2017 Stroud Classical Guitar Entrepreneurship Awards Announced
In 2015, James Stroud, the generous benefactor and founder of our annual state-wide Classical Guitar Competition at Oberlin, founded a corollary annual scholarship for Oberlin guitar students. These awards, totaling $5,000 in cash, are distributed each spring based on the student's additional (non-required), guitar-related activities. I present them with a list of suggestions at the beginning of the year (see original description and full info here), and they submit a resumé highlighting their year's accomplishments in the spring. This year, the winners are:
Mohit Dubey $2,000
Mohit played four solo concerts, participated in four collaborative concerts, gave the premiere of two student compositions, played with Contemporary Music Ensemble, was a member of PI (Performance and Improvisation with Jamey Haddad), was involved in four recording projects, took some or several lessons on flamenco guitar, jazz guitar, Indian music with a veena player, and classical guitar with Matt Palmer, made and performed guitar duet arrangements of three pieces of Scriabin and one traditional piece from Ghana. He won a $1500 grant that paid for a trip to India where he studied, performed and taught; he wrote a blog about the experience. He started a separate blog reviewing our guest guitar concerts at Oberlin. He performed additionally for community centers and retirement centers in Washington, D.C. and in Lorain, OH and worked to procure and maintain instruments for a community project in Detroit. He maintained his presence on Facebook, Spotify, Bandcamp and iTunes.
Brian King $1,500
Brian played nine solo and duo concerts (duos with flutist Katie Kim), played incidental music for a student film project, played with Contemporary Music Ensemble, formed a band (The Laughing Yeti) and played out with them. He won 3rd prize in the Stroud Guitar Competition and 1st prize, with Katie Kim, in an online chamber music competition. He arranged and performed a solo version of "You Are My Sunshine". He took lessons on the Renaissance lute and performed three pieces on the instrument in his Junior recital. As President of our Guitar Club, he handled all payment processes for guest artists and wrote and submitted our proposal for the 2017-18 season.
Stephen Fazio $750
Stephen played two solo concerts, played with Contemporary Music Ensemble on two concerts and with the Oberlin Sinfonietta on two concerts (one at home and one on tour, in Brooklyn, NY). He maintains 30 hours of outside guitar teaching, including a regular guitar class in the Cleveland Public Schools administered by the Cleveland Guitar Society, and started and taught two music theory classes. He studied and performed on the flamenco guitar.
Collin Sterne $250
Collin Played one outside concert (with violinist/soprano Abigail Hekel-Garcia), studied the theorbo and will perform on it on his non-required Sophomore recital, and took responsibility for posting Facebook events for all of our guitar concerts.
Jonathan Bodian $250
Jonathan won first prize in a guitar competition in CA, part of the prize for which he gave a partial concert there; he played for Sergio Assad's Cleveland Guitar Society master class. He gave a full solo Sophomore recital.
Aidan Wiley Lippke $250
Aidan attended a week-long guitar festival in Serbia over spring break, playing in a number of master classes and performing both solo and in a guitar ensemble. He played for Sergio Assad's Cleveland Guitar Society master class and gave a full solo Freshman recital.
We are incredibly grateful and appreciative of the largesse shown by my long-time friend James Stroud, in his interest in and support of our efforts in the Oberlin Guitar Studio. I'm confident this annual award will continue to galvanize the students to consistently reach beyond the average, to take advantage of every opportunity, to look inside for inspiration for what they really want to do and to be, and to feel encouraged and rewarded for their efforts. Many thanks to James Stroud!!!
And my congratulations to my students for an incredibly productive and impressive year of music-making and wide-ranging accomplishments!
