CHICAGO, IL (June 26, 2008) Through a grant from the Open World Cultural Leaders Program, Columbia College Chicago’s master of fine arts in music composition for the screen program recently hosted four Russian composers for a week of cultural exchange, education, and creative work.
Aleksandr Platonovich Manotskov, Anna Dmitriyevna Mikhaylova, Anton Valeryevich Silayev and Dmitry Vladimirovich Ryabtsev enjoyed a two-week residency, June 4 – 18, during which they worked with a team of composers and educators headed by Music Composition for the Screen Director Andrew Hill and Music Composition Professor Ilya Levinson.
The Russian delegation learned state-of-the-art computer scoring programs, screened and analyzed scores from several classic Hollywood films, and scored scenes from movies including two in-production movies, “Clear Cut” and “The Girls of Alden,” by Dalila Droege, an MFA Film & Video student at Columbia. View Droege’s portfolio at www.daliladroege.com
The culmination of the Russian composers’ Open World Cultural Leaders experience was a recording session at Hinge studios on June 15, during which a full orchestra, conducted by Cliff Colnot, recorded the newly composed scores for selected scenes from Droege’s films. Recording musicians include members of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, the Civic Orchestra, Lyric Opera Orchestra, and the Grant Park Players.
The visitors also enjoyed an immersion into Chicago’s outstanding culinary and cultural scene including visits to the CSO, museums, a dance concert at the Harris Theater, and a theater performance at Steppenwolf.
The visit wrapped up with a film screening and celebratory dinner at The Club at Symphony Center. Present at the dinner were Droege and the Russian composers, dignitaries from the college, and Jeanne Whitney Smith of Open World, who came to Chicago from Washington D.C. for the event, as well as F. Daniel Cantrell, representing the office of Illinois Congressman Danny Davis.
At the dinner, the composers thanked the Columbia educators for an education and enriching experience and emphasized the value of the Open World Cultural Exchange program, praising the funding organization for making the educational and cultural experience possible.
Open World’s Cultural Leaders Program aims to forge better understanding between the United States and Russia by enabling emerging Russian leaders in the arts to experience America’s cultural and community life, and to work with their American counterparts. Support for the cultural program is provided through partnership and funding from the National Endowment for the Arts; the Open World Leadership Center funds the administrative portion of the program.
Open World is a unique, nonpartisan initiative of the U.S. Congress. Delegates range from judges to mayors, from innovative nonprofit directors to experienced journalists, and from political party activists to regional administrators. Over 10,500 Open World participants have been hosted in all 50 U.S. states since the program’s inception in 1999. Open World is managed by the Open World Leadership Center, an independent legislative branch entity headquartered at the Library of Congress in Washington. Open World is the brain child of Librarian of Congress James H. Billington and members of Congress led by Senator Ted Stevens of Arkansas. More information at www.openworld.gov
Pictured above left to right: Alexsandr Platonovich Manotskov, Dmitry Vladimirovich Ryabtsev, Dalila Droege, Anton Valeryevich Silayev, Anna Dmitriyevna Mikhaylova.-end-