74 items found for your search. If no results were found please broaden your search.
(04/29/09 12:00pm)
Steve Voelker, tenor saxophonist, was trying to earn his pork pie hat in the Jazz Ensemble's concert Saturday night in Kendall Hall.
The junior musician had the task of playing tenor on the Lester Young piece "Tickle Toe." Young was famous for wearing pork pie hats, and for his cool tone. But Voelker is no Young follower: Voelker plays hotter and with more muscle than the cool Young. Voelker might have earned his pork pie hat anyway with his play. He explored the whole range of his instrument in three blistering solos.
Where Voelker plays with power, fellow sax player Matt Gramata, junior music major, employs subtlety and organization. Out of the entire sax section, Gramata might be the one who comes closest to reproducing Young's style. Playing soprano saxophone on "The Waltz You Swang for Me," Gramata demonstrated a wide range of tones. Each of his solos had a well defined beginning, middle and end, and his solo on "Waltz" was no exception, opening as a stop-and-go tease and building to a soaring conclusion.
The ensemble played a piece with a College connection, though it was tenuous at best. Ensemble director Gary Fienberg said the Bill Holman composition "The Git" expressed "all the energy and the fire and the love we have for the College of New Jersey." Aside from its title, Holman and the piece had no real link to the College. The piece featured a wicked drum solo by Charlie Winkler, junior music major.
Including Winkler, the ensemble featured three drummers on the set. Danielle Nudelman, freshman music major, provided the thunderous fills that are a trademark of Count Basie favorite "High Five." Pianist David Schuster, junior business major, was a standout on "High Five," driving the ensemble's edition of Basie's "All-American Rhythm Section." Schuster opened with the light, playful melodies that led perfectly into the song. The song also featured solos by every saxophone player.
One of the night's highlights followed immediately after the intermission, when trumpet player Richard Risden, sophomore music major, nearly blew the roof off the place with a screaming solo on Horace Silver's "Sister Sadie." He displayed a remarkable capacity to not only reach the upper register of the trumpet, but to play clear phrases at those heights.
"That's what we call screaming," Fienberg said of his playing.
The ensemble displayed its lighter side on pieces like "Stardust," which featured junior music major Brian Plagge on the flugel horn.
"This is probably one of the most recorded songs of the big-band era," Fienberg said of the Hoagie Carmichael piece. Plagge's melancholy tone and the swelling and fading accompaniment of the sax section gave the piece a nostalgic, looking-out-the-window mood.
(01/28/09 12:00pm)
So we're almost halfway through another brutal New York Knicks season. Things have certainly improved under Donnie Walsh and Mike D'Antoni, but like any good Knicks fan, I'm not happy.
Supposedly, the team is more fun to watch thanks to D'Antoni's impulsive offense. If fun is watching Nate Robinson and Al Harrington shoot as often as they want, I don't want any.
I get that D'Antoni is the best coach the team could have gotten, and I loved watching the seven-seconds-or-less Phoenix Suns, but I don't think it fits this team. Chris Duhon is no Steve Nash. He's performed admirably despite a hurt back, but I think his stats are definitely inflated by playing ridiculous minutes and playing at a stupid-fast pace every night.
And there are still some doubt as to the man who probably should be the starting point guard of the team, Stephon Marbury. Hear me out before you crucify me, Knicks fans. I know the marriage between Marbury and pretty much every basketball team he's been a part of has been rocky, but the Knicks have totally mishandled the situation. If they didn't want to play him this season, they should have waived him.
In addition to Marbury, the team has three other wasted roster spots: Eddy Curry, Jerome James and Cuttino Mobley. Curry's hurt, James is out for the season and shouldn't be a professional basketball player to begin with and Mobley has a heart condition that forced him to retire. At one point in the season, D'Antoni was using a seven-man rotation and running the team into the ground. Why not waive Marbury and sign someone who can actually give the rest of the team a breather?
The worst part of watching the Knicks this season is that management has already written it off. Walsh's strategy, like that of many other teams, is to clear cap room for 2010 when the Knicks will sign LeBron James, Dwayne Wade and Michael Jordan.
This is great for the fans. For the next two seasons, we'll be treated to non-competitive basketball solely for the chance of signing a good player in 2010. I understand New York is the media capital of the world and that James Dolan is willing to spend all of Cablevision's money, but my guess is a lot of the free agents on the market in 2010 will be looking to join a team they can win a championship with.
I can't see any championship team including Jared Jeffries, who seems to have absolutely no redeeming basketball ability at all, Quentin Richardson, who talks a huge game and almost never backs it up, or Nate Robinson, who is the stupidest person I have ever seen play basketball. And yes, D'Antoni's game is fun to watch and no doubt play but I can't see him winning any hardware with it.
The Knicks have certainly moved forward from the shambles of the Isiah Thomas era, but it's still not pretty in the Garden. Here is my projected lineup for the 2010-11 New York Knicks: Amare Stoudemire at center, Chris Bosh at power forward, LeBron James at small forward, Dwayne Wade at shooting guard and the lively Walt "Clyde" Frazier at point guard.
Myles Ma can be reached at ma5@tcnj.edu.
(12/03/08 12:00pm)
A malfunctioning heating unit produced smoke on the fourth floor of Holman Hall at about 8:30 a.m. Monday.
The malfunction was caused by a power failure, according to a firefighter on the scene.
Students heading to their first classes of the day had a chance to sleep in after the building was evacuated and fans were installed to get rid of the smoke and odor caused by the unit.
Those attending classes on the first and second floors were allowed back into the building a few minutes before 10 a.m.
The rest of the building remained closed until noon to make sure the heating unit did not cause further problems.
In a campus-wide e-mail sent from the office of Facilities Operations, students were advised to contact professors about classes scheduled to take place on the third and fourth floors before noon.
"Students should check with faculty members regarding potential alternative arrangements," the e-mail said.
The e-mail added that all classes normally taking place on the first and second floors of the building would proceed according to schedule.
