FACULTY POSITION OPENING
California State University, Northridge
MUSIC INDUSTRY STUDIES

California State University, Northridge is known for the intellectual, social and cultural relevance of its 200 academic programs and engaged centers. Ranked in the top 25 accredited university programs in the nation, the Music Department at Cal State Northridge is known for superior teaching provided by 70 distinguished faculty and professional musicians. Currently, more than 500 students pursue undergraduate and graduate degrees in music.

CSUN’s music programs have been recognized internationally for the excellent preparation of students in a variety of careers in classical and commercial music. Located within 20–30 minutes from the center of the film, television, and recording industry, the Music Department at Cal State Northridge offers outstanding studying and performing opportunities in connection with the leading educational institutions and cultural venues of the Los Angeles area.

The ideal candidate for the Assistant/Associate Professor (Tenure Track) position will have earned an MM in Music or MBA or MA in a closely related field. An earned doctorate in Music, or a related discipline is desired.

Responsibilities of the position include assuming leadership as Area Coordinator of the Music Industry Studies major including coordination of curriculum and part-time faculty assignments; advisement of all Music Industry Studies majors; recruitment of students to the Music Industry Studies major; teaching Music Industry Studies courses; and other duties.

Salary is dependent on background and qualifications.

The effective date of the appointment is August 2010. Screening of applications will begin November 30, 2009 and will continue until the position is filled. Interested candidates should submit a letter of interest, a current curriculum vitae with complete professional and academic history, three references with complete contact information (address, telephone, and e-mail), three current letters of recommendation, and a transcript (unofficial acceptable/official preferred). Do not submit additional support material (tapes/videos) unless requested.

Inquiries and nominations should be addressed to:

• Chair – Search and Screen Committee
  Music Industry Studies
  Department of Music
  California State University, Northridge
  18111 Nordhoff Street
  Northridge, CA 91330-8314

“Hollywood in New York”
Sunday Oct 4th, 2009
2:00 PM - 6:00 PM
The New York Street backlot, CBS Studio Center, 4024 Radford Ave., Studio City

"Hollywood in New York" will raise funds for the CSUN Music Therapy Wellness Clinic. The clinic uses music to help children with various types of special needs such as Autism or Down syndrome. The clinic also addresses teenagers and adults who need support in daily living skills as well as those who are seeking wellness in their lives.

Among the celebrities expected to attend the event are Joe Manganiello who has starred in such films as "Spider-man" and "Spider-man 3" and such television shows as "One Tree Hill" and "How I Met Your Mother;" Stacey Oristano, star of "Friday Night Lights;" Justine Wachsberger, star of "Sorority Row" and the upcoming "Twilight Saga: New Moon;" Naya Rivera, star of "Glee;" and Hayley Marie Norman, who appeared in the movie "Fired Up" and such T.V. shows as "Crash" and "Deal or No Deal."

Cost:
$25 per person and $17.50 for children under 12; VIP tickets $100

Contact Phone: (310) 749-9585

Website: http://www.eopf.org

CSUN Symphony performed at Viewpoint School

On September 30, 2009, the CSUN Symphony performed at Viewpoint School in Calabasas, performing two different concerts: one for the high school and one for the middle school. The concert was effective as an educational concert due to the repertoire we performed. Every section of the orchestra had a moment to be featured. The brass section was introduced in Aaron Copland’s Fanfare for the Common Man. The strings were showcased in Dvorak’s Serenade for Strings. The winds and percussion were featured in Messiaen’s Un Sourire. Within this, the students were exposed to a wide range of nationalities and eras of music.

The most challenging piece listening-wise was the Messiaen. It does not have a melody, nor does it have standard practice Western tonality. The piece was prefaced before it was performed. Un Sourire has a very clear rondo form (ABABA) that was explained to the students. Messiaen was a very religious man and so the A section entails very ethereal almost sacred string music. The B section makes use of birdsong, which Messiaen included in many of his works. With the students understanding this, it made the piece more listenable to them. Students in a Q&A session asked Dr. Roscigno to see the printed score as they couldn’t comprehend how such a piece could be notated with all the complex rhythms and harmonies. It was nice to see that rather than think the piece was boring and uninteresting, they were intrigued by the complexity. They delighted in the uniqueness of it, and that they had never heard anything like it before.

