Brustein became Dean of the Yale School of Drama — now the David Geffen School of Drama — in 1966 after leaving his professorship at Columbia University. After arriving in New Haven, he founded the Yale Repertory Theatre. He remained at Yale for 13 years before departing for Harvard, where he established the American Repertory Theatre in 1979. 

“Bob … refin[ed] the conservatory model of training at Yale by professionalizing the faculty and bringing distinguished guest artists to New Haven,” wrote James Bundy DRA ’95, the current Drama School dean and artistic director of the Yale Repertory Theatre. “He was committed to exploring new directions in playwriting and theater making and also to relevant and vivid productions of canonical works. These remain hallmarks of the Rep.” 

Student demand brought Brustein to Yale, said Lonnie Carter DRA ’69, who was a first-year student at the beginning of Brustein’s tenure. While Carter had not yet been a student, he characterized students’ desire to bring Brustein from Columbia as a “mutiny.”

Before Brustein became the dean of the Drama School in 1966, David Epstein DRA ’68, a student when Brustein arrived, was considering leaving the school. Epstein said that it focused on “asinine” practices that did not reflect the “excitement of what was happening in the theater in the 60s.” 

This all changed with Brustein, who brought in renowned actors from across the U.S. and from England to teach –– such as Kenneth Haig, Irene Worth and Richard Gillman. According to Epstein, Brustein focused on bringing in active professionals who could better prepare drama students for the world of professional theater. 

In addition to this new approach to pedagogy, Brustein embraced newness and experimentation in the productions held at the Yale Repertory Theatre. After his graduation, Epstein said that Brustein “kept him around,” putting on Epstein’s plays at the Theater and asking Epstein to be the first producer of the newly-formed Yale Cabaret. 

“You were given the opportunity to try anything,” said Epstein. “That’s a pretty terrific passport to be given. Two of my closest, longest-lasting, writing friends from Yale — Lonnie Carter ‘69 and Robert Bob Montgomery ’71 — are terrific playwrights, but their style of writing was totally different from mine. Bob was a big supporter of both of those guys as well. He was not looking for what had been done before. He was looking for what was coming next.” 

Brustein’s legacy in the world of theater has been matched by very few American theater-makers, said Ron Daniels, a director and frequent collaborator at the Yale Repertory Theatre. To those who were close to Brustein, his legacy also encompassed his sense of “adventure” as a theater-maker and “deep” loyalty to the actors and directors he worked with, Daniels said. 

The artistic liberties Brustein gave to the actors and directors of the Yale Repertory Theatre reflected how much he cared about the work, Daniels told the News.

“He gave me enormous freedom,” Daniels said. “He was always after new ideas, after new thinking, after new people to work with, and at the same time, deeply, deeply loyal. That was the most important thing about him — he really cared about the work, and he cared about the ideas in the work.” 

Brustein shied away from productions that “everybody else was doing,” per Daniels. Brustein was “adamantly” against showcasing the works of popular playwrights at the time, such as Tennessee Williams and Arthur Miller, both of whom had frequently showcased their work on Broadway productions and were established names in the world of theater.

Beyond his list of accomplishments, Brustein is remembered as a “family man,” who not only cared about his wife and children but also about members of the theater community, whom he considered a part of his family. 

For instance, Brustein’s loyalty and care for Daniels extended beyond their shared time at the Yale Rep — Brustein offered Daniels a job after coincidentally running into him in London.

“My prospect of being out of work was looming ahead,” said Daniels. “I just happened to bump into Bob on the street in Sloane Square in England. I told him, ‘Look, I’m going to be out of work.’ And he said, ‘Come to me immediately.’ Not a moment’s hesitation. And that’s what I mean by loyalty. He was true to his word.”

Brustein was committed to the idea of a theater company — an organization made up of actors, directors and producers that collectively run a production. Brustein “held people together,” said Daniels, who, among other theater-makers and actors, followed Brustein to Harvard after his departure from Yale. 

During Brustein’s time at Harvard, Daniels said that Brustein’s theater philosophy and “aesthetic aspirations” largely remained the same. Founding members and professors at the Drama School and Yale Repertory Theatre, such as Rob Orchard DRA ’72, Jeremy Geidt and Jan Geidt, played similar roles at the American Repertory Theatre. 

“I’m not sure that that happens nowadays,” said Daniels. “Nowadays, it’s much more to do with ad hoc. You employ actors, they do the play, and then they go away. They don’t stay for 234 plays.” 

Brustein was also an outspoken advocate for non-profit theater. In an article with the New York Times, he said that the profit-driven goals of commercial theater did not align with those of noncommercial theater, which aimed to “create the conditions whereby works of art can be known.” 

While the Yale Repertory Theatre was not profit-focused, Daniels and Carter said that they never felt restricted by financial constraints during their times as directors and actors, respectively. Carter said that he never felt that he “didn’t know where [his] next check was coming from.” 

According to Daniels, the Yale Repertory Theatre was not concerned about finances because of Brustein’s strong fundraising efforts. He was a natural charmer and could easily get wealthy patrons “to open their purses,” said Daniels. Carter also said that the Yale Repertory Theatre enjoyed financial support from the University, largely due to former Yale President Kingman Brewster’s support of the arts. 