The Pennington Road, West Trenton and Prospect Heights fire companies reported to the scene after receiving a call at 8:38 a.m.
Myles Ma can be reached at ma5@tcnj.edu.
(12/03/08 12:00pm)
As a way of avoiding writing an editorial that no one will read, I have instead elected to write a goodbye letter - that no one will read.
What can I say about my time at The Signal that will do my experiences here justice? This newspaper has taken five semesters of pure youth away from me. For your reading pleasure, here is a short list of things I could have done instead:
1) Watch football: As an avid fan of the second-best football team that calls Giants Stadium its home, the first-place New York Jets, I could have spent my Sundays root-rooting for my team instead of laying out pages in the venerable Brower Student Center basement, home of the executive office suites of The Signal.
2) Write the great Asian-American novel: As the most talented writer at this crummy paper, I could have channeled my firm, swollen talent into a work that would have shaken the Asian-American community to its moist core.
3) Become a successful business major: Given my special talents, I could have parlayed all of my free time on Sundays and Mondays into at least $4 million in junk bond trading, based on a number of studies I've done. I saw this subprime mortgage thing coming when I was still a sperm cell reading The Wall Street Journal. That's why I moved out of my parents' house, which has declined tenfold in value over the past two years, into the more stable cardboard box market. Home sweet home.
4) Pleasure myself and others: Soo many ladies!
5) Overdose on heroin: Why did I waste hours and hours of time staying up late working on the newspaper when I could have been shooting up, staying up late playing Jenga (and winning) against other heroin addicts? Jenga. Jeeenga.
As you can probably tell, I've got some regrets. But I've got to square with you, reader. Without The Signal, I wouldn't know a lot of the things that I know. I wouldn't know the joyfully broken logic that is the Associated Press Stylebook.
Without The Signal, I never would have gotten the opportunity to make big decisions like: Should that headline be center aligned or left aligned (left aligned, bitches)? I would never have learned just how huge Yao Ming is (pretty huge).
In all seriousness, here's the facts, Jack: Without The Signal, I'd be pretty crappy. I never would have won that Pulitzer for all my articles on the Municipal Land Use Center. I never would have had the opportunity to watch the sun rise outside my window as I crawled into bed. I never would have gotten to know the degenerates over in the staff box.
I'll miss you next semester, Signal. You took five good semesters of my life away. But tucking you in and putting you to bed every Tuesday morning made it all worthwhile.
With love,
Myles Ma
(Almost former) Editor-in-Chief
(12/03/08 12:00pm)
The halls of the Mildred & Ernest E. Mayo Concert Hall were graced with a virtuoso performance and some holiday-appropriate song selections from the College Orchestra on Saturday, Nov. 22. A number of audience members had to stand at the sold-out concert.
The centerpiece of the performance was faculty soloist Tomoko Kanamaru, assistant professor of music, on the piano.
Together, she and the Orchestra performed Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky's first piano concerto.
Kanamaru played the chameleon in her performance. At the start of the piece, she seemed to be keeping the beat and then took over the melody. She was able to change volumes smoothly, slipping in and out of the background. She also displayed command over a number of different tones - at times she was furious, at other times, gentle or melancholy. She commanded so much attention that when she wasn't playing, you noticed.
And it's not like Tchaikovsky made it easy on her or anyone else sitting down to play - even though Kanamaru was more than game, a listener could tell how difficult some of the passages were.
Kanamaru is a performer who is as fun to watch as she is to listen to. During the piece, she swayed her head to the music and often raised her free hand from the keys dramatically.
The first movement of the piece showed Kanamaru and the Orchestra's muscle.
Philip Tate, the Orchestra's conductor, displayed a propensity for turning the volume way up, but Kanamaru was right there in terms of decibel level. On some of the solo passages, she filled the halls with just the sound of her piano.
The second movement turned sweet and playful, carried by lovely melodies, while the third was bipolar. It traded between a robust main theme and a more lyrical melody.
The piece brought audience memebers to their feet because of the verve, vigor and volume with which it was played. A long, standing ovation and shouts of "bravo" followed.
The concert also featured more familiar work, also by Tchaikovsky, as the Orchestra performed a number of selections from "The Nutcracker."
Pieces like "Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairy" and "Waltz of the Flowers" are familiar, though people might not know them by name. It's a little like covering the Beatles - it's a crowd-pleaser, but you have to execute.
And the Orchestra did. The strings were particularly majestic on "Waltz of the Flowers." The waltz began with a skillful Ashley Taylor, sophomore music education major, on the harp.
In came the strings, then the horns and then the clarinets, before everything gave way to the grand and familiar melody, punctuated by playful flutes.
The Orchestra's play swelled in grandeur and emotion as the piece closed, sending the audience sailing happily into intermission.
(11/19/08 12:00pm)
This semester's Jazz Ensemble concert was a blend of old and new. Special guest Roger Dannenberg, a trumpet player and computer scientist, brought a hefty dose of innovation to the proceedings.
Dannenberg composed the most remarkable piece of the night, "Looking Up." As Dannenberg explained it, it was an attempt to improvise an ensemble piece on the spot. Each of the performers was assigned 10 lines of music, which Dannenberg dialed up on the fly using hand signals.
Dannenberg, also the inventor of the free recording software, "Audacity," showed off another of his innovations, a computer program that accompanies soloists, on another original composition, "Elephant Hippopotamus Sine Theta."
The meat of the piece was based around a funky bass line by Bryan Mayer, junior computer science major. The band took a break for Dannenberg and his program, and although his first attempt to demonstrate the program didn't get off the ground due to some technical difficulties, the band gave it another go and Dannenberg got it working.
He was able to call up different digital accompaniments by stepping on a pedal, producing the sound of an entire band. Stepping on different pedals produced different-sounding accompaniments.
Dannenberg also performed on one of the prettiest pieces of the night, "Spring Can Really Hang You Up the Most." His tones were blue-sky clear to start off the sentimental piece, at the beginning of which he was joined by junior business major David Schuster on piano, sophomore music education major David Ortiz on bass guitar and senior economics major Shane Mullin on the drums.
