Celebrating 100 Years of The Juilliard School in Multimedia Exhibition at The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts, September 16, 2005 - January 14, 2006

Alumni Renée Fleming, Kevin Kline, Wynton Marsalis, and Paul Taylor among Artists Included in Exhibition

The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts is presenting The Juilliard School, 1905-2005: Celebrating 100 Years, an exhibition marking the centennial of the renowned conservatory of dance, music, and theater. The exhibition documents Juilliard's rich history with materials from both the archives of the school and the collections of the Library for the Performing Arts, including photographs, playbills, posters, correspondence, and scores, many of which have never been on view. Also featured are exceptional performances and classes on audiotape and videotape available for listening and viewing in the gallery. The exhibition is on view from September 16, 2005 through January 14, 2006 at The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts Dorothy and Lewis B. Cullman Center, Vincent Astor Gallery, 40 Lincoln Plaza. Admission is free. For further information, telephone 212.870.1630 or visit www.nypl.org.

"The Library for the Performing Arts has a close working relationship with The Juilliard School," notes Jacqueline Z. Davis, the Barbara G. and Lawrence A. Fleischman Executive Director of The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts. "Juilliard's history is documented throughout our collections. Its students draw frequently on our resources, and we regularly present performances by Juilliard faculty members and students. This overview of their history makes it impressively clear how influential the school has been in developing artists who have risen to the forefront of the performing arts."  

Juilliard Beginnings, 1905

The exhibition begins with Frank Damrosch's prospectus for his Institute of Musical Art (IMA), which opened in 1905 to keep serious American students in this country instead of having to go to Europe for professional music training. "In my opinion, an American school of music should differ materially from the existing European schools. Our conditions are different and our needs are different. We need an institution, not alone for the training of professional musicians, but for the development of true musical culture among all classes..." wrote Damrosch, a noted choral conductor and Supervisor of Music for the New York City public schools before he founded the IMA with funding provided by philanthropist James Loeb. Also on display is the will of textile merchant Augustus D. Juilliard, who left approximately 15 million dollars for "the development of music in the United States." With these funds, his trustees established the Juilliard Graduate School (JGS) in 1924. The two schools merged in 1926.

Celebrated Teachers and Future Stars

Education, performance, and creation are at the heart of the Juilliard experience, and the exhibition pinpoints these strengths. From the start both schools attracted the best teachers, including many of international stature. The exhibition documents this with photographs of original IMA faculty members Georges Barrere and Franz Kneisel and original JGS faculty members Ernest Hutcheson, Leopold Auer, and Marcella Sembrich. The exhibition showcases the student productions where future stars perfected their craft and the classes they took with their celebrated teachers. A photo of the 1934 student production of Ariadne auf Naxos, the New York premiere of the Richard Strauss opera, shows student mezzo-soprano Risë Stevens as Dryad. Leontyne Price is seen in a photo with her teacher Florence Page Kimball in 1973 when Ms. Price was the commencement speaker at Juilliard. The famous 1971 and 1972 master classes by Maria Callas are memorialized in several photos and productions of the Terrance McNally play Master Class, based on those sessions, are remembered in posters and other images. Members of the first graduating class in the Drama Division, including Kevin Kline, Patti LuPone, and David Ogden Stiers, are seen in the cast of a 1971 student production of School for Scandal. Paul Taylor captures Dance Division Founder Martha Hill in a drawing.

Video and Audio Preserve Performances and Master Classes

The exhibition includes selected videos of Juilliard dance performances over the years: Doris Humphrey's Ruins and Visions (1964), Anna Sokolow's Ballade (1965), Antony Tudor's Little Improvisations (1968), Martha Graham's Diversion of Angels (1948), Robert Battle's Baseline (2002), Lar Lubovitch's Thus is All (2002), and Ohad Naharin's Minus 7 (2002). Also featured are selections from the Martha Hill Video Project, the 1990 interview given by the division's founder Martha Hill to Carl Wolz. Selections from Salome Akatov's recent award-winning documentary film about legendary piano teacher Rosina Lhévinne are also available for viewing. The 2002 documentary Juilliard by Maro Chermayoff and Amy Schewel for the PBS series, American Masters, will be shown continuously in the exhibition.

Among the audiotapes available for listening in the exhibition are selections from Callas at Juilliard: Master Classes; the second movement of Bela Bartók's String Quartet No. 2 performed by the Juilliard String Quartet; "Introitus" from Mozart's Requiem, K. 626, with Chorus and the Juilliard Orchestra; "Wie liebliche deine Wohnungen" from Brahms's Eine Deutsches Requiem with the Juilliard Choral Union and Juilliard Orchestra; "Minuet and Dance of the Blessed Spirits" from Gluck's Orfeo ed Euridice with Julius Baker, flute, the Vienna State Opera Orchestra, and Felix Prohaska, conductor; Charles Ives's Three Places in New England: Putnam's Camp, Redding, Connecticut with Joel Sachs, conductor, and New Juilliard Ensemble; and William Schuman's Concerto for violin and orchestra with Joseph Fuchs, violin, Juilliard Orchestra, Jean Morel, conductor.

