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Musicians
Barbara Allen
Born in Muskogee, Oklahoma. Spent most
of growing up years in Elmhurst, Illinois, West of Chicago.
Moved to New York City in 1970 after a year in Europe.
Married Arnold Perey, anthropologist and Aesthetic Realism
consultant in May of 1977, which continues happily today.
As a flutist with her colleague Edward Green, pianist,
has presented discussion and performances of important
works from the flute literature. For example:
- What We Can Learn about Love from Johann Sebastian
Bach’s Sonata in E-Flat
- Severity and Good Nature in Telemann’s Suite
in A Minor
- Dignity and Abandon in Handel’s Flute Sonata
in G Major
- Mozart’s Flute Concerto in G Shows the Victory
of Self-Questioning
Education: BA from the University of Illinois, Champaign-Urbana
1967. Taught English and Social Studies in the Chicago
Public Schools 67-69. Began study of Aesthetic Realism
with its founder Eli Siegel in 1970. Teacher of English
at Roosevelt Junior High School, West Orange, New Jersey
1971-1973. Aesthetic Realism Consultant 1972 to the
present.
Teacher of: Aesthetic Realism and Marriage
Class from 1973 to the present; Aesthetic
Realism and Education Workshop for Teachers from
1974 to the present; Learning to Like the World
Class for Children (ages 5-12) from 1975 to the
present; The Opposites in Music Class 1980
to the present.
Ms. Allen also teaches private flute classes. She says:
This principle by Eli Siegel enables students to
learn the art of flute playing and understand what
it means to play beautifully: "All beauty is
a making one of opposites, and the making one of opposites
is what we are going after in ourselves."
In my classes, flutists at every level learn how
opposites--like tenderness and severity, accuracy
and wildness, toughness and gentleness, cheerfulness
and sadness--are made one in successful flute playing.
Amazingly, a person's playing improves technically
as one understands better how one sees the same opposites
in one's own life.
We study questions like these: Does the way we see
the world affect how we play--our position, articulation,
breath control, phrasing? Is there anything in ourselves
that interferes with our attaining the greatest beauty
we are capable of?
And there is this: Musicians can learn--and need
to learn--from the beautiful way opposites are made
one in music to do a good job with these very opposites
in our lives. Through the critical method of Aesthetic
Realism, we can.
For more
information about studying the flute with Barbara Allen
Website of Barbara
Allen
Edward Green
Composer-in-Residence
Edward Green has been on the faculty of
the Aesthetic Realism Foundation since 1980. A prize-winning
composer, his music has been performed by orchestras
across the United States as well as in several countries
overseas—including Russia, the Czech Republic,
Argentina and England. He received first place in the
International Kodaly Composers Competition for his Brass
Quintet and a Delius award for his Genesis Variations.
In 2004 he was awarded a Music Alive! grant
jointly sponsored by the American Symphony Orchestra
League and Meet the Composer. He has composed overtures,
songs, and incidental music for several productions
of the Aesthetic Realism Theater Company, and has also
accompanied productions as pianist and harpsichordist.
Since 1984, Edward Green has been a professor at Manhattan
School of Music, teaching courses in Ethnomusicology,
Jazz History, Composition, and the Humanities. He is
included in Who’s Who among America’s
Teachers and in the International Who’s
Who in Music—both in their Classical and
Popular volumes.
Prior to Manhattan School of Music, he taught at St.
John’s University, Pace University, Brooklyn Conservatory
of Music, and the School of Visual Arts. He is currently
completing a Doctorate in Historical Musicology at New
York University.
Prof. Green has been a guest composer and lecturer
at Tanglewood, the University of Southern California
(Los Angeles), the University of Montreal, Baltimore's
Eubie Blake National Jazz Institute, Ithaca College,
Dartmouth University and other important educational
institutions. In 2003, he gave a Convocation Address
at the University of Denver’s Lamont School of
Music, and in 2004 participated in the First International
Conference on Interdisciplinary Musicology, held at
the University of Graz, Austria. His presentation, co-authored
with anthropologist Arnold Perey, was entitled “Aesthetic
Realism: A New Foundation for Interdisciplinary Musicology.”
The conference was sponsored by the European Society
for the Cognitive Sciences of Music.
In 1991 under the sponsorship of the Smithsonian Institution
Prof. Green addressed the International Association
of Jazz Educators' convention in Washington D.C. on
the subject "The Aesthetic Realism of Eli Siegel
Explains the Beauty of Jazz and of Duke Ellington."