The piece became gorgeous when the rest of the band joined in. The biggest credit to the ensemble on this piece was how they restrained themselves and allowed the guest star to shine.
The band had plenty of opportunities to star on its own during the first half of the concert. The song selection drew heavily from Count Basie-inspired big band music.
The band shone brightest during an "All" trio of songs.
On "All Heart," arranged by Fred Wesche, a former music student at Trenton State College in the '50s, Brian Plagge, junior music education major, played a flugel horn solo that dripped with sentimentality. He was able to draw out the pretty melody of the melancholic song, which picked up halfway through before ending with a flourish.
Matt Gramata, junior music education major, counted the band in for "All of Me." The piece began with Gramata on alto saxophone and Ortiz on bass. Gramata, among the most emotional performers in the ensemble, was responsible for some of the best solos of the night.
The smoky "Always and Forever" featured Alan Rigoletto, guitarist and junior music performance major. Rigoletto kept his fingers moving quickly over the frets, while not detracting from the slow and smooth character of the piece. Rigoletto's cool play stood out well against the band's emotive playing. Gary Fienberg, director of the ensemble, allowed Rigoletto to close the piece with a flourish and a flurry of great lines.
The last piece, the Basie-inspired "Wind Machine," was probably the band at its best. Fienberg promised a fast tempo as he described the piece, and as he started snapping his fingers to count off, his charges called for him to count even faster.
Steve Voelker, junior music education major on tenor sax, was more than up to speed. If the song was going to be fast, he seemed determined to be blistering.
Dennis Quinn, sophomore interactive multimedia major, manning the drums on this piece, also impressed, though he slowed it down a bit for his solo. Somewhat to the surprise of the band, Ortiz went backstage, grabbed his bass guitar and laid down a funky line, almost certainly deviating from Sammy Nestico's arrangement. Soon conga, guitar and shaker were in on the fun in a final moment of pure fun.
Afterward, Fienberg fessed up: "It was a complete add-on."
(10/29/08 12:00pm)
Prior to the Raiders' Week 7 matchup against my perennially middling Jets, Sebastian Janikowski had never kicked a 57-yard field goal. As I was watching the Raiders go three and out in The Signal office, I was celebrating because of the ludicrous, impossible length of the kick.
"Game over," I thought. The Jets had played a stinker, but they were still alive against a terrible, terrible team that had played terribly.
And just like every time in my football-watching life when I have had a remotely positive thought about the Jets, I was wrong. Janikowski drilled it.
The Jets lost to the Oakland Raiders. After all the money we threw at people this summer, after drawing a schedule easier than cheesecake, after winning the Brett Favre lottery, the Jets still stand at 3-3.
So I'm switching sides - turning in my Gang Green card, if you will - and I don't have to go far to find a successful team to root for; I'm going the way of Jerry in Seinfeld episode 11, season six: "The Switch." That's right - I'm going for the roommate: the 2008 Super Bowl Champion New York Giants.
I just feel like I'm wasting my love. I give and I give and I give, and JaMarcus Russell (who is simply a terrible quarterback) outplays Favre.
Now Eli Manning, he's a quarterback I've believed in since the beginning. Well, not since the beginning. More like since the Super Bowl. Honestly though, the guy has a different aura about him this year.
In seasons past, I would watch the Giants in late-game situations when they needed a big drive out of Eli, and you could just tell from the look on his face that he would throw a crippling interception, blow the game and do the "Sad Eli" face.
This season, aside from the Browns game, I watch the Giants in the same situation and that feeling is gone. He looks like a capable, confident quarterback - exactly the guy you want in those situations.
Against the Raiders, Favre just looked old. I can't believe this, but I'm comparing the boyish, even twerpy, Manning favorably with probably the manliest guy to ever line up behind a center. What league is this?
This season was supposed to be different for the Jets. They got Brett, the devil finally collected on his deal with Tom Brady, Thomas Jones has a real line to run behind and the Jets have a .500 record to show for it. In my delusion, I saw a deep playoff run for this team, but as of Week 7, the Buffalo Bills have somehow emerged as the cream of the AFC East. I forgot in my advanced age how this team has let me down year after year, and will certainly continue to do so year after year until I am dead.
I feel like a battered wife.
Maybe I should just forget the NFL altogether. Basketball was always more my sport; no matter how disillusioned I may get with the Jets, I can always look forward to another thrilling season with the New York Knicks.
Myles Ma can be reached at ma5@tcnj.edu.
(10/08/08 12:00pm)
The closest most people come to listening to sitar music is the Beatles' "Norwegian Wood."
Not to take anything away from former Beatles guitarist George Harrison, but he could have learned a lot from Sanjoy Bandopadhyay, who showcased the instrument in a sitar recital Oct. 2 in the Mildred and Ernest E. Mayo Concert Hall.
Bandopadhyay, a professor at Rabindra Bharati University in Kolkata (formerly Calcutta), India, played a piece that lasted about 45 minutes, one he said was almost entirely improvised.
The sitar produces notes that can be stretched and bent, like a slide guitar, though the instrument offers more sustain and range.
Bandopadhyay was accompanied by Abhijit Banerjee on the tabla, a percussion instrument comprising a pair of hand drums.
Banerjee drew more out of his instrument than seemed possible given its simple appearance. Tones ranged from rumbling bass to snapping treble.
The concert was aptly titled "Trance and Verve." Bandopadhyay and Banerjee put the audience in a trance without the aid of pills or strobe lights.
The 45-minute piece slowed down and sped up organically like human breathing. It featured passages played like frantic hyperventilation, when both men's hands moved wildly about their instruments, which transitioned into sections of probing, meditative breaths.
The pair played with obvious enjoyment and it seemed like they wanted to impress each other with their playing as much as they did the audience. They exchanged grins with each new idea.
Bandopadhyay's music is heavy on improvisation, and it is only fitting he and Banerjee were joined at the concert's opening by six members of the College's Jazz Band and its director, Gary Fienberg, chair of the music department, on cornet.
