A Call For Papers

DePauw University is pleased to announce a symposium on “The Interaction of Poetry and Music,” on February 18, 2006. The symposium is being held in conjunction with Music of the 21st Century, an annual festival celebrating contemporary composers. Scholars from the fields of music and literature are invited to submit paper proposals for this symposium.

Jake Heggie will be the featured composer at the festival. The composer of the operas Dead Man Walking and The End of the Affair, Heggie has won numerous awards and honors. His songs and operas have been performed by internationally celebrated artists such as Renée Fleming, Frederica von Stade, and Bryn Terfel. Previous composers honored at Music of the 21st Century include George Crumb, Tanía León, and Augusta Read Thomas. This year’s festival is spread over five days. It will include student and faculty performances of contemporary works, a lecture/performance by the composer, and public masterclasses on composition and song performance led by Jake Heggie. A detailed schedule can be found here.
(The schedule will become more detailed.)

The symposium will feature a keynote address by Deborah Stein. Dr. Stein has published articles in music theory and musicology journals, and is author of Hugo Wolf’s Lieder and Extensions of Tonality. In 2004, Stein published a chapter in A Rebecca Clarke Reader and edited and contributed to a book, Engaging Music: Essays in Music Analysis. Her book Poetry Into Song: Performance and Analysis of Lieder, coauthored with pianist Robert Spillman, was named an Outstanding Academic Book of 1996 by Choice.

Proposed papers can be on any aspect of music and poetry in interaction. Topics may include analytical or theoretical studies from either discipline, historical contexts, cognitive theory, or technical aspects of composition. Proposals should be submitted electronically by November 28, 2005.

Proposals should be no longer than three pages (including footnotes or endnotes); they should be double-spaced and use a 12-point font. Proposals should be anonymous and articulate clearly the paper’s premise. Include a cover letter listing the title of the paper, the author’s name, with rank and institutional affiliation (if applicable), and the author’s address, telephone number and email address. Please also list any technical requirements (stereo, piano, computer, overhead projector, etc.) in the cover letter.

Proposals should be submitted electronically as either a MS Word or .pdf document email attachment to spiegelberg@depauw.edu. Please put “Symposium 2006” in the subject heading.

A liberal arts college with one of the oldest Schools of Music in the country, DePauw University is located in Greencastle, Indiana.