Department of Music Concert and Event Listing

UC San Diego Department of Music concerts are open to both internal and external audiences. All guests are required to RSVP for all concerts that are both free and ticketed. RSVP at music.ucsd.edu/tickets.

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La Jolla Symphony & Chorus NEXUS

Saturday, March 16th, 2024 7:30 pm

Mandeville Auditorium

For ticket information: lajollasymphony.com


Nexus is a symphonic journey curated by Music Director and Orchestra Conductor Sameer Patel.

Celebrate the awakening of spring with Lili Boulanger's D’un Matin de Printemps. Discover Nina Shekhar's Lumina, a contemporary masterpiece that bridges the gap between tradition and innovation.

Immerse yourself in Debussy's La Mer, a sonic depiction of the majestic sea. The evening concludes with Poulenc's Gloria.


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La Jolla Symphony & Chorus NEXUS

Sunday, March 17th, 2024 2:00 pm

Mandeville Auditorium

For ticket information: lajollasymphony.com


Nexus is a symphonic journey curated by Music Director and Orchestra Conductor Sameer Patel.

Celebrate the awakening of spring with Lili Boulanger's D’un Matin de Printemps. Discover Nina Shekhar's Lumina, a contemporary masterpiece that bridges the gap between tradition and innovation.

Immerse yourself in Debussy's La Mer, a sonic depiction of the majestic sea. The evening concludes with Poulenc's Gloria.


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Vocal Masterclass, 32VM

Sunday, March 17th, 2024 5:00 pm

Conrad Prebys Music Center Recital Hall

Free. RSVP: http://music.ucsd.edu/tickets
Streaming LIVE for FREE at http://music.ucsd.edu/live


Event Program (PDF)

Natalia Merlano-Gomez instructs MUS 32VM Vocal Master Class for their end-of-term performanaces. 

Accompanied by Dr. Kyle Adam Blair. 


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KNOWING / NOT KNOWING

Sunday, March 17th, 2024 7:00 pm

UC San Diego Park & Market

General Admission: $10-$15 via eventbrite link


KNOWING / NOT KNOWING (2022-2024)

A new multimedia work by Roger Reynolds.

Narrator, recorded voices, mixed chorus, 2 percussion, trombone, 8-channel sound and video projections.
World premiere performance: Sunday, 17 March 2024, 7 pm
UC San Diego Park & Market
1100 Market Street, San Diego

Description By The Composer 

What can I as an individual know? What seems out of reach? In fact, how does “knowing” come about? In everyday life, one faces such questions constantly. One is perplexed by events, by the opinions of others, with deciding how to act in circumstances with immediate or more long-term implications. In contrast, other moments can feel immediately “right”. There’s no friction. Living in this world of disrupted comfort, we seek perspective. KNOWING / NOT KNOWING is an 80-minute musical work for narrator, recorded actors, live and filmed performers, projected imagery, San Diego’s SACRA / PROFANA Chorus, and 8- channel sound movement. The work’s text has nine sections spanning Infancy and Individuation through Communality and Knowledge. It is a montage of more than two dozen sources ranging from ancient Persian and Indian wisdom, through the contemporary voices of Chinua Achebe, Wallace Stevens, James Baldwin, Simone Weil, Albert Camus, Amanda Gorman, Carlo Rovelli, David Brooks, Toni Morrison and many others. Although their perspectives span time and arise from the living of contrasted lives, the composite weave feels natural: many voices speaking as one about the lives we all lead. “Trust implies a willingness to depend upon another.” … “Compassion is a miracle more astonishing than walking on water.” … “Make yourself into an agent – consistent, unified and whole.” … “Every human being is a miracle.”

Experiencing KNOWING not only entails a kaleidoscopic array of observations, but frames and interconnects their content with a central musical score that stems from the world of lullabies: a mother singing to her child. Computer technologies allow individual phrases, nested dialogs, and shared ruminations to move choreographically across the performance space, circling around and through the audience. And what a listener experiences will not only come from the work’s sources and the efforts of those who realize it in performance, but will also include the literal voices of the community in which the finished work is heard. In a tenth section, the community speaks back to the work with its own voice.

Our diverse, dynamic, and turbulent world offers opportunity and peril in comparable proportion. If one cares about what they observe and wants to use who they are and what they can do to respond in useful ways, what to do? KNOWING seeks to address our perplexing encounters with the world. It involves a process of investment that hopes to clarify terrain, diminish tensions, and enable action.

Acknowledgements 

The realization of KNOWING / NOT KNOWING has been generously supported by Chancellor Pradeep Khosla, to whom we are deeply indebted.

We also acknowledge the important support of UC San Diego's Park & Market Facility, and the UC San Diego Department of Music, as well as the many KNOWING collaborators whose energies and imagination have been and continue to be essential, including: Robert Castro, Steven Schick, Kyle Johnson, Peter Sellars, Jacob Sundstrom, Karen Reynolds, Juan Castro Acosta, Shahrokh Yadegari, Paul Hembree, Berk Schneider, Aiyun Huang, Kosuke Matsuda, Jessica Flores, Andrew Munsey, Andrew Waltz, Jennifer Ziemba, and, of course, Producer Leslie Leytham.

UC San Diego Division of Extended Studies has a mission to serve the critical lifelong learning needs of individuals, organizations, and the community, which includes the cultivation of arts enrichment and cultural experiences in the region. We are dedicated to sharing unique and diverse performances to foster vibrant and inclusive artistic encounters. The collaboration with internationally recognized composer Roger Reynolds on the KNOWING / NOT KNOWING Project aligns with these institutional commitments and helps ensure the transformative power of his innovative work reaches a broad audience.