The students who joined Fienberg, Bandopadhyay and Banerjee onstage were: Dave Ortiz, sophomore music education major, on bass; Brian Plagge, junior music education major, on trumpet; Al Rigoletto, junior music education major, on guitar; Dave Schuster, junior business major, on piano; and Steve Voelker, junior music education major, on tenor saxophone.
The band played a piece Bandopadhyay wrote primarily the morning before, and which he finished the day of the performance, a challenge for everyone involved, but one they overcame.
The brass elements gave the Indian composition a New-Orleans-meets-New-Delhi feel. Improvisation played a heavy role, and every musician got a chance to solo.
The audience clapped after every such instance, a practice usually reserved for raucous jazz concerts, not recitals.
Bandopadhyay was content to let the students, as well as Fienberg, steal the show, and they were every bit as electric as they are during Jazz Band performances. After each had a solo, they traded improvised phrases until all the music ran together and everyone was playing at once.
Bandopadhyay summed up the spirit of the night best: "Musicians don't play," he said. "They just allow music to flow through them."
Bandopadhyay, Banerjee and the rest of the musicians proved they were more than up to the role of conduits for the evening.
(09/10/08 12:00pm)
A power outage caused by a lightning strike to the College's Cogeneration Plant on Aug. 30 is still affecting campus power, causing a string of short power outages in the past two weeks.
This past weekend, the College performed tests on the electrical system, which led to more outages.
Friday, the servers controlling swipe access shut down for several hours during an outage, according to Matthew Golden, executive director of Public Affairs and Communications.
Campus Police were notified that anyone with an I.D. Card could swipe into any building around 9:30 p.m. Friday.
"The alternative would be for (the swipe cards) to work in none of the halls, which would lead to a large number of people being locked out," Golden said.
Golden added, "Because individual rooms have locks and because IT works to restore the servers as rapidly as possible if they go down, the current default makes the most sense."
Campus Police Chief John Collins advised students to be cautious if the swipe access servers go down again, allowing students to swipe into any building on campus.
"People should just exercise their normal precautions they would when they get in their rooms and lock them," Collins said.
Lightning struck PSE&G's grid Aug. 30, causing a power surge at the College's Central Utilities Plant and damaging the Cogeneration Plant's computers, according to Golden.
The second outage occurred at about 5 p.m. the same day when Facilities restarted the Cogeneration Plant, but it was unable to synchronize with the PSE&G grid.
"PSE&G advised us that they continued to have significant power dips in their lines throughout the day after the lightning strike, which we believe caused our inability to synchronize with the utility grid," Golden said.
The campus suffered another outage Sept. 2 when the Cogeneration Plant again failed to synchronize with the PSE&G grid.
Facilities successfully restarted the Cogeneration Plant again Sept. 3, only to fail again, causing another campus-wide outage.
"It is now apparent that the damage sustained on Saturday (Aug. 30) is more widespread than previously thought," Lori Winyard, director of mechanical engineering, said in a campus-wide e-mail.
According to Golden, the College's electrical systems are designed to sever the Cogeneration Plant from the grid in the event of a potentially damaging event, like the Aug. 30 lightning strike.
"While this causes a campus power outage, it protects human safety as well as the College's equipment and buildings," he said.
Golden said planned power outages over the summer were unrelated to the recent outages.
(09/03/08 12:00pm)
College is often marketed to incoming freshmen as leaving the nest. It is presented as a chance to take one's first steps unassisted, cord cut. This is an exaggeration of course. The problems of tuition, room and board, as well as dental and health insurance are taken care of by our parents for all but the most independent students.
But 18-year-olds entering college do get a slew of new freedoms: the right to vote, sign contracts, serve on juries and serve in the military, to name a few. But a lot of 18-year-olds never partake in any of those freedoms. What a lot of 18-year do partake in is illegal underage drinking.
Now the Amethyst Initiative is circulating a statement asking college presidents to rethink the drinking age. Perhaps, 100 college presidents who have signed the statements are saying, 18-year-olds should be allowed to drink.
Changing the law to allow kids to do something they are already doing seems like a logical step, but it the change effected would be nominal at best. Underage kids will go from beer-swilling criminals to beer-swilling upstanding citizens.
Changing the law will affect whether kids will go to the club with the ID they got from Chinatown or the ID they got from the DMV.
Not every 21-year-old is ready to drink. Not every 18-year-old at a party is risking his life. Age is hardly a perfect measure of maturity. But it's as good as we've got. Three years doesn't seem like a lot, but ask the seniors graduating this year how much they've changed in that time.
It may not be true across the board, but the thought process that goes into making a smart decision is a lot different at 18 than it is at 21. There may be three years of hangovers, blackouts and nights spent holding the toilet to consider for a 21-year-old.
President Gitenstein is right to hold off before deciding whether to sign the Initiative's statement. Lowering the legal age would remove a lot of the romance and rebelliousness of underage drinking, but it would also lower a lot of barriers that many 18-year-olds may not be ready to cross.
- Myles Ma
Editor-in-Chief
(09/03/08 12:00pm)
The stars were suddenly clearer when a campus-wide power outage struck the College Saturday around 12 a.m.
As of Saturday afternoon, Campus Police officers still didn't know what caused the outage that morning, or another blackout that occurred just before 5 p.m.
PSE&G restored power to the campus within about 30 minutes of each outage.
Jim Lopez, a Campus Police officer who answered the phone during the first power outage, said the police had "no idea" what caused the power outage.
He said for students to be aware of any emergencies caused by the blackout, like students getting stuck in elevators.
For Danielle Kuhn, junior fine arts major, the blackout became a lockout.
Because of the outage, she couldn't get into her townhouse after going to a concert with a group of friends.
"I came up to the house and the lounge light was on and the outside light was on, but the light on the swiper thing wasn't on and it wouldn't read my card at all and the doorbell wouldn't work either," she said.