“[The University] was keeping the lights on,” said Carter. “The president at the time supported Bob and said ‘this is nonprofit theater, and we’re doing an alternative to commercial theater. We’re gonna do what’s challenging to us and challenging to our audiences.’”

This financial luxury and stability was unique for a nonprofit theater at that time, said Carter, and it’s still unique today. He recalled how Arvin Brown, a former artistic director of Long Wharf Theatre, held out his cup and said ‘please give me money.’”   

Theater companies still confront these “economic realities” today, said Daniels. He said that these financial difficulties were exacerbated by the pandemic and pointed to the large number of companies closing down or experiencing cutbacks in funding. 

As challenging as it is to sustain nonprofit theater, Bundy said that profit-driven theater fails to provide a space to pose “urgent moral and aesthetic questions” raised by great works of dramatic literature. 

“Robert Brustein saw clearly that Yale could invest in artistry and challenging ideas for the benefit of audiences and of the field,” wrote Bundy. “In the 57 years since he founded Yale Rep, the work done at our theater, and by graduates in the field, has proven the value of his thesis over and over again, and the wider resident nonprofit theater movement that owes so much to his vision has become the predominant engine of artistry in both the nonprofit and for-profit theater.”

During his tenure as artistic director of the Yale Repertory Theatre, from 1966 to 1979, and of the American Repertory Theatre, from 1980 to 2002, Brustein oversaw over 200 productions.

The post Remembering Yale Repertory Theatre founder Robert Brustein appeared first on Yale Daily News.

As stated in his inaugural address, Salovey hoped to “enhance excellence” in art faculties and foster “inspiring galleries, museums and library collections.”  

“These aspirations have since guided my focus on the arts across disciplines,” Salovey told the News. “Significant strategic investments have not only maintained but augmented Yale’s standing as a preeminent institution of the arts — and produced many memorable milestones of which I am proud. Each of these was only successful because members of our community have worked together toward those goals.”

Salovey’s involvement with these projects has ranged from spearheading University-wide initiatives to appointing personnel to execute these visions, to securing funds for these plans. Specifically, he was closely involved in the Robina Foundation’s $18 million endowment of the Binger Center for New Theatre in 2012, said James Bundy, dean of the David Geffen School of Drama. 

President Salovey also “forged the extraordinary partnership” with American business magnate David Geffen, according to Bundy. These efforts led to Geffen’s $150 million donation — the largest gift made in the history of American theater. The donation has covered, and will continue to cover, tuition for all School of Drama students since the fall of 2021. 

Juilliard followed in Yale’s footsteps and made its graduate acting program tuition-free in 2023. 

“The Geffen School is an exemplar of access,” said Bundy. “It was wonderful to see a peer school like Juilliard also expanding access by making its MFA program tuition-free — our field needs more quality training programs that prioritize access in this way.” 

Salovey has also made significant headway in supporting literature at Yale.

According to Michael Morand, Director of Community Engagement at the Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Salovey is someone who “walks the walk” in supporting and participating in the arts at Yale. 

Morand specifically pointed to the Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library’s Windham-Campbell Literature Prizes, which launched in 2013 and annually provide eight writers with prizes of $185,000. Recent winners include Cathy Park Hong, C.E. Morgan, Ike Hotler and John Keene. 

“He’s a cheerleader and participant in the [Windham-Campbell] program,” Morand said. “All of the winners come to a festival at the beginning of September. The prize ceremony and lecture is always led by President Salovey. President Salovey has been an enthusiastic and important part of the prize program and the festival.” 

Salovey’s contributions to the arts are reflected in the personnel that he has appointed over the years. He welcomed Susan Gibbons as the vice provost for collections and scholarly communication and chief of staff to the president in 2021, an “unprecedented collaboration amongst arts institutions and museum collections at Yale,” said Morand. 

In 2019, Salovey appointed Courtney Martin as the sixth director of the Yale Center for British Art. Since then, her work has championed Salovey’s greater vision for engagement with the New Haven community, said Salovey. 

“Yale Center for British Art is thriving under the inspired leadership of Courtney Martin,” said Salovey. “As the Center undergoes a fourth phase of conservation and renovation, I especially appreciate Courtney’s work to retain its programmatic focus on New Haven students, including through Community Day and after-school enrichment activities.” 

Beyond collaborations with the local New Haven community, Salovey has aimed to connect Yale resources and faculty to a global audience. 

Salovey said that arts faculty members were important facilitators of these international partnerships. He named the Institute for the Preservation of Cultural Heritage — a research collaborative dedicated towards the study of material culture — and the Yale University Art Gallery’s partnership with museums in Nigeria — a part of an initiative launched during Salovey’s own travels to Nigeria. 

When asked about his hopes for the next president, Morand said that he hopes to see “continued cheerleading and support” for Yale arts. While there has been significant development in collaboration, accessibility and community engagement, Morand said that there is “always room to build and strengthen them further.” 

Bundy said that he hopes for Salovey’s successor to expand upon his “impressive legacy.” According to Bundy, the interactive nature of Yale’s arts collections offers a unique asset to the institution. 