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“UC San Diego Extended Studies is thrilled to collaborate with Roger Reynolds on the KNOWING / NOT KNOWING project. This performance explores the uniquely human quality of self-knowledge and how this innate ability evolves from infancy to adulthood as the boundaries between self and other are explored. Roger's body of work has contributed greatly to our region's creative legacy, leaving an indelible mark on the intersection of art and innovation. The addition of KNOWING / NOT KNOWING amplifies his influence.”  
- Andrew Waltz, Director of Arts Management, UC San Diego Division of Extended Studies.

Creative Team

Roger Reynolds, composer
Kyle Johnson, filmmaker and video design
Jacob Sundstrom, electronics and sound design
Robert Castro, stage director
Steven Schick, conductor
Juan Carlos Acosta, choir conductor
Leslie Ann Leytham, creative producer

With Performances By

Aiyun Huang, percussion
Berk Schneider, trombone
Kosuke Matsuda, percussion
Monique Gaffney, actor
SACRA / PROFANA, choir

 


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one fish two fish percussion ensemble

Monday, March 18th, 2024 7:00 pm

Conrad Prebys Music Center Experimental Theater

Free. RSVP: http://music.ucsd.edu/tickets
Streaming LIVE for FREE at http://music.ucsd.edu/live


Event Program (PDF)

one fish two fish Percussion Ensemble is excited to present their Winter Quarter concert! Please join us Monday, March 18 at 7 P.M. to experience an array of modern chamber percussion music ranging from John Cage's Credo in US (1942) to Alexis Lamb's Lyric Dusk (2023). one fish two fish is an ensemble of undergraduate volunteers dedicated to music making of the highest quality through recent percussion repertoire. 


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ArtPower presents Boarte Piano Trio

Friday, April 5th, 2024 7:30 pm

Conrad Prebys Concert Hall

An ArtPower presentation.
Tickets handled by the Triton Box Office



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The Music of Earl Howard, with Anthony Davis

Friday, April 12th, 2024 7:00 pm

Conrad Prebys Concert Hall

General Admission: $20 | UC San Diego Faculty, Staff, Alumni: $15 | All Students : Free with ID Purchase Online
Streaming LIVE for FREE at http://music.ucsd.edu/live


Anthony Davis presents composer/pianist EARL HOWARD in concert. 

Earl Howard has been performing his compositions in the United States and Europe for over fifty years. His recent compositions include music for live electronics, electronic tape music as well as music for electronics and instruments. Earl Howard's method of creating orchestrated sounds with electronics and adding live, improvisational performance creates a unique, densely layered composition. Howard has performed at numerous venues including Merkin Hall, the Whitney Museum, The Kitchen, The Knitting Factory, Roulette, and Carnegie Recital Hall. In 2011 Earl Howard received a Guggenheim Fellowship. In 2004 his first sound installation was commissioned for the Tiffany Collection at the Queens Museum of Art. In the spring of 2003 Howard had a Regents Fellowship at UCSD. Howard received three New York Foundation for the Arts Fellowships. In 1998 Howard was the recipient of Harvard's Fromm Foundation Commission. He graduated from California Institute of the Arts in Music Composition in 1974.

Recently Howard has performed frequently at UCSB, Roulette, the Herbst Theater, The Stone, and Merkin Hall with improvisers including; Georg Graewe, Mari Kimura, Mark Dresser, Anne LeBaron, Evan Parker, Thomas Buckner, and George Lewis. In 2005 he premiered a live improvisation with David Wessel at CINMAT in Berkeley, California. In 2006 he premiered Waftings in Grace Cathedral in San Francisco. In 2006 he was commissioned by the Donaueschingen Festival to produce a new ensemble work, Clepton. He also performed and composed for the Acoustmania Festival in Romania and Ulrichsberger Kaleidophon Festival 2006 in Austria. In 2007 Earl Howard was a special guest synthesizer performer and sound designer with the Perspectives Ensemble at the Miller Theatre and with the with Opera Omaha for Anthony Davis’s opera Wakonda’s Dream. In 2012 he premiered a composition made possible through his Guggenheim Fellowship “Superstring” in New York. This piece brought together musicians Wu Wei, Allan Jaffe, Miya Masaoka, Ernst Reijseger, Mark Dresser, Harris Eisenstadt, and Earl Howard.
Earl Howard’s compositions have been recorded by a number of musicians including Anthony Davis' recording of "Particle W", for piano and tape, released on the Gramavision label and Gerry Hemingway's recording of "D.R. for Solo percussion" on the Auricle Record label. The recording, "Pele’s Tears" is from ten years of his electronic music on the Random Acoustics Label and "Fire Song" on Erstwhile Records with hyperpianist, Denman Maroney. "Strong Force" for ensemble and electronics was released on Mutable Music's Label in the Spring of 2003. “Clepton” and “Granulary Modality” were recently released by New World Records.

Earl Howard has also produced numerous soundtracks for some of the leading film and video artists including Nam June Paik, Mary Lucier, Rii Kanzaki, Bob Harris, and Bill Brand.
 


Additional Description:

