Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!swrinde!sdd.hp.com!spool.mu.edu!news.cs.indiana.edu!noose.ecn.purdue.edu!en.ecn.purdue.edu!davisonj From: davisonj@en.ecn.purdue.edu (John M Davison) Newsgroups: comp.music Subject: Re: Northwestern U. vs. Mills College? Message-ID: <1991May7.230059.26041@en.ecn.purdue.edu> Date: 7 May 91 23:00:59 GMT References: Organization: Purdue University Engineering Computer Network Lines: 35 In article ckk+@andrew.cmu.edu (Chris Koenigsberg) writes: >vital community where art is happening, but where people don't pay much >attention to more traditional things like orchestras :-) while at >Northwestern, I'll be isolated in an academic environment, where there >will be resources to pick up a lot of background material and do a lot >of studying and experimenting on my own, but there will not be much of >an exciting community happening. Well, you'll be practically in Chicago (about 5 minutes away), and whether or not you would consider that an "exciting" community is up to you. The Chicago Symphony Orchestra is there. The School of the Art Institute of Chicago is there too, but don't expect a whole lot of creativity to flow from that institution: Over the last ten years, the quality of education there has been severely degraded. Recently I went to a display of Master's theses in one of their galleries, and 60% of what I saw there was just plain crap, stuff that high school freshman art students can easily outdo, both conceptually and in terms of the quality of execution. Part of the Art Institute's problem is money. No one wants to give money to a school that supports controversial artists (e.g. the guy who painted Mayor Washington wearing women's underwear, and the guy whose exhibit encouraged attendees to step on a U.S. flag). Wergo has a CD out which has a work of Amnon Wolman on it; I don't know if that would help you or not. Iannis Xenakis taught at Mills for a while. I don't know of any big names showing up at Northwestern to teach, but last fall there was a John Pierce 80th birthday celebration which pulled in Max Mathews, Jean-Claude Risset, Richard Boulanger, Richard Ashley, and other famous people. So Wolman evidently has some ties. That's all I know; I hope it helps. John Davison davisonj@ecn.purdue.edu