“I see opportunities to strengthen Yale’s conception of … practice — along with scholarship, teaching, research and preservation — as central to the University’s strategic competitive advantage,” said Bundy. “Across the campus, what unites us, and lends efficacy to our work, is creativity.” 

In 1955, the Department of Drama in the School of Fine Arts, now the David Geffen School of Drama, was reorganized as a separate professional school — the first of its kind in the Ivy League.

The post Salovey and the arts appeared first on Yale Daily News.

For the first time since public records started at the Office of Institutional Research in 2000, the number of graduates in science, technology, engineering or mathematics fields has outpaced the number of Yale College arts and humanities graduates. 

According to public records from the Office of Institutional Research, which date back to 2000, Yale has seen a consistent decline in humanities enrollment — majors like English, history and classics — since 2007, reflecting a broader national trend toward STEM.  

In 2020, during the COVID-19 pandemic, there appeared to be a moment of revival in the number of humanities and arts majors at Yale. The overall trend, however, still leans overwhelmingly toward STEM, and more Yale students are declaring STEM majors than ever before. 

In the 2021-2022 academic year, registration in arts and humanities were at 320, compared to 340 and 579 in physical sciences and engineering and social science, respectively. Broadly, STEM encompasses majors like Molecular, Cellular and Developmental Biology, Molecular Biophysics and Biochemistry, Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Computer Science and Mathematics.

National data reflect the same trend; the National Center for Education Statistics found that the number of graduates in the humanities declined by 29.6 percent from 2012 to 2020, as students have increasingly come to view college as an investment rather than an experience.

In part driven by a desire to attract and retain more STEM students, Yale has made landmark investments in some of its science and engineering sectors in recent years.  The University is investing $350 million in a new Physical Sciences and Engineering Building and Yale’s expansion of its School of Engineering & Applied Science is planning to add 45 new faculty members.

In February 2022, Yale also announced plans to distinguish the School of Engineering & Applied Science faculty from the Faculty of Arts and Sciences. 

The admissions office’s keenness for prospective STEM applicants and the University’s overall institutional emphasis on STEM is not new. Nine years ago, in 2014, although the University aimed for a first-year class that consisted of 40 percent STEM majors, only about 25 percent of the class of 2014 graduated with a STEM major. 

In 2014, responding to concerns that other higher learning institutions were offering more rigorous STEM programs, Dean of Undergraduate Admissions Jeremiah Quinlan assured prospective students that they would not miss out on opportunities for cutting-edge research and funding opportunities if they chose Yale. 

“If [the trend toward STEM] happens here, it’s just a sign of how bad it is in the country because you know, Yale is a great university across the board,” said Lucas Bender, the director of undergraduate studies, or DUS, for the East Asian Languages and Literatures major. “But historically, Yale’s strength has been in the humanities and the arts. It’s one of the only universities that has top-ranked music programs, drama and opera programs.”

Bender said that applicants often self-select when they choose Yale. He gave the example of someone having a choice between the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Yale, commenting that if the applicant were a science person, they would probably have chosen MIT. However, the increasing emphasis on STEM at Yale reflects much larger national trends that merit further exploration, he added. 

Another reason for these patterns, according to Bender, is economics — he said that students with art or humanities degrees may be concerned that they will not get high enough paying jobs to cover the costs of college.

But an overall trend within arts and humanities does not necessarily reflect individual trends on a major and degree basis. According to former art DUS Lisa Kereszi the number of art majors increased from 2013 to 2023. She cited the eradication of course fees and a surge in interest in “self-expression” and “artmaking” as a possible cultural reaction to current events and the political landscape. This in turn could have driven increases in art majors, she explained.  

The options and flexibility offered by double majors might also explain the rise of STEM. According to Kereszi, there were more arts major students who also had another major last year than ever before: about 40 percent in 2022-2023, compared to the usual 25 to 30 percent, she said. Bender echoed that students who are double majoring have a high tendency to choose humanities as their second if their first is STEM-oriented. 

Some students remain hopeful about the future of arts and humanities at Yale, calling attention to the importance of studying what speaks to one’s interests.

“While there is a place for the pre-professional, I find it more rewarding to study our intrinsic humanity through the words and deeds of the world’s greatest thinkers, and seek the roots of the beauty of our shared culture,” said Camillo Padulli, ’25, who is majoring in history. “Yale has traditionally been a nexus for learning about the classic tenets of high Western civilization, and I would feel loath to miss out on that.”

In 1861, Yale conferred the first doctorate of philosophy ever awarded in the United States.

The post DATA: Yale College trends toward graduating more STEM than humanities and arts majors appeared first on Yale Daily News.

The project began in 2008 with the establishment of Yale’s Office for Digital Access and Infrastructure. In 2011, the project gained momentum as Yale developed a cross-collection discovery platform. This platform was the first of its kind to include digital resources from the Yale Center for British Art, the Yale University Art Gallery, the Yale Peabody Museum and the Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library. After years of evaluation and fine-tuning, LUX was finally released to the public this past May.

“[LUX is a] single cross collection and discovery environment that could reveal relationships between things across collections,” said Robert Sanderson, co-chair of Yale’s Bias Awareness and Responsibility Committee.

