Soprano and Juilliard alumna Renee Fleming with Juilliard President Joseph W. Polisi and actress Laura Linney. Dr. Polisi was honored for his 25 years of leadership at a gala on Monday, April 26, 2010 in Juilliard's Peter Jay Sharp Theater. A dinner/dance followed in Lincoln Center's Damrosch Park. Photo by: Nan Melville

                The Juilliard School’s President’s Gala, a benefit evening on Monday, April 26, celebrating Juilliard President Joseph W. Polisi’s 25 years of leadership at the School, began with a gala performance at
7 PM in the School’s own Peter Jay Sharp Theater. Celebrated Juilliard alumni, soprano Renée Fleming (Voice, ’86), actress Laura Linney (Drama, Group 19), and choreographer Adam Hougland (BFA ’99) were featured along with performances from current students in Juilliard’s Dance, Drama, and Music Divisions, and with ‘surprise’ video greetings from a variety of Juilliard alumni and friends. The evening continued with dinner and dancing to the music of the Peter Duchin Orchestra at 8:30 PM on Lincoln Center Plaza.

Juilliard Board Chairman Bruce Kovner and his wife Suzie led the list of Chairs for the President’s Gala. Joining them were gala vice chairs: Bradley H. Jack and Lara Cairns, June Noble Larkin, Cynthia and Dan Lufkin, Nancy A. Marks, Stephanie and Carter McClelland, Dinny and Lester S. Morse, Jr., Susan and Elihu Rose, and Lisa and Charles Simonyi. Associate chairs are Beth and Christopher Kojima.

                The gala performance opened with two exceptional Juilliard Pre-College musicians, violinist Sirena Huang and cellist Sarina Zhang, in the Handel-Havorsen Passacaglia for Violin and Cello performed on instruments from Juilliard’s historic stringed instrument collection. Juilliard alumna, conductor Keri-Lynn Wilson (M.M. ’93), leads the Juilliard Orchestra in selections from Mozart’s Le nozze di Figaro featuring singers from Juilliard’s Vocal Arts department (Andreas Aroditis, Benjamin Bloomfield, Deanna Breiwick, Daniel Curran, Devon Guthrie, Carla Jablonski, Adrian Rosas, and Emalie Savoy). Adam Hougland has choreographed a world-premiere work, Six for Five, specially for the occasion set to Brahms’ String Sextet No. 1 in B-flat Major performed by the Afiara String Quartet (Juilliard’s graduate resident quartet) with cellist Jeremiah Campbell and violist Erik Peterson and five current Juilliard dancers. Juilliard actors followed with a series of monologues.

The program concluded with Juilliard Pre-College pianist Conrad Tao (Juilliard Pre-College, ’11) performing the last movement of Rachmaninoff’s Piano Concerto No. 3 in D Minor, Finale-Alla breve. Juilliard’s Resident Conductor, George Stelluto, leads Mr. Tao and the Juilliard Orchestra.

Proceeds from the evening benefit Juilliard and its students directly.

The 2009-2010 season marks the 25^th anniversary year for Juilliard President Joseph W. Polisi, who became the School’s sixth president in September 1984. During his tenure, Dr. Polisi has made substantial changes in the School’s culture and promoted a real-life awareness as to the opportunities and challenges of a 21^st-century conservatory graduate. New programs created include the establishment of a new student services; alumni programs; strengthening of liberal arts and humanities to the academic core; revitalization of Juilliard’s Doctoral of Musical Arts degree program and the establishment of the program as tuition-free; a new emphasis on leadership and arts advocacy among students; greater interaction between the three Juilliard divisions of music, dance, and drama; and substantial community outreach; not to mention two extensive renovation projects that include the construction of Juilliard’s first residence hall in 1991 and the recent $200 million addition of a 39,000 square feet that marks the first expansion of Juilliard’s classroom building since opening at Lincoln Center in 1969.

