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Coming to Campus

- October 15, 2007

Coming to Campus is a section announcing visiting speakers of note. Those who wish to submit items for this section should send a brief description (maximum 300 words) of the event, including the date, time, and place, and giving the speaker’s name, title, and outstanding accomplishments to: Visiting Speaker, Advance, 34 North Eagleville Road, Storrs, CT 06269-3144, or by e-mail: advance@uconn.edu.

The information must be received by 4 p.m. on Monday, a minimum of two weeks prior to the event.

Heilig Concert to feature pianist Menahem Pressler

Pianist Menahem Pressler, founding member of the Beaux Arts Trio, will give the 11th annual Alice Murray Heilig Memorial Concert at UConn on Sunday, Oct. 21.

The concert, presented by the School of Fine Arts, will take place at the Jorgensen Center for the Performing Arts, beginning at 3 p.m. Admission is free.

The program will include Beethoven’s Sonata No. 31 in A-flat major, Op 110; Estampes by Debussy; and Schubert’s Sonata in B-flat major, D 960.

A brilliant soloist and chamber musician, the 83-year-old Pressler has received international acclaim for his performances with the many of the greatest orchestras around the world. He has played with the Beaux Arts Trio for 50 years.

“It is a significant opportunity for the University of Connecticut and the School of Fine Arts to host Menahem Pressler for the Alice Murray Heilig concert,” says David Woods, dean of the School of Fine Arts.

“He is by far one of the most technically clean and expert musicians today, and his music oozes with emotion and feeling.”

Woods and Pressler previously worked together at Indiana University, where Woods was dean of the music school and Pressler holds the Dean Charles H. Webb Chair in Music.

“Menahem Pressler was a dedicated and committed teacher,” says Woods, “who shared his artistic talents and abilities with everyone.”

In 1998, Pressler became one of only five recipients of the Lifetime Achievement Award by Gramophone magazine.

A five-time Grammy nominee (most recently in 2006), he has recorded more than 80 albums and received hundreds of honors.

In 2007, he was named an Honorary Fellow of the Jerusalem Academy of Music and Dance. In 2005, he received Germany’s highest honor, the President’s Deutsche Bundesverdienstkreux (Cross of Merit), and France’s highest cultural honor, the Commandeur in Arts and Letters.

Other recent honors include induction into the U.S. National Academy of Arts and Sciences, and receiving Chamber Music America’s Distinguished Service Award.

The Alice Murray Heilig Memorial Concert was established at the School of Fine Arts by the Heilig family in memory of West Hartford philanthropist Alice Murray Heilig’s life and love of music.

She was a talented pianist in her own right, and a passionate lover of the arts who was involved in many arts organizations in Connecticut.

For information call 860-486-2969 or go online: www.Jorgensen.uconn.edu.

Pharmacy alumnus to discuss health care in Thailand

A School of Pharmacy alumnus will speak about his experiences working at a health clinic in Thailand at noon on Oct. 24 at the Dodd Center.

Thomas Buckley, who currently works as a senior clinical education consultant for Pfizer Global Pharmaceuticals, will discuss his experiences as a humanitarian and a health care provider in a presentation titled, “Chronic Emergency: Delivering Health Care Amidst a 50-year Civil War.”

Buckley spent six months as a Pfizer Inc. Global Health Fellow in the Mae Tao Clinic in Mae Sot, a medical clinic that serves migrants from the former Burma, working to improve clinical pharmacy service, develop a universal precaution program, and train community health workers.

Pfizer’s Global Health Fellows program makes up to 40 Pfizer employees available each year to support the work of leading non-governmental organizations. Buckley’s fellowship was made possible through a partnership between Pfizer and the International Rescue Committee, which provides more than half of the Mae Tao Clinic’s funding.

Buckley graduated from UConn in 1982 with a bachelor’s degree from the School of Pharmacy and a master’s degree in public health from the School of Medicine.

Bangladeshi poet to be topic of lecture

Winston Langley will give the first annual lecture on Kazi Nazrul Islam, the national poet of Bangladesh, on Saturday, Oct. 27 at 2 p.m. in the Student Union Theatre.

Langley, an associate chancellor and professor of political science and international relations at the University of Massachusetts, Boston, will discuss Nazrul’s contribution to world literature.

Langley’s latest publication is Kazi Nazrul Islam: The Voice of Poetry and the Struggle for Human Wholeness,(Nazrul Institute, Dhaka, Bangladesh, 2007).

Nazrul was born in 1899 in what was then British India. An advocate for social harmony, global peace, and international brotherhood, he struggled throughout his life, while fighting for the people of India in their quest for independence from British colonialism.

He championed equal rights for women, and stood firm against social injustice and religious intolerance and fanaticism.

Nazrul was a prolific artist. His poetry, songs, and music are intertwined with the spectrum of human emotions.

He died in 1976.

The Asian American Studies Institute and the Asian American Cultural Center have teamed up with key members of New England’s Bangladeshi and Bengali community to sponsor yearly lectures to examine Nazrul’s works.

      
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