The College conducted a planned electrical shutdown during the summer break on May 17 and 18. An e-mail sent out to students said the goal of the shutdown was "to service our transformers, switch gear, and related equipment to help prevent service interruptions during the year."
Another planned shutdown, also conducted to prevent power outages during the year, was held in August.
Campus Police and College administrators weren't available for comment before press time because of the holiday weekend.
(04/16/08 12:00pm)
As Gary Fienberg, the College Jazz Ensemble's director, said, the night's theme was dance.
"We're going to talk a lot about dancing," he said before the band played "Smoke and Mirrors," a funk number composed by Mike Tomaro.
Fienberg and the Jazz Ensemble, a 20-piece big band, took to the Main Stage in Kendall Hall Friday night for a diverse seven-song set, plus an encore, that featured a pair of funk pieces, as well as music from the Caribbean.
Fienberg gave the history of each song before it was played. His explanation for "Smoke and Mirrors" was particularly ominous. He said funk was characterized by "evil, blues-sounding bass lines," bass lines that "want to kill you." From this, dance music arises.
Bassist David Ortiz, freshman music major, lived up to that introduction. The rhythm section was rounded out by Caryn Feder, senior music major, who picked up a cowbell for the song, one of four percussion instruments she took a turn on.
Richard Risden, sophomore music major and lead trumpet, started the song up front and led off with a smoky solo on a muted trumpet, true to the song's name. The smoke cleared as Alan Rigoletto, sophomore music major, dropped a heavy guitar line of only a few notes. His lines turned lighter as the song went on, teasing quick phrases out of his guitar.
Matt Gramata's soprano sax solo went along the same lines at first. The sophomore music major played a few long notes that petered out into multi-note bursts. Playful at first, he let loose, going wild before handing the reins back to the rest of the band.
Fienberg occupied himself on stage by clapping along with the music and snapping his fingers, declining to play the ringmaster. He preferred a different term: "I am Dr. Gary Fienberg, master of ceremonies - head clown of the circus, so to speak," he said by way of introduction. One thing he never did was wave a baton - Fienberg said in an interview before the show that a big band doesn't need much conducting; the rhythm section keeps the band in line.
On "San Juan Shuffle" the rhythm centered around drummer Joseph Ketterer's bass pedal. Ketterer's not even a student here - he's a sophomore at Nottingham High School and sophomore music major John Ketterer's younger brother.
"He's been filling in all semester," Fienberg said, "and he sounds like a seasoned pro."
As Fienberg said, the rhythm in "San Juan Shuffle" is straight out of the Dominican Republic, and it shares genes with the merengue. Fienberg shuffled his six-foot frame into a brief demonstration of the dance.
During the song Feder, situated behind Ketterer, had maracas in one hand and kept slapping her bongos with the other. As the song went on, her bongos and Ketterer's drums went back and forth after Steve Voelker, sophomore music major, put his fingers to work on a tenor sax solo punctuated by blasts of trombone and trumpet.
The night reached its climax on "Latin Injection." All five sax players soloed - first Gramata, then Voelker, then Jordan Smith, senior music major, then Kate Maiuro, senior music major, then the older Ketterer, then back to Gramata and so on around and around until they all started playing at once, kept together by Ortiz's steady bass. The band followed the lead of pianist Dave Schuster, sophomore economics major, who started the song off accompanied by appealing melody lines from the trumpet section.
Before the night was over, Fienberg had one more trick up his sleeve: an utterly planned encore. The band sat motionless after the last piece in the program and the audience was still seated before he asked, "Do we have time for one more?"
As the band played the encore, "Groove Merchants," Fienberg exited stage right to get the audience's point of view. What he and everyone else could see was a young band, anchored by many sophomores, with plenty more fine performances to come.
(03/19/08 12:00pm)
On the night of April 19, many Jewish students will be at home with their families to celebrate the first night of Passover, one of the most important nights of the Jewish year. During this night, Jews face certain restrictions.
They can't use electronics. They can't listen to music. And they certainly can't attend rock concerts.
For this reason, a number of students have complained about the scheduling of the College Union Board's (CUB) annual Spring concert featuring Third Eye Blind on April 19, the first night of the holiday.
Joel Blenner, sophomore accounting major and treasurer of Hillel/Jewish Student Union (JSU), said the Jewish population on campus is "a significant proportion of the student body to deny access to a concert of this magnitude."
"This concert is something that the entire (College) community could share, but instead the timing alienates Jewish students," he said.
CUB responded to student complaints through an e-mail statement.
The organization wrote that April 19 is the only date that matches both the availability of the band and the availability of the Student Recreation Center and apologized that some students will be unable to attend the concert.
"It is unfortunate that throughout the planning process, none of our members, or people involved in the process, recognized the conflict," CUB said in its statement.
"We feel certain that had we recognized this conflict in due time, we would have worked with the band and the Rec Center staff to find an alternative date."
The band, which is currently on tour, is scheduled to perform several times in April. According to the band's Web site, it is traveling to Williams College in Massachusetts the night after performing in the Rec Center.
"We, just as everyone else, are paying tuition that is being used to subsidize Third Eye Blind, but will be unable to attend," Blenner said, referring to the fact that the concert is being funded through the Student Activities Fund (SAF), which the Student Finance Board (SFB) is charged with allocating.
CUB offered the band $45,000 to play at the College.
Leo Acevedo, SFB executive director, defended CUB's efforts.
"When it comes down to it, the students want and have come to expect a concert in the spring, and as time goes on, it becomes harder for CUB to request money for a concert because there is limited time for them to actually put the concert together," he said.
"I have no doubt that if it (was) possible to have the concert on a different day, CUB would have done so," he said.
Because the concert is SAF-funded, tickets will cost $15, about half of what Third Eye Blind normally charges for its concerts.
At its April 1 and 2 concerts at the Starland Ballroom in Sayreville, N.J., general admission costs $29.50.
Brian Gross, senior finance major and JSU member, said although Jewish students can see the band elsewhere, tickets are cheaper at the College.
"Tickets are much more expensive in the real world," he said.