FROM THE LINER NOTES TO GRANULAR MODALITY ON NEW WORLD RECORDS
I first encountered Earl Howard’s music in 1980 with his work V & T, which was composed for the violinist Shem Guibbory. I was greatly impressed by his command of texture and the subtle interaction between the soloist and the tape. Initially I felt the soloist was controlled by the tape music but the piece fostered a nuanced performance with a refreshing attention to detail within a relatively restricted musical realm. I felt a connection to this new music because it resonated with my desire to create ensemble music in which compositional aims could be achieved through directed improvisation. I was pleased when he decided to create a new work for piano and tape, Particle W. Particle W was the beginning of a creative collaboration with Earl that continues to this day.
Working on Particle W I was introduced to a new vocabulary of musical terms that were certainly unique in the improvised sphere. His directions for the piano were very specific, not necessarily about pitch or even rhythmic gesture, but about the relationship of the “improvised” material to the tape music. The tape music moved through various textures divided into sections that featured subtle transitions. I had to negotiate very specific musical identities whether playing points with space, bandwidth games, or the beating tones of microtonal harmonics. The terminology for the piano textures came from electronic music. Directions were not metaphoric but a concrete design of interaction and play within a dynamically evolving musical frame. I was always aware of the fixity of tape music, the idea that the piece provided a clock, an organization and frame for the timing of events. This was not altogether different from playing a concerto where the performer must not only realize the inherent structure of the piece but reveal the structure as a new discovery for each performance. The piece excited me because it shattered the anachronistic idea of improvisation and composition as an oppositional binary. Howard’s innovations suggest that music can be realized in a continuum of interaction and design.
The only limitation in Particle W and Monopole, the subsequent work that Earl created for piano duet with Ursula Oppens and me, was that ultimately the tape maintained control. It dictated the duration and succession of events. The sounds and textures for Particle W, Monopole, and the tape composition Pele’s Tears were all created with a Serge system that Howard describes as an analog computer. With new technology, particularly the Kurzweil K2600, he could create music in real time. The music could be truly interactive within a complex, replicable design. The music could flow through textures and processes that were never static. Textures and ideas could transform and evolve over time. Howard did not conceive sound as an environment or a sonic field but as dynamic forces in motion. The sounds and textures could have behaviors and probabilities rather than static, unrelenting fixity.
In many respects Earl Howard’s music is an anomaly that resists categorization and the seductiveness of genre. He is an important force in improvised music and yet his work employs complex structures and rigorous transitions of sound and texture. His electro-acoustic music is realized with a Kurzweil K2600 that for Howard is not merely a keyboard synthesizer, but as he has described, an open system, a computer with a most effective interface with modules and a key map that enable more freedom in the composer’s creation of textures. The keys, pedals, and sliders on the instrument are in effect switches that can accomplish various musical tasks determined by the composer. Howard does not play the Kurzweil as a mere keyboard; the tactile interface with it allows for a musicality and subtlety that cannot be achieved by most artists working on laptops that feature a visual interface. Howard’s performances on the Kurzweil are embodied and the physical relationship of performer to music and action is self-evident. His painstaking programming of the Kurzweil creates a space for the intuitive mind and the improviser’s imagination. I have witnessed experts in computer music who are stunned by what he is able to achieve with effects and processes that would be impossible for the laptop in realtime.
Howard’s music challenges many assumptions about electro-acoustic music and the role of electronic music. In most electro-acoustic music today the electronic elements are limited to either an attenuation of the instrument in so-called hyper-instruments or in the creation of static environments that provide background for acoustic instruments. Very few composers working in computer music today are interested in new sounds or textures or sound transformation and are more concerned with the movement of sound in virtual spaces, the concert hall as a projected set of headphones.
Earl Howard grew up in Los Angeles. As a child, he was influenced by film music and he was fascinated by the way music and sound in films provided shifting perspectives, moving from large masses of sound like a posse on horseback to an individualized perspective of a bullet whistling overhead. Films provided sound in constant motion forming shifting points of view, from the dense to the spare, from the echoes of space to the violent confrontation. He attended California Institute of the Arts where he studied under the composer Morton Subotnick and the celebrated improviser Buell Neidlinger. Howard also studied saxophone with Phil Sobel. He is a virtuoso on the saxophone, performing on the alto as well as the soprano saxophone and the saxello. Sobel abhorred patterns and licks and emphasized the disruption of patterns by asking for random pitches during exercises. This served Howard well in the future because his music always engages in creative disruption, not allowing the improviser to dwell in the known clichés and patterns of playing and demanding that the performer listen and understand the movement and transformation of texture within the composition.
In the three solo works presented on Granular Modality, one can observe the striking continuity of Howard’s aesthetic approach. All three pieces employ a flexible script of material that transforms and modulates from texture to texture. Each section in the composition represents a complex sound world that is not simply multiphonics or sub-harmonics, for example, but an exchange, an interplay that is both directional in terms of an overall sense of form and discursive in its oppositional characteristics. The discursive elements in Howard’s playing on the saxophone and on the synthesizer convey a restless approach toward material. Musical material and texture always change and evolve. On the synthesizer this is accomplished with a scripted succession of programs, textures, and behaviors that can overlap and be revealed over time. The scripted flow of events creates a coherent overall structure that is malleable in terms of duration and nuance.
Distinction between the improvised and the composed becomes irrelevant, as the order of events, the script, remains the same as the details are revealed in the action of improvisation. The binary of composition and improvisation is an anachronism and inadequately describes a creative process that embraces immediacy and formal complexity.
Bird 3 (2006), a solo work for Kurzweil, opens the recording. The piece employs sharp contrasts of musical material with abrupt changes of texture. In a way the piece has a nostalgic quality as it negotiates a virtual history of electronic music from the Columbia-Princeton sine waves to musique concrète to the exploration of granular synthesis and noise. The piece is breathtaking in its virtuosity, filled with surprise and the unexpected. At times the piece builds with rhythmic momentum and then collapses into a mass of sound like a flock of birds drifting in and out of formation moving across a stereo field. Bird 3 has a unique spaciousness and in the piece Howard explores silences that disturb the expectation and predictability of cross-fades. Strasser 60 (2009) is the other Kurweil solo on the recording. In both pieces the listener is startled by the variety of sound and texture that are complexly defined, hardly ever sounding like a conventional instrument. In the opening sections of Strasser 60 the transformations are less abrupt, with large, dense textures that vie for attention. Textures collide and are augmented by harmonics and colorful elaboration with the occasional introduction of tonality and downward moving glissandi. This reveals Howard’s mastery in orchestration as the piece finally resolves into a pedal-point drone that dissipates into a sheen of harmonics, a sublimation of the tonal center.
2455 (2009) is a work for alto saxophone featuring the composer. Works for solo saxophone remain an important facet of Howard’s music. This piece follows his work on 5 Saxophone Solos. Unlike Anthony Braxton and Roscoe Mitchell, two other important composers who performed music for solo saxophone, Howard creates longer, more elaborate musical structures that are multi-thematic, employing a variety of extended techniques. He never limits himself to one idea in a piece. The composition morphs and transforms, negotiating contrasting textures and sounds.
The piece opens with breathy sub-harmonics creating a microtonal melody. He uses his glissando technique with an oblique nod to Johnny Hodges. Howard’s control of his instrument is especially impressive in his attention to dynamics and timbre, employing soft multiphonic textures and sub-tone melodies. Howard’s process of composition in his solo saxophone works is similar to his approach on the synthesizer. He explores contrasting sections of material in an array of varying approaches to technique and sound. Listening to his performance one often arrives at unexpected places like the folksy, Albert Ayler reference in the middle of the solo. The solo has a strong sense of structure while revealing a playfully melodic vision.
Crupper (2009) features Miya Masaoka on koto with the composer on synthesizer. Crupper begins with the koto alone and the listener is struck by the sense of space. The koto plays around D minor emphasizing the flat fifth, A-flat, like a blues. Later, the koto emphasizes a pentatonic modal scale introducing the E-flat against the D. This establishes a tonal center that will be felt throughout most of the piece. The music takes its time to reveal itself. The synthesizer enters as a shadow of the koto as Howard begins the processing of the koto. Slowly the interaction becomes more rhythmic with repeating figures in the koto but the synthesizer never overwhelms the acoustic koto as Masaoka moves to bowed figures on the koto and later percussive sounds beating on the wood. In the beginning sections of the piece the synthesizer plays a more subordinate role, mirroring and attenuating the melodic figures of the koto. This piece is rather unique in Howard’s music with its slow, almost ritualistic unfolding and with the presence of a predominant tonal center. The synthesizer gently disturbs and extends the tonality, slowly moving toward stochastic textures, less tonally defined, juxtaposed against the prevailing D tonal center in the
koto. When Masaoka moves to more percussive sounds, the gravitational pull of tonality begins to abate as the synthesizer employs more stochastic sounds. Later, Masaoka plays microtonal figures with the synthesizer. The piece concludes with a drone in the synthesizer that recalls the D tonality in the beginning of the piece. The roles of the koto and the synthesizer are effectively reversed at the end of the piece with the koto providing melodic embellishment of the drone.
The piece has a fascinating tension between tonality and sound, finding a delicate balance between the stochastic and the melodic.
Earl Howard is a unique voice in new music. His sound world is probably the most rich and varied in electronic music and his playing on the saxophone reinforces a singular vision of music and sound. He draws from a wide range of influences across racial, social, and aesthetic barriers.
New music of the late twentieth century is not only defined by Stockhausen, Cage, and Varèse, but Ayler, Cecil Taylor, Ellington, and even Hank Williams provide the foundation for music today, shattering the anachronistic boundaries between the improvised and the composed.
Howard understands the history and development of electronic music without being constrained by its past. His music avoids the facile eclecticism so prevalent in music today. He has created his own idiosyncratic world of sound.
—Anthony Davis
Anthony Davis is a composer, pianist, and Professor of Music at the University of California, San Diego.