According to their website, the Bias Awareness and Responsibility Committee was created to ensure that Yale is held accountable for the biases present in how they describe and present their cultural heritage selections. 

Anyone can explore the treasure trove that is LUX. Online visitors can get an up-close look at Aztec pottery, peruse through a gallery of Renaissance paintings and read through Shakespeare’s complete anthology all in one place. 

The archive helps facilitate quick searching and research by allowing users to select a variety of filters such as location, object type and material. Once a user finds their desired work, LUX gives a detailed description of the work, along with its physical location at the University. 

“We always do things better in a team than we do separately — it’s just undeniable,” Sanderson said. “So in following that ethos, we’ve seen in progress this project to connect our platforms.” 

Communication between Yale’s various artistic institutions proved vital to the creation of LUX. The platform showcases the multidisciplinary aspects and widespread coverage of Yale’s galleries. 

Students told the News that they hope the new ease of research across Yale’s archives with LUX will make writing about and analyzing artifacts more efficient. 

“It’ll eliminate a lot of wasted time by … [allowing me] to search through all of Yale’s resources before actually going to the museum to look at something,” said Olivia Fayemi ’27, who is an art history major.

Fayemi highlighted how convenient it would be to gain more direct access to the breadth of resources and historical collections Yale has to offer, adding that LUX will help her “take advantage” of what she can for her degree.

LUX currently features an archive of more than 17,000,000 objects and 13,000,000 works from over 500,000 locations across the world. Included in this collection are original sketches by Leonardo da Vinci, clay vessels from the Incan empire and fossils from the Moreau River. 

According to Sanderson, LUX is more than an archive as he claimed it represents a celebration of the artifacts and texts that people have made throughout history. He said LUX also serves as a reminder of the diversity, equity and inclusion goals that Yale has yet to achieve. As co-chair of the Bias Awareness and Responsibility Committee, Sanderson described how the group addresses the complications that come with publicizing art from a variety of cultures.

“We have to rely on the providers of that data to be respectful … We want to be respectful of other cultures, while still providing information as openly as possible,” he said. 

Descriptions of sources are available in a variety of languages. Additionally, Sanderson said the LUX team worked with people with disabilities to make LUX more accessible. 

LUX’s Open Access Policy is a keystone feature of the website. This means that anyone, regardless of their affiliation with Yale, has access to LUX and all of its data. 

“I think it’s quite a luxury to have LUX,” Bella Le ’27 said. “Coming from a school that did not have … adequate resources for research, I think it’s nice to have such an accredited institution provide these [for] free … to the public.” 

The LUX team has been in contact with universities such as the University of Oxford and the University of Cambridge, as well as local museums and art galleries, to discuss the digitization and release of their archives, according to Sanderson. 

Founded in 1832, the Yale University Art Gallery is the oldest collegiate art museum in the Western hemisphere.

The post New Yale digital archive, LUX, lights the way for greater access to University collections appeared first on Yale Daily News.

García-León served as The Juilliard School’s dean of academic affairs and assessment for nine years. He succeeds Robert Blocker, who had a 28-year tenure at the School of Music.

“The school is in a wonderful place right now,” García-León said. “I arrive with a sense of awe and admiration. My goal is to honor the school’s great history and reputation while finding ways to invigorate the general training and establish new paths towards the future.”

Born in Seville, Spain, García-León graduated from the Conservatorio Superior de Música de Sevilla with highest honors before earning his bachelor’s degree in music from the State University of New York at Binghamton and his doctorate in piano performance from the Manhattan School of Music. 

Prior to his time at Juilliard, García-León was associate dean of the College of Arts and Sciences at the University of New Haven. 

His decision to switch from a professorship to an administrative role was “sparked” by his goal of helping students and faculty in a “more substantial way” by working within the administration. 

Emily Bakemeier, vice provost for arts and faculty affairs at Yale, chaired the University’s search committee. The search process, which she described as “very rigorous,” combined efforts from two groups: Bakemeier’s Yale search committee, composed of faculty from the School of Music and other related areas of the University, and Isaacson, Miller — an external search firm that includes professionals who specialize in the arts.

The Yale search committee first engaged in “stakeholder conversations” with School of Music faculty, staff, students and alumni before writing a position description. Then, after they received applications, the committee interviewed applicants and nominees, narrowing down the field to a few candidates before sending the names to University President Peter Salovey for the final decision.

“The Yale School of Music is the premier school of music in the world, so we were looking for the best in the world,” Bakemeier said. “We wanted someone who is a leader in the arts, and, for the music school in particular, a musician themself, who understands a complex, educational institution and its workings and has the highest standards of excellence for a school of music.”

Alec Chai MUS ’24, a student involved in the search committee’s stakeholder conversations, cited the School of Music’s renowned faculty and the full scholarships and stipends that it provides its students as “an incredible gift” from Blocker’s tenure.

But there are “opportunities of growth” that Chai hopes García-León will address during his deanship.

“I’ve heard students express a desire for expansion in certain programs, such as performance of baroque, contemporary and jazz music,” Chai said. “Many of us performers also wish there were more opportunities for individual and chamber music performances.”