CUB pledged in the future "to be aware of any major conflicts, be they religious observance or other major campus-wide planned event."
This is little consolation for Jewish students who had hoped to attend this year's concert, however, since the date has already been set.
"It's an unfortunate scheduling conflict that Jewish students will have to deal with," Gross said. "Hopefully CUB has learned to look at important holidays in all religions."
(03/05/08 12:00pm)
Gov. Jon S. Corzine recommended a $76 million cut in higher education funding during his budget address for the 2009 fiscal year on Tuesday, Feb. 26. The cut includes a $3.7 million reduction in funding for the College.
The cut was one of many of what Corzine called "painful reductions" in a proposed budget of $32.97 billion. The proposed budget is $500 million lighter than the budget passed for the 2007 fiscal year.
The $3.7 million cut to the College's state appropriation would be a 10 percent decrease from funding this year.
College President R. Barbara Gitenstein posted her response to the governor's budget proposal on the College's Web site the same day. Gitenstein criticized the governor for not considering the long-term consequences of cuts to higher education funding.
"The state's continuing disinvestment in higher education will lead to a choice between two distasteful alternatives," she wrote that afternoon. "New Jersey's public colleges and universities will be forced to diminish the quality of education offered to our state's students or raise tuition significantly."
In an e-mail interview, Gitenstein addressed the preparedness of the College in regard to the proposed budget.
"We have been scenario planning since early November," she said.
The exact impact of the 10 percent cut is still uncertain.
"We will have to make some difficult decisions," Gitenstein said.
To increase revenue, Gitenstein said the College could increase tuition and fees.
"Remember, this is all at the planning stage," she said, adding that aside from the 10 percent cut to the College's base appropriation, other factors could have a negative impact on the College's finances, including the scaled salary increases negotiated last year between the state and unions representing most faculty and staff members.
Corzine's proposed budget allots $38.5 million to help pay for the salary increases, but Gitenstein pointed out that it is still unknown what portion of those funds will go to the College.
In his speech Tuesday, Corzine said the reductions to higher education were among the smallest in his proposed budget.
"This is because we carry grave concerns about the level of potential tuition hikes," he said.
In light of this, the proposed budget includes a $13.8 million increase in student financial assistance, most of which goes toward an increase in funding for need-based Tuition Aid Grants.
However, Corzine's budget continues the phase-out of the Outstanding Scholars Recruitment Program, a scholarship that offered merit-based awards as generous as full tuition, room and board.
The leaner budget is part of a continuing response to the ongoing financial problems of the state government.
"It's certainly not a budget designed to please," Corzine said. "I can tell from the applause lines. But it is a prudent blueprint to meet difficult economic circumstances, correct past mistakes and it lays a foundation for a responsible future."
Corzine's budget proposal now awaits approval from the Legislature, due by July 1 at the latest. The College's budget is normally completed during May or June. Gitenstein promised that the College would lobby Legislators in an effort to restore funds.
"I will be honest with you, however," she said. "The financial situation of the state is so dire, I am not tremendously optimistic about large-scale restoration this year."
(02/13/08 12:00pm)
Nora Sirbaugh, professor of music, described her relationship with Stephen Peet, her late longtime accompanist and collaborator, as a "musical marriage." In the program notes for her faculty recital Saturday night, she mentioned that after their last recital together, Peet said the two had never performed anything by Johannes Brahms together. As Sirbaugh wrote in the program notes, "Stephen, here is your Brahms."
Sirbaugh, known to the students in her vocal studio as "Dr. S," opened her Saturday night faculty recital with Brahms' "Vier ernste Ges?nge," literally, four serious songs, an emotionally-charged set dedicated to Peet, who died in 2005. The first three pieces in the set dealt with death. Even without the aid of the program notes, which contained translated lyrics, Sirbaugh communicated the dark and grave content of the words, Old Testament verses translated into German, coming close to tears as she did.
Sirbaugh's harrowing mezzo-soprano voice, a dark and vulnerable instrument, turned uplifting and hopeful as the third piece, "O Tod, wie bitter bist du," (O death, how bitter are you) shifted into the last of the set, "Wenn ich mit Menschen."
Where the previous three pieces were taken from Ecclesiastes, the last was taken from Corinthians and dealt with love. As she sang the piece, she was suddenly animated, and with uplifted hands, she sang the German equivalent of, "Now there remains faith, hope, love, these three, but love is the greatest among them."
Sirbaugh's second set was similar thematically, but it came with a language change from German to French. The second piece of the set, "La Belle au Bois," told the story of a sleeping beauty, who, after being awakened by a prince, chooses eternal slumber "rather than to live and suffer." Sirbaugh smiled sadly as she delivered the final line of the piece, "at the threshold of the seven funeral turrets of Sleeping Beauty."
The audience, a collection of Sirbaugh's students, family and fellow faculty members, couldn't possibly have been prepared for the second half of her performance, a decidedly lighter side of Sirbaugh, given the dark nature of the first half.
Before performing "The Gnu," by Michael Flanders and Donald Swan, Sirbaugh addressed her students.
"I want to dedicate this first English song to all my diction students, and you'll know why when we start," Sirbaugh joked, drawing confused laughter.
Their confusion was assuaged as Sirbaugh sang, "G-know, g-know, g-know, I'm a G-nu," drawing laughter as she sang the story about meeting a gnu while pronouncing all the silent letters (K-know wuh-who's wuh-who).
The last piece in the set was "Vespers," the first Christopher Robin poem, set to music by Harold Fraser-Simson. The piece, about a boy struggling through his bedtime prayers, contained easily the most adorable moment of the night. Sirbaugh yawned as the song ended, and even tiptoed off the stage after the song had ended and Christopher Robin was asleep in bed, stopping only to wake up her accompanist, Kathleen Milly, whose head had drooped down onto the piano.
Sirbaugh came out for the final set with a giggle, followed by fellow professors of music Suzanne Hickman, Robert Guarino, Mark Moliterno and Joanna Chao.
