School of Music composers' works garner multiple 2006 Grammy Award nominations

The nominees for the 48th Annual Grammy Awards were announced Thursday, December 8, and two University of Michigan composition professors garnered multiple nominations. The much-acclaimed recording of William Bolcom’s Songs of Innocence and of Experience led the field with three nominations: Best Classical Album, Best Choral Performance and Best Classical Contemporary Composition. A recording of "UFO" from Michael Daugherty's Philadelphia Stories, featuring conductor Marin Alsop and percussionist Evelyn Glennie, received a nomination for Best Instrumental Soloist Performance with Orchestra. And the recording of a second Bolcom work, Songs with soprano Carole Farley, garnered a nomination for Best Classical Vocal Performance.

Additionally, the recordings of Bolcom's Songs of Innocence and of Experience and Daugherty's Philadelphia Stories helped to earn a nomination for Tim Handley as Producer of the Year. The recording of Bolcom's Songs with soprano Carole Farley received a nomination in the Best Engineered Album, Classical category, again for Handley.

The recording of Songs of Innocence and of Experience, on the Naxos record label, features multiple School of Music ensembles: University Symphony Orchestra, Contemporary Directions Ensemble, Chamber Choir, University Choir, Orpheus Singers and the University Musical Society Choral Union --- under the baton of Leonard Slatkin. Also appearing on the recording are solos by Professors Carmen Pelton and Joan Morris.

The orchestras were prepared by Professor Kenneth Kiesler and the choirs by Professor Jerry Blackstone and graduate students William Hammer, Christopher Kiver, Carole Ott and Jason Harris. The concert staging presented on April 8, 2004 in the newly renovated Hill Auditiorium was a collaboration between the School of Music and the University Musical Society.

View the nomination list.

More on William Bolcom.

More on Michael Daugherty.