                Soprano Renée Fleming is an alumna of Juilliard where she studied with Beverley Johnson. Now acknowledged as one of the world’s great operatic singers, she graces the world’s greatest opera stages and concert halls, and her career extends into other mediums. During the past few seasons, Ms. Fleming has begun hosting a wide variety of television and radio broadcasts, including the Metropolitan Opera’s Live in HD series for movie theaters and television, and Live from Lincoln Center on PBS. In 2008, a precedent was broken when Ms. Fleming became the first woman in the 125-year history of the Metropolitan Opera to headline an opening night gala. As a musical statesman, she is sought after for numerous distinguished occasions, from the 2006 Nobel Peace Prize ceremony to performances in Beijing during the 2008 Olympic Games. On January 18, 2009, she performed for the televised We Are One: The Obama Inaugural Celebration at the Lincoln Memorial concert for President Obama. She has performed for the United States Supreme Court, HRH The Prince of Wales at Buckingham Palace, and celebrated the recent 20^th anniversary of the Velvet Revolution at the invitation of Václav Havel. Renée Fleming’s 2009-2010 operatic season at the Metropolitan Opera included performances of Strauss’s Der Rosenkavalier (October 2009; January 2010), and continues with a new production of Rossini’s Armida (April/May 2010), which is a MET premiere. She also appears at the Vienna State Opera in performances of Strauss’ Capriccio (June 2010) and at the Zurich Opera in Verdi’s La Traviata and Strauss’ Der Rosenkavalier (June/July 2010). A three-time Grammy winner, Ms. Fleming won the 2010 Grammy Award for Best Classical Vocal Performance for Verismo (Decca/September 2009), a CD featuring a collection of rarely heard Italian arias with the Orchestra Giuseppe Verdi di Milano conducted by Marco Armiliato.

                Actress Laura Linney received an Academy Award nomination in 2008 in the lead actress category for her role in the box office hit, The Savages, opposite Phillip Seymour Hoffman and also starred in the critically-acclaimed mini-series, John Adams, for which she won Emmy, SAG, and Golden Globe awards.

Additionally, Ms. Linney completed filming on the James Ivory film, City of Your Final Destination, opposite Sir Anthony Hopkins and Sympathy for Delicious with Orlando Bloom and Mark Ruffalo, and The Other Man with Liam Neeson and Antonio Banderas. Ms. Linney appeared in the Manhattan Theatre Club Production of Donald Margulies’ Time Stands Still. Ms. Linney starts production of the highly-anticipated Showtime series, The Big C, in which she will star and Executive Produce. Ms. Linney’s additional credits include many critically praised performances in films such as: You Can Count On Me; Kinsey; Love Actually; Mystic River; Congo; Absolute Power; The Truman Show, among others. Ms. Linney starred in Roundabout Theater Company’s revival of Christopher Hampton’s Les Liaisons Dangereuse, opposite Liam Neeson. In 2004, she starred in Donald Margulies’ Broadway re-staging of Sight Unseen, portraying different roles in the same play she did 12 years apart. For her role as Patricia, she received a Tony nomination, as well as nominations from the Drama League, the Drama Desk Club, and the Outer Critic Circle for Outstanding Actress in a play. Ms. Linney appeared on NBC’s comedy, Frasier, with fellow Juilliard alum Kelsey Grammer, in four episodes that closed the series and won a 2004 Emmy award for Best Outstanding Guest Actress in a Comedy Series. She graduated in Group 19 from Juilliard’s Drama Division.

                Choreographer Adam Hougland grew up in Dallas, Texas and studied visual arts and acting from an early age. At 14, he began his dance training at the Dallas Conservatory of Ballet and the Booker T. Washington High School for the Performing and Visual Arts. In 1999, he received his BFA degree in Dance from Juilliard and then went on to perform with Limón Dance, Toronto Dance Theatre, and the Lar Lubovitch Dance Company. While at Juilliard, he choreographed his first ensemble dance, Beyond, which won the Hector Zaraspe Prize for choreography. This piece set his choreographic career in motion and was quickly taken into the repertoires of Les Grands Ballets Canadiens de Montréal, Cincinnati Ballet, BalletMet Columbus, and the Louisville Ballet.

Mr. Hougland has gone on to create original works for Morphoses/The Wheeldon Company, the American Ballet Theatre Studio Company, Introdans in the Netherlands, Limón Dance, Cedar Lake Ensemble, and the New York Choreographic Institute at New York City Ballet. In 2006, Mr. Hougland created a world premiere for Juilliard’s centennial celebration that toured to Chicago and Los Angeles and was broadcast on PBS’ Live From Lincoln Center series. He has won the Princess Grace award for choreography and the Choo-San Goh, a New York State Council for the Arts Commissioning Grant, plus he was named one of Pointe magazine’s ten VIP’s of 2006.

Mr. Hougland is the principal choreographer for the Louisville Ballet creating five critically-acclaimed works for the company, most recently, Rite of Spring, with special guest artist Wendy Whelan (principal dancer, New York City Ballet). He recently was named resident choreographer for Cincinnati Ballet and created a world premiere to Mozart’s Requiem (March 2010). Last summer 2009, he created a world premiere for the Manchester International Festival, as a companion piece to three works dances by Carlos Acosta, which went on to Sadler’s Wells (London) in December 2009. Mr. Hougland also created Small Steps, a new solo work for Marcelo Gomes (principal dancer, American Ballet Theatre), which was performed during the Kings of the Dance tour.

