USC Thornton School of Music, Los Angeles, CA Videos

From all of us at USC Thornton, we wish you love, light and joyous music in the New Year!

The Process: filmUSiC
Trojans are constantly finding new ways to collaborate and bridge the gap between disciplines. In the latest installment of The Process, discover how students from USC Thornton and USC School of Cinematic Arts collaborated to create the live-to-picture concert, “filmUSiC.” Learn more about the making of filmUSiC: https://bit.ly/3PzdVgC

Celine Chen performs on NPR's "From the Top"
USC Thornton Keyboard Studies student Celine Chen was featured in an episode of NPR's "From the Top" on the week of May 8. In case you missed it, here is a clip of Chen's incredible performance of Fanfare Toccata by Stephen Hough. Videography by Hojoon Kim

Discover USC Thornton
USC Thornton is eager to welcome our new students to campus next year! Hear from undergraduates and faculty, in their own words, about what they feel makes Thornton unique among music schools. Learn more about the school by visting our new "About USC Thornton" page: https://bit.ly/3zZAi6h

We've launched our USC Thornton Spotify page with a music playlist curated by doctoral student and member of Thornton's Justice, Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion (JEDI) Committee, Angelica Brooks. As part of the campus-wide celebration of Black History Month, the playlist reflects USC's theme for this year: “Reclamation through Resistance, Rebirth through Reconciliation." Brooks describes the arc of the playlist, which she says transitions from songs about collective resistance to collective joy. "The playlist closes with songs that remind us of how we can experience rebirth through our bright future. The focus is on our identity: we are a miracle, we are warriors, and we all carry a message in our music, our rhythm, our blues, and our 'Freedom,' a song written by Jon Batiste and Andrae Alexander." Read more: http://bit.ly/3Z3u9Ax

Grygorii Koval and Marina Hovhannisyan perform the Ukrainian lullaby and Medieval folk song “Oy Khodyt’ Son Kolo Vikon"
Sometimes, bonds are built between a teacher and student that transcend the classroom, ties marked by mutual respect and trust that persist after final examinations and despite geographical distance. It’s bonds like these that motivated Grygorii Koval, a Ukranian-born teaching assistant and doctoral student in the USC Thornton Classical Guitar program, and his classical guitar professor of practice William Kanengiser to raise funds and collect resources for Koval’s former guitar school in Vinnytsia, Ukraine. “It was a kind of psychological support so that they felt they're not forgotten there, so they know there is somebody outside who's supporting them and thinking about them,” Koval says. “They felt it. They started to record, they took some pictures, they wrote letters. It was very, very important for them.” Listen to Koval and Thornton early music vocal performance master’s student Marina Hovhannisyan perform the Ukrainian lullaby and Medieval folk song “Oy Khodyt’ Son Kolo Vikon,” arranged by Koval and Kanengiser. Video by Felix Salazar and Kelly Coats courtesy of Guitar Salon International. Learn more about Koval and Kanengiser’s Ukrainian relief efforts, as well as the bonds forged among teachers and students within the Thornton Classical Guitar program, here: https://bit.ly/3AAW546

IN CONVERSATION WITH | Peter Webster & Tina Huynh
As Peter Webster will tell you, he didn’t arrive at his interactive, interdisciplinary philosophy of music education all at once. It was culled from a lifetime of experiences as both a music student and educator, decades spent learning what techniques worked and realizing what might be missing from a typical American musical education. “I found out pretty early on that music education really begins with a philosophy of music: what is music is and why is it so powerful? Why does it make the effect on us that it does?” Webster says. Before he retired this spring, the USC Thornton scholar-in-residence and adjunct professor in the Music Teaching & Learning program sat down with his colleague and former student Tina Huynh to discuss creativity, mentorship and the “cosmic magic” of teaching. Read the next installment of the IN CONVERSATION WITH | series here: https://bit.ly/3zrhE8n