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WEDS@7: Stephen Drury, piano

Wednesday, April 17th, 2024 7:00 pm

Conrad Prebys Concert Hall

General Admission: $20 | UC San Diego Faculty, Staff, Alumni: $15 | All Students : Free with ID Purchase Online
Streaming LIVE for FREE at http://music.ucsd.edu/live



Additional Description:

Pianist STEPHEN DRURY, in concert

Pianist and conductor STEPHEN DRURY has performed throughout the world with a repertoire that stretches from Bach to Liszt to the music of today. He has appeared at Carnegie Hall, the Kennedy Center, the Barbican Centre and Queen Elizabeth Hall in London, the Cité de la Musique in Paris, and the Leipzig Gewandhaus, and from Arkansas to Seoul. A champion of contemporary music, he has taken the sound of dissonance into remote corners of Pakistan, Greenland and Montana.

In 1985 Stephen Drury was chosen by Affiliate Artists for its Xerox Pianists Program, and performed in residencies with symphony orchestras in San Diego, Cedar Rapids, San Angelo, Spokane, and Stamford. He has since performed or recorded with the American Composers Orchestra, the Cologne Radio Symphony Orchestra, the Vienna Radio Orchestra, the Brooklyn Philharmonic, the Boston Philharmonic, the Boston Pops, the Springfield (Massachusetts) and Portland (Maine) Symphony Orchestras, and the Romanian National Symphony. Drury was a prize-winner in the Carnegie Hall/Rockefeller Foundation Competitions in American Music, and was selected by the United States Information Agency for its Artistic Ambassador Program and a 1986 European recital tour. A second tour in the fall of 1988 took him to Pakistan, Hong Kong, and Japan. He gave the first piano recitals ever in Julianehaab, Greenland, and Quetta, Pakistan. In 1989 the National Endowment for the Arts awarded Drury a Solo Recitalist Fellowship which funded residencies and recitals of American music for two years. The same year he was named “Musician of the Year” by the Boston Globe.

