Music aficionados looking for something to do this weekend might want to go for Baroque.

The School of the Arts is hosting the New York State-St. Lawrence Chapter of the American Musicological Society's 2003 meeting at McMaster this weekend. A highlight of the two-day conference is a Baroque concert scheduled for Saturday night (April 26) at 6 p.m. The public is invited to attend.

“The concert is really a gift to the University and we're hoping people will come and join us for what promises to be a wonderful evening of beautiful music,” says School of the Arts associate professor Jim Deaville. The concert will feature Richard Semmens (recorder) and Sandra Mangsen (harpsichord), both from the University of Western Ontario, and Mary Cyr (viola da gamba), University of Guelph.

Deaville says the society's meeting will bring together many scholars and musicians from several well-known universities within the chapter, including Cornell University and the University of Toronto. “The spectrum of papers that will be presented ranges from a discussion of the waltz in the film Carousel to a talk on a type of Gregorian chant known as Sarum chant,” says Deaville, who, along with colleague and associate professor Susan Fast, is organizing the event.

Sessions are grouped according to such topics as the waltz in the 20th century, spiritual music in the 16th and 17th centuries and the agenda of modernism in the 20th century.

For the first time, the chapter meeting will feature a keynote address, given by Carleton University music professor Elaine Keillor -her topic is “Canadian Compositrices [Women Composers] and the Other.”

Notably, three McMaster alumni (Alexander Carpenter, Teresa Magdanz and Lindsay Moore) who are now studying for their PhDs at University of Toronto will be among those presenting papers.

The University last hosted the New York State-St. Lawrence chapter six years ago.

Chapters of the American Musicological Society help to foster the advancement of research in the various fields of music as a branch of learning and scholarship for society members.

The concert is at 6 p.m. Saturday in TSH-114. The society's meeting is being held in TSH-201.

For the complete program, click here
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