García-León’s scholarly research focuses on the similarities and differences between Argentine tango and tango flamenco, the roots of multiculturalism in flamenco music and music composition. As dean, he hopes to balance “well-versed tradition” with “new expertise in the latest trends in the field.”

He said that this balance is even more important today, noting that the “pace and range of change” of transformation in the world of classical music has “increased greatly” over the last several years.

“We are in the midst of a time of renewal in the profession, both in the ways music is shared with audiences, be it recorded or live, and in terms of which music should be prioritized and showcased in performances,” García-León said. “The curriculum needs to be as current and relevant to the profession as we can possibly make it.”

García-León is in “complete agreement” with Chai’s hopes for additional performance opportunities and expanded programs in baroque, contemporary and jazz.

He looks forward to having many conversations with current students and alumni like Chai “to incorporate their feedback and suggestions in [his] planning.”

“Musicians can only benefit from having the choice to expand their training to include a variety of styles and traditions,” he said. “Not only will it help them be more versatile as performers, but I firmly believe it will also help them understand more deeply their own craft in classical music.”

He also hopes to develop more performance opportunities for students. To this end, he wants to “create and nurture” a sense of community beyond the school, a quality that he believes is tied closely to “welcoming and engaging” student events and performances.

For García-León, collaboration and openness are integral to expansion in more non-traditional programs. García-León said that collaboration is key to “where music is heading.” He hopes to connect the School of Music with other areas of the University and beyond.

“We need to start with enhancing collaboration from what is closest to us, within the [School of Music], but also — and very importantly — with other areas of the university,” García-León said. “So that, as it develops, it can expand to the New Haven area and beyond. I hope students will relish the opportunity to create community wherever they are, starting at the [School of Music] and Yale, and later on, wherever they go.”

García-León has performed as a solo piano recitalist at prestigious venues around the world, including the Big Hall at the Tchaikovsky Conservatory, the Weill Recital Hall at Carnegie Hall and the St. Petersburg International Music Festival. He is a member of the Northeast Chapter of the College Music Society and the Music Teachers National Association. 

“It is an honor and a privilege to serve [the students and faculty at the School of Music] in every way I can,” García-León said.

The School of Music offers three graduate degrees: master’s degrees in music and musical arts, and a doctoral degree in musical arts.

The post José García-León appointed dean of the School of Music appeared first on Yale Daily News.

Since then, Tesori, a lecturer of musical theater composition at Yale’s Department of Music, has written four Tony-nominated Broadway scores — “Twelfth Night at Lincoln Center,” “Thoroughly Modern Millie,” “Caroline” and “Shrek the Musical” — in addition to two Tony-winning scores — “Fun Home” and, most recently, “Kimberly Akimbo,” a musical about a lonely teenage girl who suffers from a condition that gives her the appearance of an elderly woman.

Tesori’s initial encounter with music began with her family piano. The piano was a world that “just made sense” to her. 

“It occurs to me when I work with young people in music, that there is an innate wisdom that every young person has. They just do. I don’t think it can always be expressed in language, but it can be expressed in intention or directionality,” Tesori said. “There’s just this natural impulse and natural matching. Sometimes when we teach people, we almost take the saran wrapping of their natural abilities away and put something on top of them.” 

Instead, Tesori encourages her students to embrace their inherited musical gifts, a lesson inspired by the oral music traditions of folk music. On the first day of classes, Tesori always poses a question to her students: “Who are you bringing into the room with you?” 

Tesori’s teaching philosophy is then to give direction to these parts of the students’ musical identities. The key is to help students’ ambition meet their skill level, said Tesori. 

“What’s your ancestral pull? What is the culture that you’re from, that you want to explore, if you want to explore that? Who is here with you? Because you are not here alone, you are many, many things that create your point of view — you’re writing from a specific place,” Tesori said.  

For Tesori herself, she brings her own specific combination of inspirations into the room: her Italian heritage and storytelling, musical styles of neo-traditionalism and directors with whom she’s worked — namely, American playwright and director, George C Wolfe. 

According to Tesori, Wolfe has warned her not to be deceived or trapped in musical beauty, teaching her that beauty is a product of music and not a source. 

Instead, Wolfe encouraged her to be aware of the intentionality and politics of her musical choices. 

“When we were first working together, he would say, ‘What are you doing with your left hand?’ And because I had been trained as a pianist, you can easily smoke people by just sort of being fancy with your hands,” Tesori said. “And I thought, ‘No director ever asked me what I’m doing with my left hand.’ But what he was saying was, nothing is neutral. Nothing is neutral: every prop, every measure, every left hand, bass note. Of course, you’re free to choose anything. But if you start listening to the piece, it starts telling you what it wants.”

When Tesori writes dramatic music, there are two things that interest her: a compelling storyline and characters who have yet to take center stage in the canon of musical theater. “Fun Home” centers around the voice of a queer female protagonist — the first of its kind on Broadway. In the opera “Blue,” an African American family faces tension as the son confronts his police officer father for upholding an oppressive police system. 

Fellow Musical Theater lecturer Joshua Rosenblum ’83 MUS ’85 applauded Tesori’s ability to create “three-dimensional, fully-fleshed” characters on stage. As a fellow lecturer who teaches part-time and works professionally in the musical theater industry, Rosenblum has emphasized how lecturers’ professional work outside of the classroom can influence their teaching inside the classroom. 

