Sinsinawa
Spectrum
A Congregation News Magazine
Alliance Publications Distributes Czech Music to Schools
API Receives $4,995 Gift to Support Czech Music in the Midwest
by Anita Smisek, OP
Sr. Anita Smisek prepares a mailing for 65 midwestern schools to receive Czech music scores to use in their band programs.
Alliance Publications, Inc., (API) Sinsinawa, WI, received a financial gift of $4,995 from the Embassy of the Czech Republic in Washington, DC, in August 2009. This gift was provided to support the API Czech Music Score Distribution to Schools Project coordinated by President of API Anita Smisek, OP. In September, 65 midwestern state schools received a gift of a score and parts for their concert band to promote the awareness and musical contribution of Czech composers to the concert band repertoire and to provide variety to their concert programs for the public. Nora Jurkovicova, the Embassy’s cultural liaison, provided a stunning brochure of the Czech Republic to be sent with the music for each school.
Receiving these gifts were four middle/junior high schools, 40 high schools, and 21 colleges or universities in Iowa, Illinois, Indiana, Minnesota, Michigan, and Wisconsin. A wide variety of Czech composers’ music was distributed in this project, such as the music of Vaclav Nelhybel, Antonin Tucapsky, Jan Pavel, Josef Flegl and Karel Belohoubek, Jan Vodnansky and Joel Blahnik, Rudolf Novacek, Jiri Laburda, Robert J. Dvorak, Jan Vicar, Zdenek Lukas, Josef Suk and Thomas Huelsman, Veroslav Neumann, Bohuslav M. Czernohorsky and Joel Blahnik, Karel B. Jirak, Ctirad Kohoutek, Karel Belohoubek, David Resnick, Amy Dunker, and Joel Blahnik. This represents those composers born in the Czech Republic and those of Czech ancestry immigrating to or born in the United States. Efforts were made to match the difficulty level to the size of the school bands in the variety of schools selected across a wide spectrum of localities in large and small cities as well as rural areas.