Sirbaugh both began and ended with Brahms, though her final set was radically different from her first: Sirbaugh chose to perform a selection of Brahms' "Liebeslieder," love songs.
Sirbaugh, Hickman, a soprano, Guarino, a tenor, and Moliterno, a bass-baritone, formed a quartet, while Chao joined Milly at the piano, as they charged through the short pieces in numerical order. The songs were sweet trifles until the quartet took a collective deep breath before suddenly turning up the volume and singing, "Nein, es ist nicht auszukommen mit den Leuten!" (No, there's just no getting along with people!")
The final piece on the program was Number 15 - "Zum Schluss" (To the close), from Brahms' "Neue (New) Liebeslieder." The lyrics contained a message of healing from creativity.
The quartet wasn't done, however. Sirbaugh and the rest of the gang came out for an encore, another "Liebeslied."
"The words say," Sirbaugh explained, "'like a rushing stream, we give you a hundred thousand kisses.'"
Her students, family and co-faculty members returned the favor as she left the Mildred & Ernest E. Mayo Concert Hall to a round of cheers.
(02/06/08 12:00pm)
An article that appeared in The Signal last week, "Apartments to be completed August 2009," mentioned that the College planned to replace the sliding doors in Brower Student Center with revolving doors. William Rudeau, director of Construction, said the new doors will help save on energy costs by reducing heat loss.
Yes, that is a good thing. If getting rid of the sliding doors will improve the efficiency of the building and save this College a desperately needed dime or two, I am all for it. My issue is with revolving doors.
Allow me to paint a terrifying picture. Imagine yourself in the student center at around 12:15 p.m., huffing and puffing to class after purchasing a high-priced, low-quality meal from the Food Court.
In front of you is a terrifying obstacle: a spinning dervish of steel and glass. To pass unscathed, you need timing, quickness and above all, courage.
Everyone has stood in front of a revolving door, as I have, and known what it is to fear.
This is the thought process hundreds of students will be reduced to each day:
"Should I go now? No. OK maybe now. Damn. Oh! Damn. Maybe? No. I'm so scared!" College students, robbed of dignity en masse.
I know what you're thinking. I thought the same thing as I read about the revolving doors last week:
"I'm just trying to get to class! I don't need this!" No, reader. Nobody does.
Imagine the traffic jams a revolving door would create at an already-busy entry point. Imagine the sense of despair you would feel if you dropped a book inside the spinning cell.
Imagine the pranks! Imagine a team of mischievous, mischievous frat boys holding the door still with you inside, clawing at the glass for mercy, their jeering, backward-hat-wearing faces giving no quarter.
This is just a glimpse of the doom that would undoubtedly dawn on our campus should the College be allowed to proceed with its plans. It is a doom we shouldn't allow to pass.
There are so many better alternatives to a revolving door. Here's one: a regular glass door. This would eliminate any requirement of timing, balance and agility a revolving door would present.
The glass will help prevent anyone from having a door opened in their face, an ever-present danger with non-glass doors.
In addition, such a door would likely be even better for heat conversation than a revolving door.
A regular door: saving heat - and lives.
I admit I've taken the sliding doors for granted. I didn't even have to think about them as I passed by, leaving me free to ponder: Did I do my homework? Will we have a quiz today? How many pairs of underwear am I wearing?
Every day, the sliding doors smoothly allow hundreds of students to pass through unobstructed.
The next time you walk through those convenient, non-terrifying doors, you should give thanks that you'll never have to be afraid of them.
My advice for the future is to be prepared for the revolution (Get it? Revolving doors!). I've already purchased a helmet and kneepads. Hard times are coming.
(02/06/08 12:00pm)
Come early May, students may find their late-night schedules busier than they had hoped, thanks to a new final exam schedule. Because the new schedule shortens the exam period from five days to four, exam days will last from 8 a.m. to 10 p.m.
During the Fall semester, the final exam schedule had six reading days and five exam days, which lasted from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. This semester, according to a mass e-mail sent by the Committee on Planning and Priorities (CPP), an exam day could last up to 15 hours. According to the e-mail, exams will not be scheduled to end until up to 10:30 p.m.
The reason for the change is that unlike last year, when the semester began on Martin Luther King Jr. Day, the Spring semester began the day after the federal holiday.
"I remember a few years ago we would have classes on Martin Luther King Day and then have a celebration of Martin Luther King Day on the following Wednesday," Andrew Clifford, associate professor of mathematics and co-chair of CPP, said. Clifford said it was decided that setup was "less appropriate" than having the holiday off, which the committee recommended.
The committee considered two alternatives to the current schedule. One was to convert one of the four currently scheduled reading days into an exam day. The second was to shorten the actual exams by about 30 minutes.
CPP chose the current option Monday morning, after deliberating via e-mail the previous week.
CPP considered more options, including adding an exam day on Saturday. However, Clifford said this option was rejected because it would cost the College too much money.
Clifford and CPP received input from the Student Government Association (SGA), as well as the faculty and staff senates, regarding the three proposed changes to the final exam schedule.
"Just about all the feedback we got was 'none of this is good,'" Clifford said.
SGA conducted a poll last week to gauge student preference among the three choices.
"The majority of SGA and the majority of the student population who contacted SGA in regards to this matter were in favor of shortening the exam periods from two hours and 50 minutes to two hours and 30 minutes," Christine Cullen, SGA executive president, said.
When told of CPP's decision to run exams until 10 p.m., some students responded negatively.
Lauren DiMatteo, senior marketing major, said, "I feel like it doesn't leave you with any time to do anything." DiMatteo was also worried about not getting enough sleep if she had a late exam scheduled before a morning exam.
Christine Selvaggio, junior communication studies major, was worried about the safety of having late exams.
"I think that it could be a safety concern walking from a building at 10 p.m.," she said. Selvaggio said she would have preferred it if CPP had chosen to shorten the exam period.
According to Clifford, 10 p.m. is not the latest exams have ever been scheduled. He recalled spring of 1999, before transformation, when students took more classes and more exams. Then, exams were scheduled to end as late as 11 p.m.
