UAB Briefs: Spring music, climate talk, an exclusive club
Welcome to another installment of UAB Briefs.
In this weekly online feature, we keep track of interesting people and events on campus.
Know people, places and programs on the UAB campus that deserve a mention? Email jchambers@starnespublishing.com.
A MUSICAL SPRING
The UAB Department of Music has begun its new season of more than 40 musical performances for spring 2019.
Many of the events are free, and the ticketed shows help support the department’s programs.
The series, which takes place between January and May, includes recitals and performances by numerous faculty and student groups at such venues as the Alys Stephens Performing Arts Center and the Mary Culp Hulsey Recital Hall.
The groups include the Faculty Brass Quintet, the Chamber Trio, the Jazz Trio, the Wind Symphony and UAB Opera.
Special events include the Celebration of Trumpets concert on Feb. 9 and the Clarinet Symposium concerts on March 16-17.
Visiting artists in the spring series will include the U.S. Naval Academy Brass Quintet on Feb. 8, the Bayberry String Quartet on Feb. 15 and the Iron Giant Percussion Ensemble on March 19.
One of the highlights is the UAB Piano Series, which brings the world’s finest pianists to Birmingham. Yakov Kasman, a professor of piano, artist-in-residence and a Van Cliburn medalist, directs the series.
Birmingham audience favorite Nikolai Lugansky, considered one of the world’s great interpreters of the piano repertoire, will play on Tuesday, Feb. 12.
Yeol Eum Son will perform on Tuesday, April 9. She has played around the world and is known for her eclectic repertoire, ranging from Bach to Gershwin.
For details, including a complete schedule, call 934-7376 or go to uab.edu/cas/music.
CAN WE TALK CLIMATE?
UAB professor James McClintock, an acclaimed author, explorer and Antarctic researcher, is now a spokesperson for the “Can We Talk Climate” campaign of The Nature Conservancy.
Launched by the Conservancy this year, the campaign promotes “connected conversations” around climate change and encourages people to sign a pledge to speak up soon and often.
“I’ve dedicated my life to talking to people about the climate impacts I’ve witnessed firsthand during my scientific expeditions to Antarctica,” said McClintock, a professor of polar and marine biology at UAB.
According to The Nature Conservancy, a survey by Yale University shows that seven in 10 Americans believe climate change is happening, and six in 10 are at least somewhat concerned, but 65 percent of them rarely discuss the issue with family or friends.
It is high time to talk more about the problem, according to McClintock.
“Over the past two decades on the western Antarctic Peninsula, I’ve seen glaciers increasingly shed house-sized chunks of glacial ice, and the number of icebergs increase,” he said.
He received the SCAR Medal for his decades-long educational efforts emphasizing Antarctic climate change and its impact on marine biology.
In 2016, he was elected to be a fellow in the prestigious Explorer’s Club in New York.
The club was founded in 1904, and the list list of past members includes legendary pilot Charles Lindbergh, mountain climber Sir Edmund Hillary and astronaut Neil Armstrong.
McClintock also serves as a member of the Board of Trustees of the Alabama chapter of The Nature Conservancy.
AN EXCLUSIVE GROUP
A UAB assistant art history professor, Noa Turel, has been named a spring 2019 member of the prestigious Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, New Jersey.
Established in 1930, the Institute is one of the world’s leading centers for curiosity-driven basic research.
Each year, leading scientists and scholars from around the world visit the institute to interact, explore, share and discover.
The group includes a wide range of scholars, from young postdoctoral fellows to distinguished senior professors.
About 1,500 people apply each year, but only about 200 are selected to become members.
Turel is working on a project titled “Ingenious Secrets: Renaissance Painter-Engineers and the Rise of Technologized Europe.”
“Ingenious Secrets” is focused on the employment of painters as engineers in French and Italian Renaissance courts.
Tracing the history of this vocational hybrid to the 15th century specifically, Turel shows how it helped create a new enthusiasm for technology in Europe.