Lab Audiophile, including works by Leo Brouwer, Jean Françaix, Pierre-Petit, Arnaud Dumond, Giovani Gabrieli, Francesco Canova da Milano, Rami Vamos and Randall Avers.
The duo also can be heard at this year’s Chamber Music America National Conference, taking place at the Hilton New York, during the “Acoustical Ear Training” session, 9 a.m. Saturday, Jan. 18. Ellis Finger, director of Lafayette’s award-winning Williams Center for the Arts, is serving as chair of the conference.
Laura Oltman and Michael Newman are artistic directors of the New York Guitar Seminar at Mannes, which will take place June 25-30, featuring concerts, master classes, workshops, ensemble coachings, and panel discussions, featuring Newman & Oltman Guitar Duo, Frederic Hand, David Tanenbaum, William Kanengiser, Dusan Bogdanovic, Srdjan Berdovic, and Corey Christiansen.
The duo will perform the world premiere performance of “Caught in the Headlights” by Michael Karmon at the Raritan River Music Festival, May 24, 2003, in Clinton, N.J. For more information, visit the festival’s web site.
Newman and Oltman periodically give class presentations on aspects of guitar music. They have already completed a session with the Music in Western Civilization class taught by William Melin, professor of music, the Music Theory I class led by Skip Wilkins, assistant professor of music, and the Introduction to World Music Traditions course instructed by Larry Stockton, professor and head of music. By the end of the year, the duo will have given presentations in every music course. The artists also have had some interaction with a Spanish course, and gave a presentation for the campus on “Guitar in the Americas: 500 Years of Music from the New World.”
The two are acclaimed as innovators in the chamber music field. However, Stockton notes that they move beyond the boundaries of classical guitar, making them a perfect choice as artists-in-residence.
The duo performed in a recital given by Stockton in September at the Williams Center for the Arts. The repertoire of the concert consisted of three Brazilian pieces for percussion and guitar. The Pesky Artists-in-Residence also played the Star Spangled Banner at a Lafayette home football game. They will give a concert 8 p.m. Tuesday, March 11, at the Williams Center for the Arts.
Hailed by The New York Times as “fresh, hot and headed for fame,” Newman & Oltman Guitar Duo continues to fulfill that promise with over 20 years of international touring, ten critically-acclaimed recordings, and development of a new repertory for the ensemble. The duo’s concert tours have taken them to 49 states and to Asia, Europe, South America, Africa, Canada, and the Caribbean, featuring performances at such venues as Carnegie Hall, Ambassador Auditorium, Caramoor Festival, and Princeton and Yale Universities, and at the world’s cultural capitals, including Rome, Seoul, Oslo, Lima, and Cape Town.
The duo has been featured in the national media, including People Magazine, National Public Radio, The Larry King Show, and The New York Times. Newman & Oltman’s CDs for MusicMasters, Musical Heritage, and Sheffield Lab Audiophile have garnered such praise as “a revelation to hear,” The Washington Post; “Critics Choice,” Billboard; “doubtless the greatest guitar record yet made,” New York Daily News.
As founders and music directors of New Jersey’s Raritan River Concerts, the duo established the Raritan River Music Festival, New Music Commissioning Program, and Artists-in-the-Community Residency Program, receiving the National 1999 SCAP/Chamber Music America Award for Adventurous Programming.
For more information, visit www.guitarduo.com.