The Exhibition Documents Juilliard's 100-Year History

The exhibition documents the development and growth of both the curriculum and physical plant of The Juilliard School throughout the hundred years of its existence. It concludes with a model of Juilliard's 73,600-foot expansion and renovation that is being designed by a team from architects DILLER SCOFIDIO + RENFRO.

By the end of the exhibition, it is clear that the goals of Frank Damrosch, the first head of the school that became Juilliard, and those of the current president Dr. Joseph W. Polisi are strikingly similar. Dr. Polisi's 2005 Juilliard Centennial Convocation speech included these words, "The need for the artistic experience to be an important element of our society has only increased since Juilliard began its tradition of excellence in 1905. It will be your charge to help our fellow citizens understand the important role that the arts have in the fabric of our society. A role and presence that heals, stimulates, enlivens, makes us more discerning, and thrusts excellence into our lives."

Juilliard in The Library's Collections

The Juilliard School's history is well documented throughout the music, dance, theater, and recorded sound divisions of The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts. The papers of William Schuman, Juilliard's president from 1945 to 1961, are housed in the Music Division, as are the papers of faculty members Rosina Lhévinne and Marcella Sembrich. The exhibition includes some of the correspondence between Lhévinne and her pupil James Levine in the Library's collection. Composer Teo Macero, a Juilliard alumnus and a record producer at Columbia Records, has donated to the Library his session sheets, clippings, and other documentation relating to his work with Juilliard alumnus Miles Davis and such musicians as Duke Ellington, Andre Kostelanetz, Dave Brubeck, Stan Getz, Lionel Hampton, Charles Mingus, Woody Herman, J.J. Johnson, and Ramsey Lewis. The Library's Jerome Robbins Dance Division is a repository for films and videos of Juilliard's student dance performances. The Billy Rose Theatre Collection houses the papers of Alan Schneider, Director of Juilliard's Drama Division from 1976 to 1979. This division also includes photographs and playbills documenting the stage and film careers of most of Juilliard's Drama Division alumni. This exhibition is the second collaboration between The New York Public Library and Juilliard. In 1941, the Library exhibited materials relating to 25 operas produced at Juilliard between 1931 and 1941.

The Juilliard School, 1905-2005: Celebrating 100 Years is curated by Jane Gottlieb, Vice President for Library and Information Resources at The Juilliard School; Jeni Dahmus, Juilliard Archivist; and Barbara Stratyner, Judy R. and Alfred A. Rosenberg Curator of Exhibitions at The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts.    

About The Juilliard School
The Juilliard School commemorates its 100th birthday this year with a season-long celebration including world premiere performances of 47 music, dance, and drama commissions, orchestral tours of the Europe and the U.S., and the first-ever U.S. tours by Juilliard's drama and dance divisions. Since opening in October 1905 as the Institute of Musical Art, Juilliard has set this country's standard for education in the performing arts. Today's Juilliard continues to represent the finest in performing arts education, growing with and responding to the needs of a thriving cultural community in New York City, the U.S., and abroad, with more than 800 dance, drama, and music students drawn from 43 states and 43 foreign countries. The school offers degree programs from the bachelor to the doctorate, as well as highly selective and competitive diploma programs in jazz, opera, performance, string quartet, playwriting, and theater directing. Juilliard alumni are working artists who carry with them the highest standards of the performing arts profession worldwide. As it enters its second century, Juilliard continues to educate thousands of aspiring artists and expand its mission to instill a strong sense of activism and arts advocacy in its students.

It was the goal of music educator Dr. Frank Damrosch and banker James Loeb to create an institute that would give the fledgling classical music culture in the U.S. its first academy committed to the finest professional education of skilled musicians. The Institute of Musical Arts, located at Fifth Avenue and 12th Street, opened on October 30, 1905, and enrolled a first-year class of close to 500 students. In 1920, the Juilliard Foundation was created with a bequest by textile merchant Augustus D. Juilliard, specifically for the advancement of music. Four years later, its trustees formed the Juilliard Graduate School at 49 East 52nd Street, which in 1926 merged with the Institute of Musical Art under one president and one board of trustees. John Erskine became the first president of the combined institutions in February 1928. Although they kept two separate deans, the schools soon moved to new quarters on Claremont Avenue built expressly to house both educational divisions.

The amalgamation of the schools was gradual, continuing through the administration of President Ernest Hutcheson (1937-45). The next president of the combined schools was Pulitzer Prize-winning composer William Schuman (1945-62). He completed the merger, and in 1946 the name Juilliard School of Music became official. In 1951, he established Juilliard's Dance Division, making it the first major teaching institution ever to combine equal dance instruction in both contemporary and ballet techniques. Dr. Peter Mennin was Schuman's successor. In 1968, a four-year Drama Division was added, and the school officially changed its name to The Juilliard School, in time for its 1969 move to the Lincoln Center, for which it was the sole academic constituent.  

