Judith Lang Zaimont's Impronta Digitale Selected As A Featured Composition at the 11th Van Cliburn International Competition American Composer Judith Lang Zaimont's "Impronta Digitale" has been honored by the 11th Van Cliburn International Competition as one of four selected competition pieces. The selection comes as a result of the American Composers Invitational, an innovative composers competition run side-by-side with the pianist's competition, culminating a year-long selection process carried out anonymously. "Impronta Digitale" is an eight and a half minute perpetuum mobile in fast, shifting compound meters. Its single-strand of pitch ranges across the entire keyboard, changing moods from whirlwind virtuosity to romantic lyricism, while layering its complex harmonies across time. The title -- translated into English as "fingerprint" -- refers both to technical aspects of the music and to the fact that it spotlights certain of Ms. Zaimont's characteristic or "fingerprint", sound-structures. In addition to standing alone as an independent composition, "Impronta Digitale" also serves as the third movement of her 1999 Sonata for Piano Solo, which was cited as the most important piano piece of 1999 on Piano & Keyboard magazine's 20th century timeline. "Impronta Digitale" ("Fingerprint"), has been selected for performance by fully one-third of the accepted competition entrants, including competitors from Russia, China, Japan, Korea, Italy and the United States. Information about the American Composers Invitational competition, and the competitors selection process is included below. Judith Lang Zaimont, a Tennessee native who grew up in New York, and now teaches at the University of Minnesota, is an internationally recognized composer whose music is characterized by its expressive strength, dynamism, and rhythmic vitality. Her musical language is coloristic, and she has contributed to virtually every genre in a style featuring clear pulse, intricate surfaces and an almost centrifugal shift of tonal pivots. Among her many composition awards are a Guggenheim Fellowship (1983-84) and commission grants from the National Endowment for the Arts (1982) and Minnesota Composers Forum (1993), First Prize - Gold Medal in the Gottschalk Centenary Composers Competition (1971), First Prize in the Chamber Orchestra Composition contest to honor the Statue of Liberty Centennial (1986); and First Prize in the international 1995 McCollin Competition for Composers (for Symphony No. 1, performed by the Philadelphia Orchestra in season 1995-96). She has offered masterclasses at many institutions, and has also been featured Composer at the 1995 Society of Composers International American meeting; Scholar in Residence with a consortium of Atlanta-area colleges (1995), and Filene Artist in Residence at Skidmore College (1997-98). Her music appears on two Century lists (Chamber Music America; Piano & Keyboard Magazine), and is the subject of many articles, book chapters and several dissertations. Ms. Zaimont's music is widely performed (Connecticut Opera, Philadelphia Orchestra, Women's Philharmonic, Kremlin Chamber Orchestra, Czech Radio Symphony) and has been recorded for the Koch International Classics, Arabesque, Milken Family Foundation, Albany, Jeanne, Leonarda, Northeastern, and 4Tay labels. She was awarded the 1995 Recording Award - First Prize awarded by the International Alliance for Women in Music (for the Arabesque CD Neon Rhythm). "All American Appeal", an article about her piano music, was featured in the November/December 1998 issue of Piano & Keyboard magazine. Several other Zaimont compositions have been honored by selection for competition repertoire lists, including works for the Carnegie - Rockefeller competition for interpreters of American vocal music, and the General Motors-Seventeen Magazine competition. A new Electronic Dialogues interview with Judith Lang Zaimont can be read at the Internet Classical Music Magazine Sequenza 21 - http://www.sequenza21.com/ More information about Ms. Zaimont is available at her website Http://www.joblink.org/jzaimont/ and at http://www.jamesarts.com. She is represented by Jeffrey James Arts Consulting, who can be contacted at 516-797-9166 and at [log in to unmask] Since its inception in 1962, the Van Cliburn International Piano Competition has commissioned a new work from a distinguished American composer to be performed by all the semifinalists during each competition. Composers who have written for the competition include Lee Hoiby, Norman Dello Joio, Aaron Copland, Samuel Barber, Leonard Bernstein, John Corigliano, William Schuman, Morton Gould, and William Bolcom. For the Eleventh Competition, the Van Cliburn Foundation created the American Composers Invitational. The idea for this competition began during a conversation between Van Cliburn Foundation President Richard Rodzinski and distinguished American composer John Corigliano. "In the past, we have always commissioned the most celebrated, well-known composer," Rodzinski says. But this time, Rodzinski says, "We thought, why not take the opportunity to encourage more new American works," he says. So, he and Corigliano enlisted 25 distinguished musicians to each identify two composers to write a new work of eight to 12 minutes for piano solo or to submit a work of that length that had not been recorded or extensively performed. The intent was that a few, selected new American solo works would be provided to all the competitors, with the ultimate programming choice left up to each individual pianist. More than 30 scores were submitted in December to a jury made up of Corigliano and Yale University composition professor Martin Bresnick. Corigliano and Bresnick selected five compositions, which were sent to all 30 pianists competing in the Cliburn. Four of the five were selected for performance by at least one of the competitors. Throughout the entire process the names of the composers were not revealed. In addition to Judith Lang Zaimont the composers honored in the American Composers Invitational event include Lowell Lieberman, C. Curtis Smith, and James Mobberley. As a culmination of this inaugural edition of the American Composers Invitational, the new pieces will be programmed during the semi-final round of the Competition. The composer whose work is chosen by the greatest number of the 12 semifinalists will receive a prize of $5,000; the other composers whose works are performed in the semifinal round will receive $2,500. The Van Cliburn Foundation's official press release about the Invitational can be found at: http://www.cliburn.org/competition/prcomposers.html The 11th Van Cliburn International Piano Competition will be held May 25 - June 10, 2001 at Bass Performance Hall in downtown Fort Worth, Texas. For more information about the Competition, visit their website at http://www.cliburn.org/competition/index.html. For more information about their schedule of events, please visit http://www.cliburn.org/competition/schedule.html. Jeffrey James <[log in to unmask]>