Lec-Dems at the Academy
The week starting February 18, 2008, proved to be a week of great activity at the ITC Sangeet Research Academy.
Prof Clarence Barlow who holds the Corwin Endowed Chair of Composition at the University of California, Santa Barbara gave a lecture-demonstration on Tuesday 19, 2008. A renowned Western music composer, he was born in Kolkata and spent several years of his childhood and youth learning and later teaching at the Calcutta School of Music. Developing an interest in Hindustani music, he composed seven pieces - mainly rondos and fugues, using Raga music. These were presented and discussed with the scholars of the Academy.
On Friday 22, 2008, Prof Arun Chanda of The Evergreen State College, Olympia, WA, a visiting Fulbright Scholar at the Sardar Patel University, Gujarat, presented a lecture-demonstration on his contemporary compositions. Trained in the Western classical tradition, he is a composer of contemporary music and holds the view that today’s standards of music and non-music are not sacrosanct. What is not considered musical today may well become music in the future. The scholars of the Academy had an interesting afternoon of music listening followed by discussions.
Both the visitors were delegates at the International Symposium ‘Frontiers of Research on Speech and Music’ (FRSM 2008), organised by the Scientific Research Dept., ITC Sangeet Research Academy in collaboration with CDAC, Kolkata, Saha Institute of Nuclear Physics, Kolkata and Sir C V Raman Centre for Physics and Music, Jadavpur University, Kolkata.