 |
Jonathan
Chenette
Blanche
Johnson Professor of Music
|
Jonathan
Chenette, CPS biography
January 2, 2003
Research/Creative Activity: As a composer, I have
been drawn to projects emerging from the landscape and human
drama of the prairie Midwest. I am interested in connections
between artists and communities in the prairie region and
the ways in which the arts shape and reflect our views of
our environment. My music includes an opera, songs, choral
works, electronic music, and orchestral music based on my
readings of prairie literature and my collaborations with
other artists of the region. My most recent prairie-related
composition is Rural Symphony (2000), a three-movement orchestral
composition based on interviews with Iowa farm families and
recordings made during a visit to Kalsow Prairie in Iowa's
Webster County. This composition represented Iowa in a 50-state
millennium project organized by the American Composers Forum
and sponsored by the National Endowment for the Arts.
|
Jonathan Chenette
Blanche Johnson Professor of Music
|
 |
Teaching: For
many years I have asked my introductory composition class to
write music for voices, found objects, and sounds available
in a prairie location. We perform these as a class at a nearby
nature preserve. Students in electronic music collaborate with
art students on experimental videos developed from sounds and
images gathered from prairies and other outdoor locations. |
| As a result of my involvement in the Center for
Prairie Studies, I have taught a course called "The
Prairie Landscape and the Arts," dealing with depictions
of the prairie in the work of writers, painters, composers,
and filmmakers. My aim in these courses is to help students
think critically about their environment and the role the arts
can play in helping to understand, value, and imaginatively
transform their surroundings. |
. |
Return
to Meet the Faculty/Staff Page
Center
for Prairie Studies
Home
| Grinnell
College Home Page
Last
updated
03-Dec-2003
|