Conductor Keri-Lynn Wilson made her Los Angeles Opera debut conducting La Rondine in
June 2008. She divides her conducting career between symphony orchestras and opera productions. In recent seasons, she conducted the Los Angeles Philharmonic, Montreal Symphony, Toronto Symphony, Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra and the New Jersey Symphony. Ms. Wilson also made debuts at the Leipzig Opera with the Gewandhaus Orchestra in a new production of Madama Butterfly; the Puccini Festival in Torre del Lago conducting Madama Butterfly; with the Toscanini Symphony in various Italian theaters conducting a new production of Rigoletto; and at the opening of the restored opera house in Ancona conducting a new production of Lucia di Lammermoor.

Sirena Huang began violin lessons at age four and currently is studying in Juilliard’s Pre-College Division with Stephen Clapp and Sylvia Rosenberg. She is a winner of numerous prizes in international competitions. She made her concerto debut with the National Taiwan Symphony Orchestra at age nine and three weeks later played with the Staatskapelle Weimar Orchestra in Germany.

American pianist, Conrad Tao, age 15, began playing children’s songs on the piano at about 18 months of age and has never looked back. Born in Urbana, Illinois, Mr. Tao started violin lessons at age 3 and formal piano lessons at 3 ½. Mr. Tao gave his first piano recital at age 4, and at age 8, he made his concerto debut with the Utah Chamber Music Festival Orchestra performing Mozart’s Piano Concerto in A Major, K. 414. Highlights of this coming season include recital debuts at the Gilmore Rising Stars series and the Louvre in Paris, a South American recital debut in Chile, as well as concerto performances with the Russian National Orchestra in Moscow and the Festival of the Arts BOCA, the Netherlands Radio Philharmonic Orchestra in Singapore, the Santa Fe ProMusica and Reno Philharmonic. Mr. Tao also is an accomplished composer. He currently is enrolled in Juilliard’s Pre-College Division and studies with Dr. Yoheved Kaplinsky. He studies composition privately with Christopher Theofanidis of Yale University, and studied violin for five years with Catherine Cho in Juilliard’s Pre-College Division. He resides in New York City with his parents and sister.

Sarina Zhang studies in Juilliard’s Pre-College Division as a double major in piano and cello with a minor in composition. She has collaborated with the San Diego Symphony, the Buffalo Philharmonic Orchestra, the New City Sinfonia, and the Northridge Symphony Orchestra. Most recently, she played Beethoven’s Piano Concerto No. 1 with Detroit Symphony Orchestra’s Civic Orchestra.

 

About The Juilliard School

 

The Juilliard School established this country's standard for education in the performing arts, beginning with music in 1905. In 1951, its Dance Division was established, with combined training in contemporary and ballet technique. Juilliard became part of Lincoln Center in 1968, and added a four-year drama program. A residence hall - the School's first - was completed in 1990, and in 2001, Juilliard broke new ground with the addition of its jazz program; a graduate program in Historical Performance began in the fall 2009, the same year that Juilliard announced its coming partnership with the Metropolitan Opera's Lindemann Young Artist Development Program. As Juilliard commences its second century of excellence, it has expanded its facilities with a 39,000 square-foot addition, completed in 2009. Currently more than 800 young artists from 39 states (plus Washington, D.C.) and 46 foreign countries attend Juilliard.

Among Juilliard’s notable alumni are acclaimed performers throughout both classical and popular culture. Just a sampling of that variety follows: David Auburn, Morena Baccarin, Pina Bausch, Kenji Bunch, Van Cliburn, James Conlon, Miles Davis, Viola Davis, Simone Dinnerstein, Renée Fleming, Philip Glass, Kelsey Grammer, Katori Hall, Marvin Hamlisch, William Hurt, Kevin Kline, James Levine, David Lindsay-Abaire, Laura Linney, Lar Lubovitch, Patti LuPone, Yo-Yo Ma, Anthony Mackie, Wynton Marsalis, Audra McDonald, Nico Muhly, Bebe Neuwirth, Itzhak Perlman, Steve Reich, Neil Sedaka, Adam Shankman, Nina Simone, Kevin Spacey, Paul Taylor, Michael Urie, Robin Williams, Meredith Willson, among many others. An education at Juilliard truly represents the world of dance, drama, and music.