“When you’re at Yale, you assume that your teachers have a certain amount of experience and a certain amount of expertise. And I think you’re all sort of programmed to accept what they say, almost by habit,” Rosenblum said. “But if you see that they are out in the field and actually practicing the art and being successful enough to get shows produced, then you’re even more inclined to say, ‘Oh, this person actually is a so-called ‘expert,’ and so maybe I better pay attention to what they have to say.’” 

To Natalie Brown ’25 and many other students, Tesori is a “fairy godmother” of sorts. Brown, who is a singer-songwriter in addition to being a full-time student, first encountered Tesori while taking “Advanced Composition for Musical Theater.” 

When Brown wrote an adaptation of Ntozake Shange’s “For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide,” Tesori helped Brown contact the estate of Shange and put her in touch with WME, Brown’s current agency. 

Brown particularly emphasized Tesori’s generosity and excitement to help young students as something rare and rather unexpected in the world of commercial musical theater. Furthermore, she stated that Tesori’s confidence in her students’ artistic abilities manifests in the way that she teaches them. 

“She really tailored the class to meet us where we were at, instead of having a prescribed curriculum and kind of forcing us to focus on specific things that might not have fit as well with what the class needed at the time,” Brown said. 

Over the course of Tesori’s career, some things have changed and others have not. She told the News that her thought process and the way she dresses hasn’t changed since age nine. 

What has changed over the years is her approach to taking criticism: she’s learned to generally give “less of a fuck,” while taking constructive blows when she needs to. 

“Sometimes I read something, and I think, ‘Wow, I did do that. That is a party trick. I have to stop doing that.’ [I learned] the humility to just say, ‘I don’t do that well.’ That’s why I like doing dumb stuff that I’m not good at, because it’s good to not be good at something,” Tesori said. “Especially at higher institutions of learning, it’s good to feel not in the know all the time. It’s good to play, it’s good to do something that you’re a complete beginner at, including what you’ve mastered.”

Tesori’s future may find direction in her own history.

She has always been interested in telling an “Italian story” — particularly one that embodies the lived and diverse experiences of Italian American communities. 

“I haven’t found the story yet. I have ideas that are running — my roots are in Sicily, the small towns around Palermo and Stromboli. [But] I just haven’t found it yet,” Tesori said. “I hope that I get to do that.” 

In her early career, Jeanine Tesori was known as Jeanine Levenson.

The post PROFILE: Musical theater lecturer Jeanine Tesori on imperfect music and living in an empty lighthouse appeared first on Yale Daily News.

Formerly a Lecturer in Acting at the David Geffen School of Drama, Carlos currently works in Los Angeles and New York City as a professional voice, speech and dialect coach. On Jan. 26, Carlos published a book in the “Acting Essentials” series — entitled “Introduction to Speechwork for Actors: An Inclusive Approach” — edited by Bill Connington, who wrote the first book in the series. 

Carlos’ experiences in grappling with his own voice reflects deeply in his teaching philosophy. An important part of his work is providing actors with a sense of agency over their natural way of speech and honoring the “lineage of communities” reflected in their accents. 

“[People] should be able to perform in their accent, know how to make choices in that accent, and eventually know how to switch into another accent that might be right for a different role,” said Carlos. “But if you don’t find yourself in speech first, how can you do that in an accent, in someone else’s speech, in someone else’s way of navigating the world?” 

While Carlos’ teaching experiences range from his time at Marymount Manhattan College to the Shakespeare Theatre of New Jersey, “Introduction to Speechwork for Actors: An Inclusive Approach” is his first time teaching an audience through writing. 

Carlos could offer real-time, interactive feedback to his students as a lecturer, but he said he had to find a way to teach these same skills through a different medium, a task made more challenging due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Carlos said the process of writing the book was lonely in a number of ways. 

“Because of the pandemic, being stuck in a house, you have that loneliness,” Carlos said. “When you’re teaching, especially this creative endeavor, there is a give and take… I see what they’re struggling with, or I see what they’re really great at, and then that becomes the leap to the next sentence. When you’re writing a book, on that same subject matter, you don’t have that feedback of a real life, live, living, breathing, experimenting person in front of you.”

Much of Carlos’ method of teaching challenges the rigid ways of “speaking intelligibly” he was taught as a student. In his instruction, Carlos was trained in Mid Atlantic speech an “amalgamation of an upper class American accent with an upper class British accent.” 

“I want to uplift people and make them proud of their speech,” Carlos continued. “I say ‘mam’ the way my grandmother did, and I love my grandmother and I love her story. I’ve done the work and I’ve realized, ‘Oh, I get that directly from her, and I love that lineage. I love that connection to the past, to my people, and the people who I choose to emulate.’”

Carlos’ “contemporary” and “deeply understanding” way of teaching was a large reason as to why Connington, the serial editor of the series, asked Carlos specifically to write the second book of “Acting Essentials” series. Connington said he hopes that “Acting Essentials” will make theater and acting education accessible to larger audiences, something that Carlos’ writing achieves. 

