February 18, 2008
Eastman alumna Maria Schneider wins Grammy
hsnihur@esm.rochester.edu
Eastman alumna Maria Schneider ’85 (MM) won a
Grammy award in February in the best instrumental composition category for
her work “Cerulean Skies.”
The win is the second Grammy for the jazz composer,
who won the 2005 award for best ensemble album for Concert in the Garden, the first
Grammy-winning recording with Internet-only sales.
“Cerulean Skies” is the centerpiece work
of Schneider’s latest album, Sky
Blue. The composition of that piece, as well as
the album’s entire recording process, was documented on her Web site,
www.mariaschneider.com. Since its release, the album has received unanimous
praise, with Downbeat magazine noting that Schneider “now has become
entrenched among the ranks of America’s leading composers.”
Schneider has received numerous commissions from,
among others, Metropole Orchestra, Stuttgart Jazz Orchestra, Carnegie Hall
Jazz Orchestra, Monterey Jazz Festival, and Jazz at Lincoln Center. She
was named Composer of the Year and Arranger of the Year by the Jazz
Journalists Awards and the Downbeat Critics Poll in 2005. The Maria Schneider Jazz
Orchestra, formed in 1993, performed weekly at Visions in Greenwich
Village for five years and has appeared in festivals and concert halls in
Europe, Brazil, and Macau.
Schneider earned Grammy nominations for her debut
recording Evanescence. Her second and third recordings, Coming About and Allégresse, were
also nominated for Grammys. Additionally, Allégresse was named as one of the top ten recordings of 2000 by Time and Billboard magazines.
Schneider and her group the Maria Schneider Orchestra
are scheduled to perform next January in the Eastman Theatre, in a concert
co-presented by Eastman’s Institute for Music Leadership and the
Rochester International Jazz Festival.
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