Stephen Drury's performances of music written in the last hundred years, ranging from the piano sonatas of Charles Ives to works by György Ligeti, Frederic Rzewski and John Cage have received the highest critical acclaim. Drury has worked closely with many of the leading composers of our time, including Cage, Ligeti, Rzewski, Steve Reich, Olivier Messiaen, John Zorn, Luciano Berio, Helmut Lachenmann, Christian Wolff, Jonathan Harvey, Michael Finnissy, Lee Hyla and John Luther Adams. Drury has appeared at the MusikTriennale Koln in Germany, the Subtropics Festival in Miami, and the North American New Music Festival in Buffalo as well as at Roulette, the Knitting Factory, Tonic and The Stone in New York. At Spoleto USA, the Angelica Festival in Bologna and Oberlin Conservatory he performed as both conductor and pianist. He has conducted the Britten Sinfonia in England, the Santa Cruz New Music Works Ensemble, and the Harvard Group for New Music. In 1988 - 1989 he organized a year-long festival of the music of John Cage which led to a request from the composer to perform the solo piano part in Cage's 1O1, premiered with the Boston Symphony Orchestra in April, 1989. In 2009 Drury performed the solo piano part in the Fourth Symphony of Charles Ives, again with the Boston Symphony Orchestra, under Alan Gilbert. In 1999 Drury was invited by choreographer Merce Cunningham to perform onstage with Cunningham and Mikhail Barishnikov as part of the Lincoln Center Festival. Drury has also appeared in New York at Alice Tully Hall as part of the Great Day in New York Festival and on the Bargemusic series, in Boston with the Boston Symphony Chamber Players and as soloist with the Boston Modern Orchestra Project, and with the Seattle Chamber Players in Seattle and Moscow at the International Music Festival “Images of Contemporary American Music”. In 2003 he performed and taught at the Mannes College of Music’s Beethoven Institute; in 2005 he returned to Mannes to play and teach at the Institute and Festival for Contemporary Performance. That summer he was also the piano faculty at the Bang on a Can Summer Institute. In 2006, Drury’s performance of Frederic Rzewski’s “The People United Will Never Be Defeated!” at the Gilmore Keyboard Festival was a sensation; he was invited back in 2008 to premiere Rzewski’s Natural Things with the Opus 21 Ensemble at the Gilmore Festival in Michigan and Carnegie’s Zankel Hall in New York as part of the composer’s 70th birthday. That same summer Drury appeared at Bard College’s SUMMERSCAPE Festival, and at the Cité de la Musique in Paris for a week-long celebration of the music of John Zorn. In 2007 he was invited to León, Mexico to perform music by Rzewski, Zorn and Cage at the International Festival of Contemporary Art.

Drury has commissioned new works for solo piano from John Cage, John Zorn, John Luther Adams, Terry Riley, and Chinary Ung with funding provided by Meet The Composer. He has performed with Zorn in Paris, Vienna, London, Brussels, and New York, and conducted Zorn's music in Bologna, Boston, Chicago, and in the UK and Costa Rica. In March of 1995 he gave the first performance of Zorn's concerto for piano and orchestra Aporias with Dennis Russell Davies and the Cologne Radio Symphony Orchestra. Later that same season he gave the premiere of Basic Training for solo piano, written for him by Lee Hyla. Drury has recorded the music of John Cage, Elliott Carter, Charles Ives, Karlheinz Stockhausen, Colin McPhee, John Zorn, John Luther Adams and Frederic Rzewski, as well as works of Liszt and Beethoven, for Mode, New Albion, Catalyst, Tzadik, Avant, MusicMasters, Cold Blue, New World and Neuma.

Stephen Drury has given masterclasses at the Moscow Tchaikovsky Conservatory, Mannes Beethoven Institute, and Oberlin Conservatory, and in Japan, Romania, Argentina, Costa Rica, Denmark, and throughout the United States, and served on juries for the Concert Artist Guild, Gaudeamus and Orléans Concours International de Piano XXème Siècle Competitions. Drury is artistic director and conductor of the Callithumpian Consort, and he created and directs the Summer Institute for Contemporary Performance Practice at New England Conservatory. Drury earned his undergraduate degree for Harvard College, and has also earned the New England Conservatory's select Artist Diploma. His teachers have included Claudio Arrau, Patricia Zander, William Masselos, Margaret Ott, and Theodore Lettvin, and conducting with Donald Thulean. He teaches at New England Conservatory, where he has directed festivals of the music of John Cage, Steve Reich, and (in 2010) Christian Wolff.

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Tiffany Du Mouchelle, soprano and Steven Solook, percussion

Friday, April 19th, 2024 7:00 pm

Conrad Prebys Music Center Experimental Theater

Free. RSVP: http://music.ucsd.edu/tickets
Streaming LIVE for FREE at http://music.ucsd.edu/live


UC San Diego Music alumni TIFFANY DU MOUCHELLE, soprano, and STEVEN SOLOOK, percussion, present a duo concert. 

Tiffany Du Mouchelle, Soprano

Soprano, Tiffany Du Mouchelle is praised for her musical versatility, an electric stage presence and exceptional dramatic sensibilities. Most recognized for her fearlessness in exploring new and challenging repertoire, she ushers the voice into new realms of expressivity, including a vast array of musical styles and languages, featuring over 100 different languages and exploring the genres of classical, world, contemporary, cabaret, and theatrical works. Recipient of the prestigious Richard F. Gold Career Grant for American Opera Singers, Du Mouchelle has performed with the  Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, Buffalo Philharmonic Orchestra and Chorus, Bang on a Can All-Stars, Center for Contemporary Opera, Yellow Barn Music Festival, Skålholt Summer Music Series in Iceland, Norfolk Chamber Music Festival, and American Composers Alliance, and in such prestigious venues as Lincoln Center, Disney Hall, The Consulate of the Republic of Poland, The New York Historical Society, The Ukrainian Institute, the residence of the United States Ambassador in Cairo, and the Acropolium in Carthage. Recent collaborations include the AUSTRALIAN PREMIERE of Stockhausen’s Sirius with Bendigo International Festival of Exploratory Music, the MODERN PREMIERE of Karl von Seckendorff’s Proserpina (1777) combined with the WOLRD PREMIERE of Paul Botelho’s electro-acoustic mono-opera Proserpina (2016), the WORLD PREMIERE of Roger Reynolds’ JUSTICE: The Songs (Clytemnestra), the WEST COAST PREMIERE of Pasqual Dusapin’s To Be Sung (Voice Two), along with residencies at Yellow Barn and Songfest.  An active chamber musician, she is the co-founder of Aurora Borealis, a voice and percussion duo with her husband, Stephen Solook.  They frequently commission and perform new works, expanding the repertoire  for this unusual combination. A frequent collaborator with the cultural diplomacy organization Cultures in Harmony, she has served as an instructor of voice, musical outreach specialist, and performer for projects in Cameroon, Tunisia, Egypt and Papua New Guinea. In fall 2015, Du Mouchelle moved to Buffalo, NY, joining the faculty at University at Buffalo, where she serves as the director of the vocal performance program. 