Carlos’ most recent projects involve working with Sam Claflin on Amazon Prime series ‘Daisy Jones & the Six’ and helping Tom Bateman transform into an American plumber with a murderous secret in the Peacock series “Based on a True Story.” 

According to Bateman, Carlos’ care and dedication for his clients extends beyond his coaching. 

“He adapts so specifically to the person he’s working with,” said Bateman. “He reads all the episodes that we’re doing. He knows everything that’s going on. That really makes a difference, when someone feels like they’re not just here to do a little job. He’s part of the team.”

Ron Carlos’ book is published by Methuen Drama, a publisher of books on acting, theater performance, and production. 

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The world-renowned violinist teaches an intimate studio of five accomplished musicians in his position at Yale. Known for his technical virtuosity and original interpretations, Hadelich will play a varied and demanding program at his Sunday concert, featuring the music of J.S. Bach, Eugène Ysaÿe and Coleridge-Taylor Perkinson. Presented as part of the YSM’s Faculty Artist Series, the performance will begin at 3 p.m. in the Morse Recital Hall. 

“I like programming music that looks weird together on paper, but that works nicely together in practice,” Hadelich noted. 

His violin program for Sunday spans over 250 years, expressing a wide range of emotions and incorporating stylistic elements from the blues.

The recital will open with Bach’s Violin Partita No. 3 in E Major. The rapid string crossings of its exuberant “Preludio” will be a chance for Hadelich to showcase his technical execution abilities. 

“Blue/s Forms,” a piece by pioneering Black composer Coleridge-Taylor Perkinson, will follow. 

“[Perkinson’s] pieces are pretty difficult, and that presents an obstacle,” Hadelich said. “You need to know that the piece is good before learning it, but you can’t know if it’s good before someone learns it. So that is a bit of a hurdle that new pieces have to overcome.” 

As a result of Hadelich recording Blue/s Forms during the COVID-19 pandemic and posting it on his YouTube channel, he said that more musicians have started to play the work, including students at YSM. 

Hadelich hopes that recital attendees will be surprised to hear a blues piece follow standard classical repertoire, but he doesn’t believe that they will find the transition too shocking. Bach and Perkinson both incorporated stylistic elements from their time: dance forms for Bach, and the blues for Perkinson. 

The next piece, Ysaÿe’s Sonata No. 2, recalls Bach’s “Preludio” in direct quotation. But the aptly named “Obsession” sonata places Bach in contrast with its explorations of obsession, melancholy and fury. The sonata, dedicated to the early twentieth century violinist Jacques Thibaud, is also known for its technical difficulty.

 “I don’t know what Ysaÿe was trying to tell Thibaud with the dedication,” Hadelich joked. 

Hadelich will conclude the program with the chaconne from Bach’s tragic D Minor Partita, which Hadelich describes as “a monumental mountain to climb.” Hadelich described the piece as “the greatest tragic music” and, contrary to what you may expect, believes it will “leave you uplifted.”

Professor Hadelich finds time to teach his five students at the YSM even while maintaining a dizzying schedule of performances and global tours. The teaching process helps him “to crystalize all [his] thoughts about a piece” which he finds helpful to his own playing.  He adds that his students motivate him. 

“My students are great,” Hadelich said. “When they’re playing really well, they make me want to play the violin.”

Ani Kavafian, professor of violin and coordinator of string studies at the YSM, regards Augustin Hadelich as “an elegant, exciting, beautiful player.” 

Kavafian said “it was euphoria” when Hadelich joined the faculty in 2021, recalling a past conversation with YSM dean Robert Blocker in which she told him that he would “be the greatest dean in the whole world” if he could bring Hadelich on board. 

Furthermore, Kavafian shared that she was “thrilled” that Hadelich was interested in teaching given his career as a soloist with “tremendous amounts of concerts.” Kavafian herself has played with leading orchestras across the world, and understands the challenges of balancing a career as both a teacher and performer. She notes that “wherever he is, he makes himself available.”

“He’s a player that thinks about what he is doing, and so he can teach…the way he relates to his students is just really special,” Kavafian said. 

According to students, Hadelich’s teaching style is unconventional. His approach is to encourage the development of students’ artistic potential without ever being prescriptive. 

“There is no sense of restriction in his teaching,” said Charlie Lovell-Jones MUS ’24. “If he’s convinced by what you’re doing, he’ll let you do it.” 

Emma Meinrenken MUS ’24 added that Hadelich’s style was “open and creative in nature,” focusing on “exploring what is possible [musically] rather than exploring what is necessarily right.” 

Hadelich’s experiences as a touring musician have given him important insights into the practical aspects of performing a wide variety of violin repertory, his students said. Herdís Guðmundsdóttir MUS ’23 said that Hadelich could tell them “exactly where the orchestra will be late on their entrances.” 

Hadelich’s concert this Sunday is composed entirely of unaccompanied violin music, a program that Professor Kavafian finds “really makes people familiar with somebody’s playing.” She believes one thing is certain: “everybody’s going to love it and want more.”

Hadelich performs on the 1744 “ex-Leduc, Szeryng” Guarneri ‘del Gesu’ violin.