He was a panelist discussing “Innovative Teaching
Methods” for the November, 2004 Annual Conference
of the Society for Ethnomusicology, held in Tucson,
where he spoke about the Aesthetic Realism Teaching
Method.
Prof. Green has also addressed conventions of the American
Society of University Composers, the American Musicology
Society (Greater New York Chapter), the New York School
Music Teachers Association, and in 2004 gave a talk
on the music of Richard Rodgers at the 28th annual Comparative
Drama Conference, sponsored by Ohio State.
He is scheduled to give a talk on the relation of Burney,
Hawkins and Rousseau at the “First Conference
of the Répertoire International de Littérature
Musicale.” The conference, to be held in March,
2005 at the Graduate Center of the City University of
New York, is titled Music’s Intellectual History
and later this year will be giving papers at scholarly
conferences in Dublin, Nottingham and Stratford-upon-Avon.
Edward Green has participated in seminars at the Aesthetic
Realism Foundation since the mid-1980’s, and among
his talks have been papers on the lives and music of
Johannes Brahms, Franz Joseph Haydn, Glenn Gould, Irving
Berlin, John Lennon, Hector Berlioz, Sir Arthur Sullivan,
Herbert von Karajan and Felix Mendelssohn.
Articles on music by Edward Green from the Aesthetic
Realism point-of-view have appeared in Composer
(England), Chinese Music Journal, The Journal
of Music and Meaning (Denmark/Internet), and School
Music News, among other academic journals.
Articles by him dealing with ethics of current social
matters, including the fight to end racism, have appeared
in newpapers and journals here and abroad, including
Black College Magazine, The African Observer,
and Christian Social Action. For several years
he was a featured columnist for the Nigerian journal
U.S. African Eye. He is also a contributor
to the book Aesthetic Realism and the Answer to
Racism (Orange Angle Press: 2004)
Edward Green’s music is published by Frederick
Harris Ltd. (Canada) and Frank Warren Music Service
(MA). Recordings of his music have appeared on Tintangel
Records, and VP Media of Italy, and in 2005 further
recordings will appear on Centaur Records, Arizona University
Recordings, and Albany Records.
Mr. Green, as pianist, frequently performs with flutist
Barbara Allen in concert at the Aesthetic Realism Foundation.
Among his current musical positions are those of Organist-Choir
Director at St. Paul’s Episcopal Church in Jersey
City, Composer-in-Residence of the InterSchools Orchestras
of New York., and Staff Composer at Imagery Films where
he has collaborated with the Emmy Award-winning filmmaker
Ken Kimmelman on several films, including What Does
a Person Deserve? and the soon-to-be-released Hot
Afternoons Have Been in Montana—a film based
on Eli Siegel’s Nation prize-winning poem.
Edward Green studied with Eli Siegel from 1974 to
1978, and continues his study of Aesthetic Realism in
classes taught by Ellen Reiss. He is married to Carrie
Wilson, singer, actress, and Aesthetic Realism Consultant,
and they make their home in Manhattan’s Lower
East Side.
To contact
Edward Green
Website
of Edward Green, composer and musician, and Aesthetic
Realism & World Music blog
Alan Shapiro
Born in Bethesda, MD, Alan Shapiro grew
up outside of Philadelphia, PA. A pianist, singer, arranger
and composer, he has played jazz piano professionally
for 25 years. For the past 18 years he has taught chorus
and general music in public schools in New York City
and on Long Island. In addition to being one of the
singers, Mr. Shapiro plays synthesizer and percussion
for the Aesthetic Realism Theatre Company's musical
production Ethics is a Force!--Songs about Labor.
Mr. Shapiro began his study of Aesthetic
Realism in consultations in 1985 and has studied with
Ellen Reiss in professional classes for consultants
and associates since 2003. He has presented papers in
public seminars at the Aesthetic Realism Foundation
on music of Duke Ellington, Louis Armstrong, Sergei
Rachmaninoff, Richard Wagner, Giuseppe Verdi and Franz
Joseph Haydn.
Along with his colleague Edward Green,
he has presented workshops on the Aesthetic Realism
Teaching Method at the annual winter and summer conferences
of the New York State School Music Association (NYSSMA).
Articles and letters by him about music, ethics and
economics have appeared in various newspapers around
the country.
Alan Shapiro lives in New York City with
his wife, Leila Rosen, who is a high school English
teacher and Aesthetic Realism Associate.
See his website at www.AlanShapiroMusic.net.
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