Max Mueller, the cellist in the Goldberg & Sons Honors String Quartet at CSUN approached Dr. Kristin Herkstroeter, chair of the music department at Viewpoint about the quartet coming to Viewpoint to do more music outreach. Hopefully that will manifest itself this semester.A 0 It’s important to keep a good relationship with future generations of aspiring musicians so the love and passion for the art is passed down and continues into the future.

Exceptional Creative Accomplishments Award

Elizabeth Sellers, Associate Professor in Commercial and Media Music Writing, has been awarded the Exceptional Creative Accomplishments Award for 2009 as part of a creative collaboration with Prof. Karen Kearns, Associate Dean of the Mike Curb College of Arts Media and Communication, and Magdy Rizk, Assistant Professor of Art.

Professors Kearn, Rizk and Sellers worked on a documentary, That All May Be One, (http://www.thatallmaybeone.com/) about the Sisters of St. Joseph of Carondolet in St. Louis, Mo.  Kearns spearheaded the project as its writer/director/producer, Sellers wrote and produced the music score and Rizk provided design and graphics.  The score includes performances of Sellers music by a CSUN Music Department ensemble, the Women’s Chorale, under the direction of Dr. Katherine Baker.

The film has been screened at a number of local, national and international festivals.

CSUNotables
Brian Havey: Choosing a Life in the Key of Jazz

Bring a boy up on an orchard, in the company of three siblings, 300 apple trees, a rural cacophony of ducks, geese, chickens, goats, rabbits, and a donkey, and you get…jazz?

The circumstances of Brian Havey’s upbringing don’t exactly mirror the urban influences expected of the average hip young jazz pianist. But Havey, the recipient of Cal State Northridge’s Wolfson Award for Outstanding Undergraduate Scholar of the Class of 2009, is not your average hip young jazz pianist. He has been called “a brilliant, virtuosic piano player with a modern creative outlook.”

Raised near Quail Lake, a 50-minute haul from Lancaster and a good 40 miles from the nearest gas station, Havey was homeschooled with his sisters and brother through high school. “I had all this free time,” he said, “to work on things which happened to involve a lot of discipline.”

Drawing became the first of these “things.” Starting at age six, Havey worked his way up from cartoons to still lifes and portraits. Then it was chess. He read every chess book he could find and rapidly climbed to the top 15 of his age group in national chess competition.

Havey was 14 when his parents separated and his passion for chess waned. His perceptive mother signed him up with a keyboard orchestra at the local park.

“We all had these little Casio keyboards,” Havey said, “and we played the big fat notes in these little music books.” By the second lesson, he had learned all the pieces. With characteristic focus, he read theory books, taught himself to play by ear and to transcribe music. Later, a jazz improvisation class at Antelope Valley College (AVC) was—as the old jazz standard says—the start of something big.

And the end of something precious. It was about then that Havey’s father died. “It was a pretty terrible ordeal for me,” said Havey, but their shared love of music kept him going. Enrolling at AVC, he earned a berth in its big band and began building a reputation in the Lancaster area as a rising young jazz pianist.

“Then I came to CSUN and I heard all these guys in the Jazz ‘A’ Band, and I was thinking, ‘Wow, these guys are so killin’, “ said Havey. He hurled himself into constant practice. “I said, ‘I’ve gotta get better!’ ”

That work ethic produced his perfect 4.0 g.p.a. and sustains a busy schedule of performance and composing. Havey, who also teaches piano, sees a future in teaching and plans to earn his master’s at Cal Arts, on the way to a doctorate in musical arts.

“A lot of what I like about jazz is the intellectual stuff behind it,” he said. “Reading music on a page is one thing, but understanding how music works and being able to manipulate that in the moment is another thing. That’s really cool.”