Stephen Solook, Percussion

Critically acclaimed percussionist Stephen Solook currently resides in Buffalo, NY. As a vivacious interpreter of contemporary music Steve has worked with such composers as Pulitzer Prize winners Paul Moravec and Roger Reynolds, Chinary Ung, Bruce Adolphe, and David Loeb. With co-founder, Tiffany Du Mouchelle, of the Aurora Borealis duo (for soprano and percussion) they have performed together more then any other duo of its kind. Venturously they encourage the development of and explore equally composed works for this primal combination. Mr. Solook has performed as a soloist throughout the United States, Egypt, Mexico, Papua New Guinea, and is a sought after concerto soloist for many ensembles and composers. As an orchestral musician, Steve has served as principal percussionist/timpanist with multiple New York City ensembles, was a member of the La Jolla Symphony in San Diego, California, and performed as an substitute percussionist with the Buffalo Philharmonic. As a member of the non-profit organization Cultures in Harmony, Mr. Solook has traveled to perform, teach, and lead workshops in Cameroon, Egypt, Mexico, and Papua New Guinea. Ethnomusicological research has brought Steve to Fiji in a search to locate and document pre-colonial music, as a conservation project with Pacific Blue Foundation. Steve has performed with Bang on a Can All-Stars, Eighth Black Bird, the International Contemporary Ensemble, red fish blue fish, San Francisco Contemporary Music Players, Joseph Alessi, Bob Becker, David Krakauer, Steven Schick, Lucy Shelton, Socalled, Gordon Stout, Glen Velez, and the Jose Limon Dance Company.  He has had the privilege to work under such conductors as John Rutter, JoAnn Falletta, Paul Nadler, and Edwin Outwater, and in venues ranging from Los Angeles’s Disney Hall and New York City’s Lincoln Center to the legendary nightclub CBGB’s. Steve can be seen on QPTV and heard on Bridge, Vortex, and Mode labels, as well as additional forthcoming productions with Mode records. Dr. Solook is on the percussion faculty at Buffalo State University.


Additional Description:
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Pandit Kartik Seshadri, sitar

Saturday, April 20th, 2024 7:30 pm

Conrad Prebys Concert Hall

General Admission: $20 | UC San Diego Faculty, Staff, Alumni: $15 | All Students : Free with ID Purchase Online
This concert will not be livestreamed.


Pandit Kartik Seshadri, sitar with Shahshank Subramanyam, bamboo flute
Accompanied by:
Pandit Arup Chattopadhyay, tabla
Parupalli Phalgun, mridangam

Saturday, April 20th, 2024 7:30 pm
Conrad Prebys Concert Hall

General Admission: $20
UC San Diego Faculty, Staff, Alumni: $15
All Students : Free with ID Purchase Online
This concert will not be livestreamed.


Additional Description:
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Susan Narucki, soprano with Donald Berman, piano

Sunday, April 28th, 2024 3:00 pm

Conrad Prebys Music Center Experimental Theater

General Admission: $20 | UC San Diego Faculty, Staff, Alumni: $15 | All Students : Free with ID Purchase Online
Streaming LIVE for FREE at http://music.ucsd.edu/live



Grace Talaski, clarinets - DMA Recital

Thursday, May 2nd, 2024 7:00 pm

Conrad Prebys Concert Hall

Free. RSVP: http://music.ucsd.edu/tickets
Streaming LIVE for FREE at http://music.ucsd.edu/live



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Kaija Saariaho Tribute Concert

Friday, May 3rd, 2024 7:00 pm

Conrad Prebys Music Center Experimental Theater

General Admission: $20 | UC San Diego Faculty, Staff, Alumni: $15 | All Students : Free with ID Purchase Online
Streaming LIVE for FREE at http://music.ucsd.edu/live



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Kaija Saariaho Tribute Concert

Saturday, May 4th, 2024 7:00 pm

Conrad Prebys Music Center Experimental Theater

General Admission: $20 | UC San Diego Faculty, Staff, Alumni: $15 | All Students : Free with ID Purchase Online
Streaming LIVE for FREE at http://music.ucsd.edu/live



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La Jolla Symphony & Chorus To the Stars

Saturday, May 4th, 2024 7:30 pm

Mandeville Auditorium

For ticket information: lajollasymphony.com



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La Jolla Symphony & Chorus To the Stars

Sunday, May 5th, 2024 2:00 pm

Mandeville Auditorium

For ticket information: lajollasymphony.com



Kelly Feng, composition - Honor Recital

Tuesday, May 7th, 2024 5:00 pm

Conrad Prebys Music Center Experimental Theater

Free. RSVP: http://music.ucsd.edu/tickets
Streaming LIVE for FREE at http://music.ucsd.edu/live



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103C with St. Lawrence String Quartet

Wednesday, May 8th, 2024 2:00 pm

Conrad Prebys Concert Hall

Free. RSVP: http://music.ucsd.edu/tickets
Streaming LIVE for FREE at http://music.ucsd.edu/live


About

Hailed by the New Yorker “not simply for the quality of their music making, exalted as it is, but for the joy they take in the act of connection,” the acclaimed St. Lawrence continues its fabled partnership with Stanford, remaining a cultural cornerstone of the University, directing the music department’s Chamber Music Program, concertizing at Stanford Live, hosting a popular summer seminar, and running the Emerging String Quartet Program.”

