Motifs: November 2022

We’d love to hear from you! Submit your own motif.

An excerpt from Sondra (Brooks) Raines’s (IAA 74-77) unpublished memoir, Spectacular Faults, was published in the October issue of Postscript Magazine.

Heather Buchman (IAC/NMC 78-82, IAA 82-83) conducted the world premiere of Marion Bauer's Symphony No. 1 with Symphoria, Syracuse's professional orchestra, on Saturday, Oct. 15, 2022. The program, titled “Unheard No More,” also included Marian McPartland’s Silent Pool featuring Syracuse University faculty Theresa Chen as piano soloist.

Rochelle Gnagey Skolnick (IAA 80-83, IAC St 84) was appointed by American Federation of Labor-Congress of Industrial Organizations (AFL-CIO) President Liz Shuler to the Board of Directors of the AFL-CIO's Union Lawyers Alliance. Skolnick serves as Director of Symphonic Services and Special Counsel to the American Federation of Musicians of the United States and Canada. She continues to perform professionally as a violinist in St. Louis and south Florida.

David Krauss (IAC/NMC 86/87) is the principal trumpet of the Metropolitan Opera Orchestra. Krauss recently launched Speaking Soundly, a new podcast featuring conversations with world-renowned performing artists and promising newcomers about their lives and creative processes. Recent guests of the series include trombonist Joseph Alessi, pianist Emanuel Ax, and trumpeter Wynton Marsalis. The episode that features New York Philharmonic principal clarinetist and Interlochen alumnus Anthony McGill (IAC 91, 93; IAA 94-96) will be released on Tuesday, Nov. 15.

Faith Shearin (IAA 83-86, IAA St 96-97) was awarded the 2021 Leapfrog YA Global Fiction Prize for her first young adult novel, Lost River, 1918. Her next YA novel, My Sister Lives in the Sea, is due out from Leapfrog Press early next year.

Jennifer Ehle (IAA 85-87) appears as “Laura Madden” in the biographical drama She Said, which will be released on Nov. 18, 2022. The film, which is based on the 2019 book of the same name, follows the true story of the journalists who exposed Harvey Weinstein’s history of misconduct and inspired the #MeToo movement.

Ranardo-Domeico Grays (AS 88, IAC 89, IAA 89-90, IAC St 91), Founder/Artistic Director of VISIONS Contemporary Ballet in New York City, was awarded a UMEZ Arts Engagement Grant from Lower Manhattan Cultural Council supporting Redemption, a thought-provoking dance concert expressing hope of deliverance from prejudice, sufferance, and faithlessness. The concert will take place at The Riverside Theater in New York, New York on Nov. 18-19, 2022 at 7 p.m.

Stephanie Holloway (IAA 92-94, IAC St 93) married Leseliey R. Welch; the couple have been together for 19 years and have two children, Zoe and Savannah. In 2021, Holloway left her position as the Communication Manager for the University of Michigan’s Math Department to join her wife as the Marketing Director for her newly formed nonprofit, Birth Detroit. Birth Detroit will open the city’s first freestanding birth center in 2023.

Ben Foster (IAC 94-95) stars as legendary 15th century mercenary Jan Žižka in the recently-released film Medieval. The film, which is currently available for viewing on iTunes, Amazon Video, Google Play, and DirectTV, was recently reviewed by Liz Whittemore (IAC 95) for Reel News Daily.

Joseph Skerik (IAC 13; IAA 14-18; IAC St 19, 22) won third prize at the Oskar Nedbal Viola Competition in Prague, Czech Republic.

Eli Diersing (IAC 17, IAA 17-19) joined the Indianapolis Ballet as a company artist. Diersing performed in choreographer Lucy Merz’s piece during the company’s recent New Works program.