Rhonda Rider ’80MM is artist-in-residence at Grand Canyon National Park

Cellist Rhonda Rider '80MM has been named an Artist-in-Residence at the Grand Canyon National Park 2010-2011. She has commissioned eleven composers to write works for solo cello inspired by aspects of the canyon. While in residence Rider will present two performances, one for the public and one for local school children. The public performance will be an evening program held on February 26th in celebration of the 92nd anniversary of the naming of Grand Canyon as a national park.

Other performances will take place in Boston (March 10, 8pm in Seully Hall at Boston Conservatory), Fort Worth (Inspiration Celebration, May 1-8), and Millbrook, New York (September 23 at the Cary Institute). Rider is the chair of chamber music at the Boston Conservatory, cello coach of the Asian Youth Orchestra in Hong Kong, and cellist of the piano trio Triple Helix (whose other members are YSM alumni Bayla Keyes '80MM, violin, and Lois Shapiro '77MM, piano).

The composers are: Yu-Hui Chang (Brandeis University); Marti Epstein (Boston Conservatory & Berklee College of Music); Howard Frazin (Longy School of Music, Cambridge, MA); Laura Kaminsky (Symphony Space, NYC), John Kennedy (Santa Fe New Music); Emma Lively (Cameron and Lively, NYC), Jeffrey Mumford (Oberlin Conservatory); David Rakowski (Brandeis University); Jan Swafford (The Boston Conservatory); Andy Vores (The Boston Conservatory); and Dalit Warshaw (The Boston Conservatory).

Says Rider: "[one] of my great joys is working with living composers. Having the opportunity to bring a new piece to life through the exploration of fresh ideas and innovative sound worlds is tremendously exciting and rewarding. For this project I have asked ten celebrated composers to write works inspired by Grand Canyon. Each person's experience of the canyon's grandeur, while profoundly personal, can also bring us in touch with the universality of nature and the human experience."

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