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MUSIC

2023 Performances

Winter 2023 features several performances of Irving Fine's music, including the rarely performed men's choruses, McCord's Menagerie.

 

Save the dates:

  • Tuesday, February 21, 2023, 1 pm ET - Washington Men's Camerata performs McCord's Menagerie and "Pianola d'amore" from The Choral New Yorker for Concerts from the Library of Congress (VIRTUAL)

  • Saturday, April 29, 2023, 2 pm ET - Brandeis University: A Tribute to Irving Fine, featuring works by Fine, Boulanger, and more. Slosberg Music Center (Free)

  • Saturday, October 7, 2023, 7 pm ET - Brandeis University: A Tribute to Irving Fine, program TBA (Free)

Fine concerts scheduled at Library of Congress in 2022/2023 were postponed to a future season, due to repair of the Coolidge Auditorium.

Remembering Rosalie Calabrese

The Irving Fine Society mourns the loss of beloved friend, colleague, and board member Rosalie Calabrese. She worked closely with Verna Fine over many years to advance the legacy of Irving's life and music, and she went on to inspire and empower hundreds (if not thousands) of artists, poets, and leaders throughout the U.S. and around the world. She was a treasure and her spirit will live on with all of us. Donations in Rosalie's honor are accepted at Poets House http://poetshouse.org/

Rosalie Calabrese at LOC 2014
FINE & SHAPERO Symphonies in NY Times

Anthony Tommasini named the Fine and Shapero symphonies to his "7 of the Best Works from a Neglected Era of American Music" list on March 1, 2019. Of the Fine Symphony, he says "Of late, there has been a welcome renewal of interest in the Boston-born Irving Fine (no relation to Vivian). A splendid 2015 recording by the Boston Modern Orchestra Project drew fresh attention to his works." Read the full article here

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FEB

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Washington Men's Camerata

Library of Congress VIRTUAL

Washington, DC, USA

PONTUS LIDBERG'S WOODLAND 

In 2016 the Library of Congress and Martha Graham Dance Company commissioned a Woodland from Swedish choreographer Pontus Lidberg. Woodland re-imagines the music of Irving Fine's Notturno for strings and harp. The work premiered in the Coolidge Auditorium in April 2016 and has toured the United States, Cuba, and Europe. The work has been a highlight of multiple Graham Company seasons in New York City and will be presented in Cypress, Romania, and Germany during the 2018/19 season.

 

Media:

Woodland Preview Video by Ezra Hurwitz

Archival Video of the Woodland's World Premiere (Begins at 1:02:58)

Interview with Pontus Lidberg

NY TIMES PRAISES BMOP & FINE RECORDING 

2/14/16 "IRVING FINE: Complete Orchestral Works A typical BMOP/sound release, this one rescues a composer from wholly undeserved obscurity with transparent, energetic performances — and Mr. Rose is rightly proud of it. Of six pieces, including the delightfully upbeat 'Blue Towers' (1959), most important is Fine’s neo-Classical Symphony (1962), lucidly done." -David Allen Full Text

 

Review by Anthony Tommasini (4/15/15)

REMEMBERING IRVING FINE

Composer Joel Mandelbaum, who studied with Fine at Brandeis, recently recovered his 1962 diary entry about the passing of his teacher. This touching tribute is a wonderful summation of how Fine's music and legacy and lived on since 1962. Full Text

FINE RECORDINGS ON Q2 MUSIC

The world premieres of David Henning Plylar's two piano transcription of Fine's Toccata Concertante and Jefferson Friedman's The Heart Wakes Into (commissioned by the Irving and Verna Fine Fund in the Library of Congress) can now be heard at via WQXR's contemporary music station, Q2 Music.

FINE | transcr. PLYLAR Toccata Concertante for two pianos

FRIEDMAN | The Heart Wakes Into

BMOP RELEASES FINE'S
ORCHESTRAL WORKS

The Boston Modern Orchestra Project, The Irving Fine Society and Brandeis University are pleased to announce that the digital and CD versions of "Irving Fine: Complete Orchestral Works" are now available! Here's the press announcement and New York Times ReviewOrder CD | iTunes | Amazon

#IRVINGFINE100 IN NY TIMES

The Irving Fine Centennial was recently featured in a full-page article by Will Robin in The New York Times. This fantastic write-up affirms Fine's place as an important figure in America's neo-classical period. Click here to read the full article.

 

Left: Irving Fine conducting at Tanglewood in 1962, about two weeks before his death.

 

Irving Fine Collection, Library of Congress

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