Program

Mozart: Quartet for Oboe (arranged for saxophone) and strings in F Major, K 370
Britten: Phantasy Quartet for Oboe (arranged for saxophone) and Strings, Op. 2
Steven Banks: Cries, Sighs and Dreams for alto sax and string quartet (2021)
An additional work TBD.


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Michael Jones, percussion - DMA Recital

Friday, May 10th, 2024 5:00 pm

Conrad Prebys Music Center Experimental Theater

Free. RSVP: http://music.ucsd.edu/tickets
Streaming LIVE for FREE at http://music.ucsd.edu/live



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ArtPower presents St. Lawrence String Quartet

Friday, May 10th, 2024 7:30 pm

Conrad Prebys Concert Hall

An ArtPower presentation.
Tickets handled by the Triton Box Office



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Sarah Saviet, violin

Tuesday, May 14th, 2024 7:00 pm

Conrad Prebys Concert Hall

Free. RSVP: http://music.ucsd.edu/tickets
Streaming LIVE for FREE at http://music.ucsd.edu/live



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Teresa Diaz de Cossio Sanchez, flutes - DMA Recital

Wednesday, May 15th, 2024 7:00 pm

Conrad Prebys Music Center Experimental Theater

Free. RSVP: http://music.ucsd.edu/tickets
Streaming LIVE for FREE at http://music.ucsd.edu/live



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Natalia Merlano Gomez, voice - DMA Recital

Friday, May 17th, 2024 5:00 pm

Conrad Prebys Music Center Experimental Theater

Free. RSVP: http://music.ucsd.edu/tickets
Streaming LIVE for FREE at http://music.ucsd.edu/live



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New Works for Guitar and Accordion: Seth Josel and Christine Pate

Friday, May 17th, 2024 7:00 pm

Conrad Prebys Concert Hall

Free. RSVP: http://music.ucsd.edu/tickets
Streaming LIVE for FREE at http://music.ucsd.edu/live



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Alexander Leong, percussion - Senior Recital

Sunday, May 19th, 2024 7:00 pm

Conrad Prebys Music Center Experimental Theater

Free. RSVP: http://music.ucsd.edu/tickets
Streaming LIVE for FREE at http://music.ucsd.edu/live



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Erin Graham, composition - PhD Dissertation Concert

Tuesday, May 21st, 2024 8:00 pm

Conrad Prebys Concert Hall

Free. RSVP: http://music.ucsd.edu/tickets
Streaming LIVE for FREE at http://music.ucsd.edu/live



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Anita Chandavarkar, flutes - DMA Recital

Thursday, May 23rd, 2024 7:00 pm

Conrad Prebys Music Center Experimental Theater

Free. RSVP: http://music.ucsd.edu/tickets
Streaming LIVE for FREE at http://music.ucsd.edu/live



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Undergraduate Listening Room

Tuesday, May 28th, 2024 5:00 pm

Conrad Prebys Music Center Experimental Theater

Free. RSVP: http://music.ucsd.edu/tickets
Streaming LIVE for FREE at http://music.ucsd.edu/live



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Yongyun Zhang, percussion - DMA Recital

Tuesday, May 28th, 2024 7:00 pm

Conrad Prebys Concert Hall

Free. RSVP: http://music.ucsd.edu/tickets
Streaming LIVE for FREE at http://music.ucsd.edu/live



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Andrew Crapitto, double bass - Graduate Recital

Thursday, May 30th, 2024 5:00 pm

Conrad Prebys Music Center Experimental Theater

Free. RSVP: http://music.ucsd.edu/tickets
Streaming LIVE for FREE at http://music.ucsd.edu/live



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UC San Diego Gospel Choir

Thursday, May 30th, 2024 8:00 pm

Mandeville Auditorium

General: $20 | UC San Diego Faculty, Staff, Alumni: $10 | All Students : Free with ID Purchase Online
Streaming LIVE for FREE at http://music.ucsd.edu/live



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Tyler J. Borden, cello - DMA Recital

Friday, May 31st, 2024 3:00 pm

Conrad Prebys Music Center Recital Hall

Free. RSVP: http://music.ucsd.edu/tickets
Streaming LIVE for FREE at http://music.ucsd.edu/live



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Undergraduate Forum

Friday, May 31st, 2024 7:00 pm

Conrad Prebys Concert Hall

Free. RSVP: http://music.ucsd.edu/tickets
Streaming LIVE for FREE at http://music.ucsd.edu/live



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DEEP LISTENING: THE STORY OF PAULINE OLIVEROS

Friday, May 31st, 2024 7:30 pm

Mandeville Auditorium

General: $20 | UC San Diego Faculty, Staff, Alumni: $10 | All Students : Free with ID Purchase Online
Streaming LIVE for FREE at http://music.ucsd.edu/live



Undergraduate Collaboration Concert

Saturday, June 1st, 2024 10:00 am

Conrad Prebys Concert Hall

Free. RSVP: http://music.ucsd.edu/tickets
Streaming LIVE for FREE at http://music.ucsd.edu/live



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Saturday Night Jazz - 95JC Jazz Ensemble

Saturday, June 1st, 2024 7:00 pm

Mandeville Auditorium

General: $20 | UC San Diego Faculty, Staff, Alumni: $10 | All Students : Free with ID Purchase Online
Streaming LIVE for FREE at http://music.ucsd.edu/live



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Undergraduate Honors: Xiao Feng, percussion

Sunday, June 2nd, 2024 6:00 pm

Conrad Prebys Music Center Experimental Theater

Free. RSVP: http://music.ucsd.edu/tickets
Streaming LIVE for FREE at http://music.ucsd.edu/live



Shahrokh Guest

Sunday, June 2nd, 2024 7:30 pm

Conrad Prebys Concert Hall

General Public: $25 | PCC members: $20 | Free for UC San Diego students, staff and faculty
RSVP required: http://music.ucsd.edu/tickets
This concert will not be livestreamed.