IN CONVERSATION WITH | Dick McIlvery and Fred Vogler
“When you teach people, it's not like you’re a bird and you kick them out of the nest and say, ‘Okay, you're on your own.’ It's a network that gets established as a teacher-student relationship and evolves to a professional-professional relationship. It's not really a mentorship. It's more of a band of brothers and sisters. We're all in this together,” says Dick McIlvery, longtime Thornton professor, two-time alumnus and founder of its recording arts degree program, which evolved into the Thornton Music Industry program. The IN CONVERSATION WITH | series uses the power of dialogue to profile the careers, accomplishments and relationships of USC Thornton professors and alumni. In the third installment, McIlvery and alumnus Fred Vogler recall the early days of the Thornton Recording Arts program and discuss timeless techniques for creating a fulfilling career in the music industry. https://bit.ly/3LFnh6b

U.S. premiere of "All the Truths We Cannot See: A Chernobyl Story"
Join us for the U.S. premiere of All the Truths We Cannot See: A Chernobyl Story, the new opera created in partnership between USC Thornton and The Sibelius Academy, University of the Arts Helsinki. The opera runs from 4/21 - 4/24 in the USC Bing Theatre. Learn more here: https://bit.ly/3xCcwNH

IN CONVERSATION WITH | Bruce Alan Brown & Lisa de Alwis
“I explain to music students that contemporary music is really made out of our preexisting knowledge of earlier types of music, even soaked up unconsciously. When we think we're listening to exclusively contemporary music, whether it's popular or concert music, it's really built from the practices and the listening habits of centuries past,” says Bruce Alan Brown, chair of the USC Thornton Musicology program, who retires this year after more than 30 years of teaching the next generation. The IN CONVERSATION WITH | series uses the power of dialogue to profile the careers, accomplishments and relationships of USC Thornton professors and alumni. In the second installment, Brown and alumna Lisa de Alwis discuss how studying the music of years past can create expert musicians and deep thinkers. Read the entire piece here: https://bit.ly/3LyKaI2

Meet the cast of All The Truths We Cannot See: A Chernobyl Story
Meet the cast of All The Truths We Cannot See: A Chernobyl Story, a new opera produced in partnership between USC Thornton and UniArts Helsinki. This unique production, double-cast with performers from the USC Opera program and Helsinki’s Sibelius Academy, tells a story of fundamental human conflicts woven into events surrounding the social and environmental disaster caused by the Chernobyl nuclear power plant’s explosion on April 26, 1986. All The Truths premieres March 15 at Sonore Hall in Helsinki and premieres in the U.S. April 21 at the USC Bing Theatre.

The Process: Robert Wang
For USC Thornton Classical Guitar program student Robert Wang, delving into the history of his instrument adds a new layer of understanding and appreciation for its evolution and its predecessors over the last few centuries. After performing some of Renaissance composer John Dowland’s works on the modern classical guitar, Wang felt inspired to play this music from the 17th century on the original instrument the composer intended. The result was a thrilling transcription project. “It’s the feel of how the instrument sounds and how I play—it’s just completely different from classical guitar. It’s amazing to play something in its original form, when, back then, the classical guitar didn’t even exist,” he says. To learn more about Wang’s work, which lies at the intersection of the scholarly and classical divisions of the USC Thornton School of Music, watch The Process: Robert Wang. https://bit.ly/3vBACqE

That Something Within
Lenny Hayes kept his childhood memories of performing choir solos at his neighborhood church in Dallas, Texas, close to his heart while creating a new arrangement of “Something Within,” a gospel hymn composed in 1919 by Lucie Eddie Campbell, whose parents were enslaved in Mississippi. “Bringing a classical sound and a Southern gospel sound together is a beautiful marriage that I try, when I can, to bring together,” says the Thornton doctoral student in keyboard studies. The performance accompanies a video of USC Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism Professor Miki Turner reading her essay “That Something Within” that honors and reimagines the century-old hymn, presented earlier this month as part of USC’s Black History Month celebration. Learn more about the collaboration here: https://bit.ly/3LYmgq7

IN CONVERSATION WITH | Daniel Carlin & Marco Valerio Antonini
Ask Daniel Carlin what he’s gleaned from the last four decades of working in the Hollywood film industry, and you’ll hear a seven-word mantra that will never steer you wrong. “I have a mantra that I'm sure my students are sick to death of hearing,” says the Emmy-winning music editor, Emmy-nominated music director and longtime chair of the USC Thornton Screen Scoring program, who retires this year after a decade at Thornton. “Work hard, be nice and get lucky.” The IN CONVERSATION WITH | series uses the power of dialogue to profile the careers, accomplishments and relationships of USC Thornton professors and alumni. In the first installment, longtime chair of the screen scoring program Daniel Carlin and alumnus Marco Valerio Antonini discuss the values and work ethic that Carlin instilled in his students, important, real-world lessons that helped Antonini launch his own successful career in screen scoring. Read the entire piece here: https://bit.ly/3u3idm8

