Everything Nac

A publication edited by Dr. Mark Sanders, Stephen F. Austin State University’s Department of English and Creative Writing chair and professor, and published by the SFA Press recently won the 2016 Nebraska Book Awards competition in the anthology category.

“Receiving the award is a tremendous honor,” Sanders said. “My creative roots are in Nebraska and the Plains, so this award is an affirmation that I remain a part of that community and that my work in behalf of poetry, fiction, nonfiction and criticism relative to the region is still valuable.”

“A Sandhills Reader: Thirty Years of Great Writing from the Great Plains” is a retrospective of some of the best work published by the Sandhills Press, a small, independent publisher of Great Plains writing since 1979.

“Most small presses don’t last nearly as long; most survive a year or two and publish as many books,” Sanders explained. “Sandhills and its subsidiaries have published more than 50 volumes of anthologies and individual titles by new and established writers from the Great Plains.”

Among authors published are Ted Kooser, former U.S. poet laureate and late Nebraska state poet William Kloefkorn. Others include Don Welch, Twyla Hansen, Kathleene West, Ronald Wallace, Dana Gioia, Kelly Cherry and more.

“Few presses support the work of writers coming from the Great Plains states,” Sanders said. “Because of my press work, I was awarded the Mildred Bennett Award from the Nebraska Center for the Book in 2007 for fostering Nebraska’s literary heritage. This book provides a small view of what the effort entailed.”

Sanders edited and published Sandhills Press books during the past three decades. He began compiling the retrospective collection in 2008 and pulled the pieces and permissions together by the end of 2014.

Dr. Leslie Cecil, chair of the Stephen F. Austin State University Department of Anthropology, Geography and Sociology, speaks Tuesday with high school students during College Day, an all-day event hosted by SFA’s College of Liberal and Applied Arts. Throughout the day, students from school districts across East Texas were introduced to the college’s programs and educational opportunities, ate lunch with representatives from various offices, including financial aid and admissions, and were given a guided tour of the campus.

A poetry reading by Nacogdoches’ prize-winning poets Judith and Ken Lauter will be at 2 p.m. Sunday, Nov. 13, in The Cole Art Center @ The Old Opera House in downtown Nacogdoches.

“Rembrandt and Vermeer – Two Dutch Painters as Seen by Two Nacogdoches Poets” will feature the Lauters reading from their books combining poems and paintings. Ken’s book is “Vermeer in Words,” and Judith’s is “Light from the Left; poems on paintings by Rembrandt.” Each poem will be accompanied by a full-size color slide of the painting it describes.

“This format lets the two forms of art engage in a dialogue, each speaking to the other,” Judith explained. “The poems celebrate the beauty and artistic genius of these beloved paintings, and they also explore the personal, political and social context of the turbulent times in which they were created.”

A book signing will follow the reading and slideshow.

The Lauters have visited the Netherlands a number of times, and their love for the country, its culture and the spectacular work of the painters of the Dutch Golden Age is fully evident in the poems they will read at The Cole Art Center.

Judith is a neuroscientist, poet and photographer who recently retired from Stephen F. Austin State University after serving more than a decade as the director of the SFA Human Neuroscience Laboratory, capping off a 30-year career as a university professor and researcher. She has published nine volumes of images and poetry, and her books are available both online and from a number of special-interest bookstores and art museums in Texas (Nacogdoches, Lufkin, Longview, Corpus Christi) and New Mexico. Information about her books is available at https://www.amazon.com/Judith-Lauter/e/B00JHWZ3TK , and on her website, judithlauter.com.

Ken has been a university professor of English and creative writing, a university administrator, a mayor’s aide (in St. Louis, Missouri), and a grass-roots environmental activist. He has published 12 volumes of poetry and also writes essays and plays. His books are available online at https://www.amazon.com/Ken-Lauter/e/B001KCMCR6. Additional information about his other writings can be found at kenlauter.com.

“Anyone interested in poetry and/or painting, particularly classical painting, will be enlightened by this event,” said John Handley, director of art galleries at SFA.

Admission is free, and refreshments will be served. For more information, call The Cole Art Center at (936) 468-1131.

Stephen F. Austin State University’s Madrigal Singers will perform a fall concert at 7:30 p.m. Thursday, Nov. 10, in Cole Concert Hall on the SFA campus.

The SFA Madrigal Singers, under the direction of Dr. Tim King, director of choral activities in the SFA School of Music, is a highly select 16-voice ensemble comprised of members of the A Cappella Choir.

For its fall concert, the choral ensemble will perform “Five Songs of the Newfoundland Outports” by Harry Somers. King explains that for the drinking song, “Si j’avais le bateau,” Somers has added some “mouth” or “chin music,” in which the ensemble imitates instruments, in this case, trumpets and drums. In “The Banks of Newfoundland,” the women’s voices imitate cold breezes. “Chin music” appears again in the comic song, “The Old Mayflower,” while the well-known folksong “She’s Like a Swallow” provides a melancholy transition to the rollicking “The Feller from Fortune,” King said.

