University of Rochester

Rochester Review
March–April 2014
Vol. 76, No. 4

pdf image
Story as a PDF

Departments

Review home

In the News

Grammy Round-Up

Jazz composer, pianist, and bandleader Maria Schneider ’85E (MM) has won her third Grammy Award, and her first in the classical category. Her crossover album Winter Morning Walks (ArtistShare), featuring soprano Dawn Upshaw performing a song cycle Schneider wrote to poems by Ted Kooser, was named Best Contemporary Classical Composition.

Schneider won her first Grammy in 2004 for her album Concert in the Garden (ArtistShare). Named Best Large Jazz Ensemble Recording, the album was the first recording sold exclusively on the Internet to win a Grammy. Schneider won another Grammy in 2007 for Best Instrumental Composition for “Cerulean Skies,” from her album Sky Blue (ArtistShare).

Mastering engineer Bob Ludwig ’66E, ’01E (MM) picked up multiple Grammys for his work on the French electronic music duo Daft Punk’s album Random Access Memories (Columbia Records). The recording was named Best Engineered Album, Non-Classical, as well as Album of the Year. Ludwig also won a Grammy for his work on the Rolling Stones’ Charlie Is My Darling—Ireland 1965 (ABKCO Films), which was named Best Historical Album.

Ludwig, who has worked for well-known artists from Jimi Hendrix to Barbra Streisand, has won four previous Grammys, including one Latin Grammy.

Martha Cluver ’03E and Eric Dudley ’01E won Best Chamber Music/Small Ensemble Performance as members of the a cappella octet Roomful of Teeth. The album Roomful of Teeth (New Amsterdam Records) is the group’s debut. Based in New York City, the octet came together in 2009.

Kent Knappenberger ’89E (MM), a music teacher and choir director at Westfield Academy and Central School in Westfield, N.Y., won the inaugural Music Educator Award. The Recording Academy and Grammy Foundation established the award to recognize music educators teaching kindergarten through college who have made lasting contributions to the profession and to the continuation of music education in the schools.

Knappenberger, who has taught in Westfield for 25 years and also teaches music in Rio de Janeiro as a volunteer, was among 30,000 people to be nominated and 10 to become finalists.

Also nominated for Grammys this year were David Slonaker ’80E (MM) and Tom Peters ’86E. Slonaker was nominated for Best Large Jazz Ensemble Album for the David Slonaker Big Band’s recording Intrada (Origin Records). Peters, a double bassist, was nominated for Best Chamber Music/Small Ensemble Performance for his work on composer John Cage’s The Ten Thousand Things (MicroFest Records).