Happy holidays from USC Thornton!
The USC Thornton School of Music wishes everyone a happy and healthy holiday season. To celebrate, we’re sharing one of our favorite videos featuring alumni Tiffany Chen (on screen) and Milaena Martinez (handing things to Tiffany offscreen) with a soundtrack provided by the USC Thornton Chamber Singers performing "Brightest and Best.” Happy holidays!

Winter Gala 2021, a special live-streamed event
Celebrate the holidays with the USC Thornton School of Music on December 22 at 7 p.m., when the department of choral & sacred music presents its annual winter gala. This special, livestream-only event features our choral ensembles performing carols and songs in an evening of festive music for the entire community to enjoy. Tune in to the school’s virtual stage, Thornton/LIVE, to watch.

Rhythms and Revolution: Race, Gender and Jazz on Thursday, Dec. 2
This Thursday at 7 p.m. in the Bovard Auditorium, hear live music from two Thornton faculty members as part of Rhythms and Revolution: Race, Gender and Jazz. This concert and conversation, organized by USC Visions and Voices, features a performance from a supergroup composed of Thornton Popular Music Program Chair Patrice Rushen; säje, a vocal ensemble featuring Thornton Jazz Studies Department faculty member Sara Gazarek; as well as legendary drummer Terri Lyne Carrington. The group will perform original works, jazz standards and contemporary covers before launching into a discussion about barriers facing the jazz industry and their own experiences as women and BIPOC artists in jazz.

William Perry, recipient of the USC Screen Scoring Diversity Scholarship
USC Thornton aims to increase opportunities for Black composers, who remain underrepresented in the film and television industries. To aid in this goal, Thornton partnered with Sony Music Publishing and Bleeding Fingers Music to launch the USC Screen Scoring Diversity Scholarship. Each year, up to two Black students receive tuition, housing and meals, as well as additional ancillary services, to attend Thornton’s Screen Scoring program. Just this month, the celebrated program topped The Hollywood Reporter's list of the 20 best music schools for composing for film and TV. We spoke to last year’s scholarship recipient, William Perry, about his goals for the future and his experiences at Thornton. Applications close on December 1 for the USC Screen Scoring Diversity Scholarship. For more information on how to apply and to read our interview with Perry, visit: https://bit.ly/3oWV4xk

USC Thornton's ALAJE performs “The Moon Was Right," 2013
Jazz Night returns to the Carson Center tonight at 7 p.m., when students from the Jazz Studies and Studio Guitar programs will perform a mix of original material and standards. The evening includes performances from the USC Thornton Jazz Honors Combo at 7 p.m., and ALAJE, the Afro-Latin American Jazz Ensemble, at 8 p.m. Tune in to our virtual stage, Thornton/LIVE, tonight at 7 p.m. to view a livestream of this event: https://www.thorntonlive.usc.edu For a taste of what’s to come, enjoy this clip of ALAJE performing “The Moon Was Right” under the direction of Aarón Serfaty at Ground Zero Performance Café in 2013. (Video: Gemma Corfield)

Quenton Blache: The Process
To third-year Composition and Cello Performance double-major Quenton Blache, music isn’t only a feast for the ears. The Thornton student collaborated with his classmates to produce a video art piece whose visuals add deeper context to its sound. “Lit” combines surreal, abstract visuals of swirling, multi-colored lights with Blache’s original music for flute and strings. He says the lights – recorded in a Composition colleague’s dorm room – possessed the “upbeat, rhythmic feel” he was looking for to visually communicate the musical piece’s repetitious rhythms. “When I think of light, I think of glimmers. It’s lively. It’s like a candlelight. It’s something that’s very energetic,” Blache says. “Being able to take other mediums like this visual content and combine that with the pieces that you write is just miraculous. It expands my idea what you can truly, truly do.” Watch “The Process: Quenton Blache” to get a peek behind the scenes of this collaborative composition: https://bit.ly/3BS2u9X