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Bass Ensemble

Monday, June 3rd, 2024 7:00 pm

Conrad Prebys Concert Hall

Free. RSVP: http://music.ucsd.edu/tickets
Streaming LIVE for FREE at http://music.ucsd.edu/live



UC San Diego Chamber Orchestra

Tuesday, June 4th, 2024 8:00 pm

Mandeville Auditorium

General: $20 | UC San Diego Faculty, Staff, Alumni: $10 | All Students : Free with ID Purchase Online
Streaming LIVE for FREE at http://music.ucsd.edu/live



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MUS 33C

Wednesday, June 5th, 2024 2:00 pm

Conrad Prebys Music Center Recital Hall

Free. RSVP: http://music.ucsd.edu/tickets
Streaming LIVE for FREE at http://music.ucsd.edu/live



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95W Indian Classical Music students of Pandit Kartik Seshadri

Wednesday, June 5th, 2024 7:00 pm

Conrad Prebys Concert Hall

Free. RSVP: http://music.ucsd.edu/tickets
Streaming LIVE for FREE at http://music.ucsd.edu/live



95C Concert Choir

Thursday, June 6th, 2024 5:00 pm

Conrad Prebys Concert Hall

Free. RSVP: http://music.ucsd.edu/tickets
Streaming LIVE for FREE at http://music.ucsd.edu/live



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UC San Diego Wind Ensemble

Thursday, June 6th, 2024 7:30 pm

Mandeville Auditorium

General: $20 | UC San Diego Faculty, Staff, Alumni: $10 | All Students : Free with ID Purchase Online
Streaming LIVE for FREE at http://music.ucsd.edu/live



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UC San Diego Chamber Ensemble

Friday, June 7th, 2024 7:00 pm

Conrad Prebys Concert Hall

Free. RSVP: http://music.ucsd.edu/tickets
Streaming LIVE for FREE at http://music.ucsd.edu/live



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Undergraduate Honors: Zoe Farrell, percussion

Saturday, June 8th, 2024 3:00 pm

Conrad Prebys Music Center Experimental Theater

Free. RSVP: http://music.ucsd.edu/tickets
Streaming LIVE for FREE at http://music.ucsd.edu/live



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Undergraduate Honors: Randy Lew, clarinet

Saturday, June 8th, 2024 5:00 pm

Conrad Prebys Concert Hall

Free. RSVP: http://music.ucsd.edu/tickets
Streaming LIVE for FREE at http://music.ucsd.edu/live



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La Jolla Symphony & Chorus Time Present and Time Past

Saturday, June 8th, 2024 7:30 pm

Mandeville Auditorium

For ticket information: lajollasymphony.com



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La Jolla Symphony & Chorus Time Present and Time Past

Sunday, June 9th, 2024 2:00 pm

Mandeville Auditorium

For ticket information: lajollasymphony.com



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Vocal Masterclass, 32VM

Sunday, June 9th, 2024 5:00 pm

Conrad Prebys Concert Hall

Free. RSVP: http://music.ucsd.edu/tickets
Streaming LIVE for FREE at http://music.ucsd.edu/live



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one fish two fish percussion ensemble

Monday, June 10th, 2024 7:00 pm

Conrad Prebys Music Center Experimental Theater

Free. RSVP: http://music.ucsd.edu/tickets
Streaming LIVE for FREE at http://music.ucsd.edu/live



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Best of ICAM - Table presentations & Pizza Party

Thursday, June 13th, 2024 4:00 pm

Conrad Prebys Music Center Courtyard

Free. RSVP: http://music.ucsd.edu/tickets
Streaming LIVE for FREE at http://music.ucsd.edu/live



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Best of ICAM - Theater Presentations

Thursday, June 13th, 2024 7:00 pm

Conrad Prebys Music Center Experimental Theater

Free. RSVP: http://music.ucsd.edu/tickets
Streaming LIVE for FREE at http://music.ucsd.edu/live



Most Department of Music events are general admission, FREE and open to the public.  Ticketed performances are listed above and available for sale online or via the Music Box Office: (858) 534-3448. 

Maps: to the Conrad Prebys Music Center pdf / Google Maps Link


ACCESSIBILITY: 
1. If you require special assistance or adaptive services, I.e. audio description, captioning/sign language interpreting, listening devices, and or locating the accessible entrances/exits, please notify Jessica Flores (j3flores@cloud.ucsd.edu) immediately so we can arrange for the services to be in place. 
2. The UC San Diego campus is an Aira Access Location. To read more about the Aira service, please visit osd.ucsd.edu/resources/aira.html.


PLEASE NOTE: NO LATE SEATING.  Guests arriving late may be turned away or will be asked to enter between pieces.


In an effort to conserve resources and reduce paper waste, we post our event programs as electronic documents on this page (see listings). If you are not at a computer, you can easily access this page by scanning the QR code at right (for iPhones we recommend using the built-in camera app). Programs for past events dating back to October 2008 are available in our events archive with links below.

PLEASE NOTE: As an experimental and new music department, much of our music is very intimate and quiet, for this reason, we request that students preparing concert reports refrain from writing or rustling papers during events.  We also respect the artistry of our musicians and adhere to a strict policy of NO LATE SEATING.  Guests arriving late may be turned away or will be asked to enter between pieces.

Please Note: The Department of Music does not take responsibility for the content of external websites, Facebook pages, and other outside UC San Diego sites.

Copies of events performed by the faculty and students of UC San Diego Department of Music are available for educational use only by the performers, composers and faculty involved in the event pursuit to all applicable copyright laws. View our Dubbing Policy for more information.


We hope that you will join us in upholding and promoting our Principles of Community in all UC San Diego events and keeping our community free from any and all forms of discrimination and harassment.


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 Conrad Prebys Concert Hall | Recital Hall | Experimental Theater | Mandeville Auditorium

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