Center for 21st-Century Music to honor composer Bernard Rands

English composer Bernard Rands will visit UB later this month to receive a SUNY honorary degree and to attend a concert of contemporary works presented in his honor by the Slee Sinfonietta, UB’s professional chamber orchestra in residence and the flagship ensemble of the Robert and Carol Morris Center for 21st Century Music.

The concert will take place at 7:30 p.m. Oct. 24 in Lippes Concert Hall in Slee Hall.

The Slee Sinfonietta will be conducted by Matthew Chamberlain, a composer and conductor who is pursuing his PhD in composition at UB under the director of David Felder, SUNY Distinguished Professor, Birge-Cary Chair in Music Composition and director of the Center for 21st-Century Music.

Also performing will be UB faculty members Tiffany Du Mouchelle, soprano; Eric Huebner, piano; and Tom Kolor, percussion, as well as Christopher Guzman, piano; Steve Solook, percussion; and Adrián Sandí, clarinet.

The program features Rands’ “now again” — fragments from Sappho, and “Folk Songs,” as well as Berio’s “Linea” and Felder’s “Coleccion Nocturna.”

Rands, who will receive a SUNY honorary doctorate in music at a separate luncheon during his visit to UB, has visited the university often as a faculty composer for the June in Buffalo festival of new music.

The Walter Bigelow Rosen Professor of Music Emeritus at Harvard University, Rands is the recipient of a Pulitzer Prize (1984) and a Grammy Award (2000), and served as a composer-in-residence for the Philadelphia Orchestra for seven years under Riccardo Muti.

He has been commissioned by such ensembles as the New York Philharmonic, the Boston Symphony Orchestra, the Los Angeles Philharmonic, the National Symphony Orchestra, the Eastman Wind Ensemble and the Cleveland Orchestra.

Tickets for the Slee Sinfonietta's concert are available through a variety of outlets at the following pricing structure:

UB faculty, staff, alumni, seniors and non-UB students

• $10 plus $2 fee online at www.ticketfly.com
• $10 plus $4 fee by phone at 877-987-6487 (Ticketfly)
• $14 in person at the Center for the Arts (noon to 6 p.m., Tuesday through Friday)
• $17 in person at the door (one hour before concert time)

General public

• $15 plus $2 fee online at www.ticketfly.com
• $15 plus $4 fee by phone at 877-987-6487 (Ticketfly)
• $19 in person at the Center for the Arts (noon to 6 p.m., Tuesday through Friday)
• $22 in person at the door (one hour before concert time)

UB students are admitted free with ID.

For a complete listing of all concerts being presented by the Department of Music, visit the department’s website.