The program also features “Five Flower Songs” by Benjamin Britten, which are “beautiful part-songs that were written as 15th anniversary presents to Dorothy and Leonard Elmhirst, who were keen botanists,” King said.

“Whatever the reason, Britten composed a set of songs that has become one of his most performed, recorded and beloved compositions,” he said. “The set has wonderful imagery of the English countryside from the simple and serene ‘To Daffodils,’ to the dark and mysterious ‘Marsh Flower,’ and culminating with the fast-paced ‘Green Broom.’ These are sheer delight for both singer and listener.”

Through the Madrigal Singers’ many performances, especially during the Christmas season, their reputation reaches throughout the East Texas area, King said.

“However, it is their wide-ranging concert repertoire comprised of music from all musical periods – Renaissance to present day – that exhibits the group’s extensive talent, precision and artistry,” he said.

The concert is a joint presentation of the SFA College of Fine Arts and School of Music.

Tickets are $8 for adults, $6 for seniors and $3 for students and youth. For tickets or more information, call the SFA Fine Arts Box Office at (936) 468-6407 or visit www.finearts.sfasu.edu.

The Stone Fort Wind Quintet at Stephen F. Austin State University features faculty members, from left, Charles Gavin, French horn; Christopher Ayer, clarinet; Kerry Hughes, oboe; Christina Guenther, flute; and Lee Goodhew, bassoon.[/caption]The Stephen F. Austin State University College of Fine Arts and School of Music will present the Stone Fort Wind Quintet performing a concert titled “Invitation to the Dance” at 7:30 p.m. Tuesday, Nov. 8, in Cole Concert Hall on the SFA campus.

Music selections for the program were based on the form of the Baroque instrumental dance suite, according to Charles Gavin, SFA professor of horn and chamber music and quintet member.

“It is actually very intriguing to contrast and compare how three modern composers adapt their music to the dance suite,” Gavin said. “Also included on the program will be a setting of the tango for woodwind quintet.”

Selections include “Cumberland Suite” by American composer Eric Ewazen, a contemporary American composer who has likely succeeded Aaron Copland as the “voice” of American music, Gavin said. The suite is a four-movement work featuring the allemande, courante, sarabande and gigue, all of which come from the Baroque dance suite.

Another work programmed is also by an American composer, Lee Hoiby. His works stem from a Romantic style and are “quite melodic and lyrical,” Gavin said. This includes a setting of the waltz.

A composition by another American composer, Michael Kibbe, is titled “Pink Flamingoes,” and it features his “somewhat humorous setting of the traditional tango,” Gavin explained.

Concluding the concert will be Shout Chorus for Wind Quintet by Kenji Bunch.

“This one piece has no ties to the dance,” Gavin said, “but it will present a wild and exciting finish to the concert.”

New faculty members Lee Goodhew, bassoon, and Kerry Hughes, oboe, will perform their first concert with the quintet. Other members include Christina Guenther, flute, and Christopher Ayer, clarinet.

Tickets are $8 for adults, $6 for seniors and $3 for students and youth. For tickets or more information, call the SFA Fine Arts Box Office at (936) 468-6407 or visit www.finearts.sfasu.edu.

The Percussion Ensemble at Stephen F. Austin State University will preform at 7:30 p.m. Monday, Nov. 7, in Cole Concert Hall in the Wright Music Building on the SFA campus.

Directed by Dr. Brad Meyer, director of percussion studies in the SFA School of Music, the SFA Percussion Ensemble will perform works by Nathan Daughtrey, Daniel Levitan, James Campbell and other composers. Daughtrey’s “Power Struggle” features an ensemble of four keyboard percussionists and four battery percussionists in a musical battle against each other.

“The struggle is apparent from the opening bars of this piece, with the two halves of the ensemble competing for attention in an exhilarating and bombastic fashion,” Daughtrey said in describing the piece.

Levitan’s “Conservatory Garden” is written in dedication to well-known conga player Frankie Malabe. The piece was named after a section of New York City’s Central Park that Levitan would walk by on his way to lessons with Malabe.

Also on the program is Campbell’s “Night Hunter,” whose title refers to vampires, as well as David Skidmore’s three-movement percussion quartet “In Contact.”

“Each performer in this piece has three drums and two pieces of metal,” Skidmore said of the piece. “The interest, I hope, is created not only by what instrument is being struck, but how the instruments are struck. There should be a direct connection between the energy of the performers and the energy of the audience…without a wall of instruments getting in the way.”

The final selection on the program features Clif Walker’s “Promise Music,” a composition that has been described as having an organic minimalistic style using mood-shaping timbres, such as a crotale on the edge of a timpani, mark tree and wooden wind chimes.

“The overall structure of ‘Promise Music’ appears to be arch-form, with the concluding section being similar to its opening,” Jim Lambert wrote in Percussive Notes magazine. “There are numerous mixed meter changes, which create an intrinsic syncopation. This percussion ensemble will certainly fit the need for large, mature college percussion ensembles.”

Tickets are $8 for adults, $6 for seniors and $3 for students and youth. For tickets or more information, call the SFA Fine Arts Box Office at (936) 468-6407 or visit www.finearts.sfasu.edu.