GERI ALLEN Awarded Guggenheim Fellowship
April 7, 2008GERI ALLEN Awarded Guggenheim Fellowship
Guggenheim Fellows are appointed on the basis of stellar achievement and exceptional promise for continued accomplishment. One of the hallmarks of the Guggenheim Fellowship program is the diversity of its Fellows, not only in their fields of endeavor but in their geographic location and ages.
Geri A. Allen, associate professor of music, for music composition. Allen's project celebrates humanity and embraces the continuity of innovation as personified by three artists - pianist-composers Herbie Hancock, McCoy Tyner and Cecil Taylor.
Allen Says:
I am grateful to the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation for honoring me and my work today with this prestigious award.
Every artist dreams of the chance to freely create unimpeded. As a working mother of three children, this honor
Encourages me, and will give me the freedom to create what I hope will be my best work.
"Refractions", my composition will celebrate the humanity and embrace the continuity of innovation in Jazz, as personified by three of the revolutionary
Pianist- composers: Herbie Hancock, McCoy Tyner and Cecil Taylor.
Jazz is a music of continuity and a direct outgrowth of the spirit of a people who rose, thrived and innovated in spite of impossible odds.
My new music will speak to freedom. Just as light passes through a prism and emerges in a new direction, I will allow the music of
Taylor, Tyner and Hancock to pass through me, in the hope that my new work will emerge at a different angle through the prism
Of my compositional imagination.
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posted by Jeffery Morse @ 9:35 PM
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