Impressionism In Music, Art & Literature

Join us in the Scott Room for an afternoon of art and music with Dr. Caryn Block. We will examine the development of Impressionism and its legacy in music with a brief lecture followed by a live concert of both 19th century pieces and original compositions.

Impressionism in music began as an outgrowth of the artistic and literary schools in France devoted to this style. As a style, Impressionism began with an art exhibition of the French painters Auguste Renoir, Claude Monet, and Camille Pissarro in the 1870s, in which their paintings captured their "impressions of nature, gardens and daily life, with its changing light, color and atmosphere." In literature, the movement of symbolism was born at the same time as the impressionist art movement, represented in such French writers as Stephane Mallarme, Arthur Rimbaud and Paul Verlaine, which would transform poetry and prose dramatically. From these activities, an evocative movement was born that would transform the sister art of music later in the 19th century, which had been become heavy and dramatic, with overblown orchestrations and huge proportions in the forms of symphony and opera, influenced by the German Romantic school.

Caryn Block, composer, is an accomplished flutist, conductor and music director whose music has been performed both regionally and nationally. She has been the recipient of numerous grants, commissions, fellowships and awards for her compositions, among them: New York State Council of the Arts “Meet the Composer” grants, the Alexander Gretchaninoff Prizes in Composition, and the Ada Arens Morawetz Prize in Composition. In the years 2000 - 2018, she was awarded ASCAP Standards Awards in Composition. In 2012 and 2008, she was the recipient of a Meet the Composer Met Life Award for her new opera Ethan Frome and her trio “Arizona Views II” scored for flute, cello and percussion, respectively, and in the year 2000, she received a Meet the Composer Award for the premiere of her trio “Newport by the Sea.” In July 2013, her trio Sea Scenes for flute, violin and cello received its Newport premiere at the acclaimed Newport Music Festival in Rhode Island. Her music has been performed throughout the United States, including such venues as Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts, The Newport Music Festival, The Juilliard School, and many others.