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Named as the Schwarzman Center’s first artist-in-residence in June, Dessner will collaborate with different artists, engage in public performances and participate in workshops with the Yale community. Dessner will work with artists Julia Bullock, Ash Fure, Nathalie Joachim and Kaneza Schaal, who work across media including voice, instruments and film. One of his first engagements at Yale included a college tea at Grace Hopper College on Nov. 4. 

“I am thrilled to work with the new Schwarzman Center and build on Yale’s history of experimental music and performance — Julia Bullock, Ash Fure, Nathalie Joachim and Kaneza Schaal are among the most important artists working today,” Dessner wrote in an email to the News.

While the Schwarzman Center opened in fall 2021, the center’s programming has been significantly delayed due to the COVID-19 pandemic, according to Associate Artistic Director Jennifer Newman DRA ’11. She added that the programs were “still very much in their early stages.” 

Newman said that the process of selecting the artists who would collaborate with Dessner was an endeavor shaped by Dessner’s “collaborative process.” According to her, Dessner often seeks to create community through his work, such as his curatorial work creating the MusicNOW Festival in Cincinnati and the Sounds from a Safe Harbor Music Festival in Ireland.

Newman noted that the artists involved in the collaboration were currently using the space to create original pieces, such as composer Ash Fure, who is currently working on a piece about the “ephemeral nature of performance.”

“It really is thrilling for me to see artists use the space and be really excited about being in the space,” Newman said. “They are very thrilled to be in the Dorm Room for an entire week and have access to the space and to really explore how sound works in a space as unique as the Dome.” 

Benjamin Verdery, associate professor adjunct of guitar at the Yale School of Music and Dessner’s teacher, friend and mentor, concurred with Newman’s comments, adding that it has been “exciting to watch [Dessner] grow musically.” 

Verdery noted that during his time at Yale, Dessner had engaged with a variety of musical influences through his work in classical guitar and creating a band with his brother and other musicians. He added that their friendship and partnership had grown throughout the years, with Dessner composing music for the Ulysses Quartet, a string quartet, who Verdery has performed with.

Thomas Kriegsmann, president of the creative agency ArKtype and Dessner’s producer, said that he was “deeply grateful for the opportunity” to work with Dessner and the Schwarzman Center. 

“The Schwarzman Center’s potential for transforming art, artists and community is boundless, as is the power of creative Centers like this as catalyzing agents in support of the creation of new work,” said Kriegsmann. “I am deeply grateful for the opportunity to work with Bryce in the Center’s first years to realize that mission and support artists with such vast potential for resonance. The work made here by Bryce, Ash, Kaneza, Nathalie and Julia will be nothing less than defining, signature works in times that need their voices badly. As a producer of experimental work, these opportunities are essential.”

The Schwarzman Center is located at 168 Grove Street.

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Entitled “Entrepreneurship in the Art Market,” the course — offered by The School of Management — is taught by visiting instructor Magnus Resch, an economist, serial entrepreneur and Amazon bestselling author of entrepreneurship books. This year was the first in which he brought MBA and MFA students together into the six-session workshop class, where they learned about different forces that shape the circulation of art.

“Business students learn little about the art market, and artists often don’t know enough about the economics of art,” Resch told the News. “It’s this exchange between artists and business students that make this class so unique.”

The class included visits to the Armory Art Fair with guided tours and two mixers to promote dialogue among students beyond the classroom. 

Painting and printmaking student Mike Picos ART ’24, who audited the class, explained that a highlight of the course was connecting with the business students.

“It was very productive to get a sense of how people other than artists think of art and experience art,” Picos said. “I had a lot of great conversations with people from the School of Management and I feel like I really have a better understanding of how they perceive what we are doing.”

Some guest speakers included leaders in these fields, such as digital artist Michael Winkelmann, known professionally as Beeple, who sold his NFT for $69 million. Other speakers included top curators, art advisors, collectors, a gallery founder in Paris and Charles F. Stewart, the chief executive officer of Sotheby’s, one of the world’s largest art auction houses.

“I was surprised by how much money is involved in the art market and how the money is being placed within different parts interacting in the market,” said Younes Kouider ART ’23, sculpture student who was taking the class.

Each class also included presentations by the artists in the classroom where they shared their own works, what inspired them and the struggles they currently face. 

Resch noted that these presentations often led to vivid discussion around market strategies, pricing and marketing ideas. Many conversations also focused on how entrepreneurs can achieve success in the art world.

“This class is a nucleus for students who are interested in pursuing a career in creative fields,” Resch explained. “Previous students joined Sotheby’s, Gagosian gallery, the Metropolitan Museum, the Whitney and the Royal Opera, a non-profit museum and others. And artists gain a much clearer picture of how to continue their career after having left their programme.”

Students had two options for the final project in the course: a paper on the future development of the art market or a work of art that demonstrates their main takeaways from the course.

Jane Cavalier SOM ’23, said that the course as a whole helped her understand the different opportunities available in the art market. Before attending business school, Cavalier worked at the Museum of Modern Art. 

“I was in the curatorial department there, so I didn’t have a lot of experience with running the business of the museum but I was involved in developing exhibitions,” she said. “For me, the class helped me sharpen my lens on what different professional opportunities there are for someone who wants to work at the intersection of art and business.”

The course will be offered again next fall.

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