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CMU’s White Pine Music releases new disc by Harlem Quartet
September 25, 2007
CMU’s White Pine Music releases new disc by Harlem Quartet
September 25, 2007 The latest release from Central Michigan University’s recording label recently made its debut at New York’s famed Carnegie Hall.
As part of a partnership between CMU’s Center for Public Service through Music and the Arts and Detroit’s Sphinx Organization, the Harlem Quartet released “Take the ‘A’ Train” on the CMU School of Music’s White Pine Music label. The compact disc’s release was celebrated Sept. 25 as part of The Sphinx Laureates at Carnegie Hall concert.
Tracks for the disc, including pieces by Wynton Marsalis, Billy Strayhorn, Joaquín Turina and Guido Lópes-Gavilán, were recorded in May in CMU’s Staples Family Concert Hall.
The quartet’s members have all been First Place Laureates in the annual Sphinx Competitions. First violinist Ilmar Gavilan, First Prize winner of the Sphinx Competition in 2001, is a native of Havana, Cuba, and currently is the concertmaster of the Philadelphia Virtuosi Chamber Orchestra; second violinist Melissa White, the First Place Junior Division Laureate of the fourth annual Sphinx Competition, is a recent graduate of The Curtis Institute of Music; violist Juan-Miguel Hernandez, the Gold Achievement winner of the ninth National Sphinx Competition in 2006, is a native of Montreal, Canada, and was one of the artists on the first Sphinx and White Pine Music release, “Moyugba Orisha,” in February 2007; and cellist Desmond Neysmith, the First Prize winner of the 2000 Texaco Sphinx Competition, has appeared as a soloist with many leading U.S. orchestras and holds the co-principal chair in La Orquesta Sinaloa Sinfonica de las Artes in Culiacan, Mexico.
The Detroit-based Sphinx Organization is dedicated to increasing the participation of Black and Latino artists in classical music, both on stage and in audiences. Its Sphinx Competitions, held annually in Detroit, offers young Black and Latino classical string players a chance to compete under the guidance of an internationally renowned panel of judges and to perform with established professional musicians in an encouraging setting. The Harlem Quartet and other Sphinx artists will continue to record with White Pine Music in the future.
For more information regarding the White Pine label or to order “Take the ‘A’ Train” or other titles, visit http://www.whitepinemusic.com or call 989-774-2045. Additional information about the Sphinx Organization can be found online at http://www.sphinxmusic.org.