Following the death of Dr. Mennin in 1983, Dr. Joseph W. Polisi was appointed Juilliard's sixth president beginning with the 1984-85 academic year. His tenure has been a time of vitality, with the establishment of new student services; alumni programs; revised curriculum; new emphasis on liberal arts; greater interaction between the three Juilliard divisions of music, dance, and drama; new emphasis on humanities, community outreach, and the arts in education; creation of a CD-ROM to teach music to children; and the development of a comprehensive long-range plan for the school to guide it through the 21 st century. In 2001, Juilliard broke new ground by opening its pre-professional Juilliard Institute for Jazz Studies, a collaboration with Jazz at Lincoln Center; in 2003, Juilliard added its first undergraduate program for jazz musicians. The success with the jazz programs was celebrated in March of 2004 with a gala benefit concert, Classified Jazz, featuring classical and jazz performances by noted alumni Renée Fleming, Wynton Marsalis, Victor Goines and the Juilliard Jazz Orchestra, and others. Recently, the school increased to $150 million its goal for the Campaign for Juilliard that will further enhance student and faculty financial support, and help initiate important artistic and academic projects. In addition to its college programs, Juilliard offers graduate and pre-college programs in music as well as a continuing education program for adults; community outreach programs for New York City metropolitan-area students, and specialized music programs for children from under-represented populations.    

About The New York Public Library
The New York Public Library was created in 1895 with the consolidation of the private libraries of John Jacob Astor and James Lenox with the Samuel Jones Tilden Trust. The Library provides free and open access to its physical and electronic collections and information, as well as to its services. It comprises four research centers - the Humanities and Social Sciences Library; The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts; the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture; and the Science, Industry and Business Library - and 85 Branch Libraries in Manhattan, Staten Island, and the Bronx. Research and circulating collections combined total more than 50 million items, including materials for the visually impaired. In addition, each year the Library presents thousands of exhibitions and public programs, which include classes in technology, literacy, and English as a second language. The Library serves some 13 million patrons who come through its doors annually and another 13 million users internationally, who access collections and services through the NYPL website, www.nypl.org.

About The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts
The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts houses the world's most extensive combination of circulating, reference, and rare archival collections in its field. Its divisions are the Circulating Collections, Jerome Robbins Dance Division, Music Division, Billy Rose Theatre Collection, and the Rodgers and Hammerstein Archives of Recorded Sound. The materials in its collections are available free of charge, along with a wide range of special programs, including exhibitions, seminars, and performances. An essential resource for everyone with an interest in the arts-whether professional or amateur-the Library is known particularly for its prodigious collections of non-book materials such as historic recordings, videotapes, autograph manuscripts, correspondence, sheet music, stage designs, press clippings, programs, posters and photographs.

Also on Exhibit:
The four research libraries of The New York Public Library (The Humanities and Social Sciences Library, The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts, The Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, and The Science, Industry & Business Library) offer a broad range of exhibitions including the following:

Treasured Maps: Celebrating The Lionel Pincus and Princesss Firyal Map Division, on view beginning September 9 at the Humanities and Social Sciences Library, Fifth Avenue and 42nd Street

"I Am With You": Walt Whitman's Leaves of Grass (1855-2005), on view beginning September 9 at the Humanities and Social Sciences Library, Fifth Avenue and 42nd Street.

The Splendor of the Word: Medieval and Renaissance Illuminated Manuscripts at The New York Public Library, on view beginning October 21 at the Humanities and Social Sciences Library, Fifth Avenue and 42nd Street.

I LA GALIGO: From the Sulawesi Epic to the Stage, on view through October 2 at The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts, 40 Lincoln Center Plaza

A Community of Artists: 50 Years of the Public Theater, on view through October 15 in the Donald and Mary Oenslager Gallery at The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts, 40 Lincoln Plaza.

The Juilliard School, 1905-2005: Celebrating 100 Years, on view September 16, 2005 through January 14, 2006 at The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts, 40 Lincoln Center Plaza

Opt In to Advertising's New Age, on view beginning September 27, 2005 in Healy Hall at SIBL, 188 Madison Avenue.

Malcolm X: A Search for Truth, on view through December 31, 2005 at the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, 515 Malcolm X Boulevard.

The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts gratefully acknowledges the leadership support of Dorothy and Lewis B. Cullman. Additional support for exhibitions has been provided by Judy R. and Alfred A. Rosenberg and the Miriam and Harold Steinberg Foundation.

The Juilliard School, 1905-2005: Celebrating 100 Years will be on view September 16 through January 14, 2006 at The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts Dorothy and Lewis B. Cullman Center, Vincent Astor Gallery, 40 Lincoln Center Plaza. Exhibition hours are Thursday from noon to 8 p.m.; Tuesday, Wednesday, Friday and Saturday from noon to 6 p.m.; closed Sundays, Mondays, and holidays. Admission is free. For exhibition information, telephone 212.870.1630 or visit the Library's website at www.nypl.org.

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Contact:         Rima Corben         212.704.8600

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