Musicatlas
News for Lifchitz
- Lifchitz given a Lifetime Achievement Award
[posted 13 November 2009]Max Lifchitz has been given a Lifetime Achievement Award from the Zethus Fund for Contemporary Music. Composer and Zethus Fund Executive Director Robert Martin announced the $10,000 award for Lifchitz, whose involvement in new music encompasses a broad range of activities—conductor, composer, pianist, and the founder/director of the North/South Consonance performing group, concert series, and recording label.
Lifchitz, who was born in Mexico City in 1948 and has been based in the United States since 1966, is a graduate of The Juilliard School and Harvard University. He has served on the faculties of Columbia University and the State University of New York at Albany where he has been a mentor to generations of younger composers and musicians.
As a composer, Lifchitz has composed works in numerous media spanning solo works to pieces for full symphony orchestra. And as a pianist and conductor he has championed the music of composers encompassing a broad range of styles.
For the past 30 years, North/South Consonance has presented a series of concerts devoted to new music by composers from the United States and Latin America and to date has released over 50 CD recordings of new music.
To learn more about the activities of North/South Consonance please visit http://www.northsouthmusic.org.
(—Condensed from the press release)
Published: 11/10/2009 at http://www.newmusicbox.org/article.nmbx?id=6185
Music
Orchestral
- Piano Concerto
- lntervención (for violin and orch.)
- Night Voices No. 13 (for cello and orchestra)
- Yellow Ribbons Nos. 8, 9, 17, 18, 37 & 40
Large Ensemble
- Globos
- Roberta
- Tiempos
- Yellow Ribbons Nos. 11, 12 & 41 (wind ensemble)
Chamber Ensemble
- Exceptional String Quartet (four double basses)
- I Got Up (trombone, double bass, percussion, electronics)
- Night Voices No. 8 (marimba and chamber ensemble)
- Night Voices No. 10 (violin and chamber ensemble)
- Winter Counterpoint (flute, oboe, bassoon, viola, piano)
- Yellow Ribbons No. 2 (violin, clarinet, and piano)
- Yellow Ribbons No. 5 (two clarinets and piano)
- Vignettes (wind quintet)
For Two Performers
- Duo (violin and cello)
- Mosaico Latinoamericano (flute and piano)
- Night Voices No. 1 (two clarinets, string quartet and piano)
- Night Voices No. 3 (oboe and piano)
Percussion
- Rhythmic Soundscape (piano and percussion)
- Music for Percussion (five percussionists)
- Inner Pulse (solo percussion)
- Pulsations & Dos Danzas (four percussionists)
Band
Mosaico MexicanoSolo Instruments
- Transformations No. 1 (cello)
- Transformations No. 2 (violin)
- Transformations No. 3 (marimba)
- Affinities (piano)
- Tientos (accordion)
- Yellow Ribbons No. 16 (double bass)
- Yellow Ribbons No. 39 (flute)
Vocal Works
- Canto de Paz (soprano and ensemble)
- Villancios Rebeldes (Chorus)
- Latin American Christmas Songs (Chorus)
- Of Bondage and Freedom (sop, vln, pno)
Life
Max Lifchitz is active as a composer, performer, arts administrator and educator.
A graduate of The Juilliard School and Harvard University, he was invited to join the faculty of the University at Albany, State University of New York in 1986. Previously, he held teaching appointments at the Manhattan School of Music and Columbia University.
In addition to teaching a variety of music courses and general education offerings, Lifchitz has served as Chair of both the University at Albany’s Music Department and the Latin American and Caribbean Studies Department, where he holds a joint appointment.
He received the University at Albany Award for Excellence in Research in 2005.
His creative endeavors have been supported by grants and fellowships from the ASCAP Foundation; the Ford Foundation; the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation; Meet the Composer, Inc.; The University of Michigan Society of Fellows; the CAPS Program of New York State; and the National Endowment for the Arts.
As a pianist, Lifchitz was awarded the first prize in the 1976 Gaudeamus Competition for Performers of Contemporary Music held in Holland. His concert appearances throughout Latin America have been underwritten by the Fund for US Artists at International Festivals. Recently, he appeared as conductor of the Houston-based Foundation for Modern Music Ensemble and as pianist in the Grand Canyon Music Festival (Arizona) and the Nuovi Spazi Musicali Festival (Rome, Italy).
Lifchitz is the founder and artistic director of North/South Consonance, Inc., a non-profit organization based in New York City devoted to the promotion and performance of music by composers from the Americas.
Active since 1980, the North/South Consonance Ensemble has received grants from, among others, the Aaron Copland Fund, the Yvar Mikhashoff Fund for New Music, the Virgil Thomson Foundation; the Mary Flagler Cary Charitable Trust, the JP Morgan Chase/Meet the Composer Fund, the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs, the New York State Council for the Arts and the National Endowment for the Arts. It has also received contributions from several corporations and numerous individual donors.
North/South Consonance Inc. sponsors an annual concert series in New York City featuring new chamber music from the Americas and has issued forty-two highly acclaimed compact discs on the North/South Recordings label.
Lifchitz is represented as composer, pianist and conductor on several CD and LP albums issued by the Classic Masters, CRI, Finnadar, New World, North/South, Opus One, Philips, RCA Victor and Vienna Modern Masters labels.