"I never ended up giving an exam that ended 11 o'clock at night," he said, "so I didn't hear any complaints."
(10/10/07 12:00pm)
The National Science Foundation awarded a $600,000 grant to support a proposed program intended to increase interest in the computer sciences.
The program will involve rising eighth graders from Fisher Middle School in Ewing, who will be introduced to computer science through interactive journalism.
"Some of the characteristics that you need to be a good computer scientist are the same characteristics that you need to be good journalists, artists, people who are creative," Monisha Pulimood, assistant professor of computer science, said.
Pulimood, Ursula Wolz, associate professor of computer science, and Kim Pearson, associate professor of English, are in charge of the grant.
For the first two years, the program will be comprised of two week-long summer camp experiences at the College as well as an after-school program at Fisher Middle School. The 18 children attending these events will be publishing an online journal using a programming language called Scratch.
"They're not going to just create text," Wolz said. "They're going to create little interactive videos using Scratch."
Scratch was designed by Mitchel Resnick, head of the media arts and sciences program at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Resnick, a classmate of Pearson's at Princeton University, designed the program with middle-school students in mind.
Fisher faculty will be trained on how to use the language before the program takes place.
Pearson said while collaborations between the College and the Ewing public school system have happened before, "Using journalism to teach computer science is new."
Among the problems the principal investigators hope to address with the program is the lack of people going into the field of computer science.
"The primary goal is to attract young people to computing careers who may not have thought of them as an option," Pearson said.
"We want to work with kids who may not necessarily be top scorers in math and science," Pulimood said.
Pearson said she hopes the children "gain an appreciation" for the journalism field through the program. She added that possible content for the proposed journal included local reporting as well as simple economic reporting.
Among her ideas is a database comparing prices of popular children's items at different stores.
The method for selecting the children has yet to be determined. Pulimood said determining an appropriate method could pose a challenge.
"I can see people getting worried about why their kids aren't in the program," Pulimood said.
Mary Switzer, gender equity diversity specialist in the department of technology studies and program manager of the grant, said, "We want to have equal access for all the students involved in the grant with particular focus on underrepresented groups," meaning women and minorities.
"Women and minorities tend to move away from computer science for various reasons," Pulimood said.
After two years, the program will be evaluated on whether its goals were realized.
(09/19/07 12:00pm)
Seven College students joined between 60 and 75 protesters in Trenton on Friday to protest against a number of Trenton issues, including Mayor Douglas H. Palmer's absenteeism and the city's crime rate and poor school system, according to missingmayor.com, an anti-Palmer Web site.
The College presence at the rally was organized by Neil Hartmann Jr., senior communication studies major.
Hartmann Jr., who works with Habitat for Humanity in Trenton, takes issue with the city's perceived renaissance and the portrayal of Palmer as the cause of that renaissance.
"It's just blatant lies," Hartmann said. "He hasn't improved a damn thing."
Missingmayor.com claims Palmer has not been seen in Trenton since May and that he doesn't live in Trenton.
The protest took place in front of the Trenton Marriot, where the U.S. Conference of Mayors, of which Palmer is president, was holding a meeting.
While the mayor didn't come out of the Mariott during the rally, the participants did get a chance to speak with several media outlets present to cover the meeting, such as the Times of Trenton.
The College presence was not organized under the banner of any student organization.
"We're just concerned citizens that are working at non-profits in Trenton and see that there has not been an improvement in the quality of life in Trenton," Todd Stoner, senior political science and international studies major, said. Stoner has worked with the Capital South Neighborhood Preservation Project, dedicated to improving quality of life in the Capital South area of Trenton.
"We didn't want (College) students going just to protest," Stoner said in reference to the small number of students in attendance. "You should never go to a protest if you don't know what it's about. So, really the people (who were) there are people that did research in Trenton, people that worked in Trenton or people who live there off-campus."
Palmer was elected mayor in 1990 and has been re-elected four times since.
Hartmann Jr., in attempting to explain the mayor's success in elections, said, "Not enough people are thinking through the issues."
"(Palmer) spends more money to get his name up in places, and that's what gets him elected," he added.
When asked if the mayor got the message, Stoner laughed. "No," he said. "Not at all."
(09/12/07 12:00pm)
Last Wednesday, the student groups of the College could be found at tables lined up along the sidewalk from the Alumni Grove to Brower Student Center. Despite the heat, representatives of each group manned their respective tables from noon until 3 p.m. as part of the mass recruitment drive known as the Student Organization Activities Fair.
However, a handful of groups, including Lions Now, formerly known as The Journal, were deprived of their three hours in the sun. The table for Lions Now, the campus TV show, was situated inside the student center, along with the tables for ROTC and the Air Force.
The reason, according to Tim Asher, director of Student Activities and Leadership Development, is that Lions Now is not recognized as an organization by the Student Government Association (SGA).
"The Student Organization Activities Fair is open to all recognized and registered student organizations," Asher said. "Groups such as The Journal may have participated in the past, but we are trying to tighten up our policies and procedures for the benefit of all students."
Scott Pioli, director of Lions Now, took issue with the change.
"Lions Now is a completely revamped group looking to become a legitimate organization on campus and the activities fair would have been a major way for us to recruit new members, especially freshmen," he said via e-mail. "Not letting us be 'direct' participants because we are not SGA-recognized is unfair."
Pioli said the presence of Lions Now outside with the other organizations "would not have hurt anybody," while being relegated to the inside of the student center adversely affected the recruitment efforts of Lions Now.
"Looking at other groups' signup sheets, which were pages long, and comparing it to ours, which was only a page, showed me the difference," Pioli said.
Lions Now, and The Journal before it, have been run through the communication studies department, which provided equipment and other means for members of Lions Now to produce a TV show.
However, after Pioli received an e-mail from Carol Willis of the division of Student Activities and Leadership Development on Aug. 29 informing him that only SGA-recognized organizations were allowed to participate in the activities fair, he took steps to become SGA-recognized, including drafting a constitution. Pioli also cited access to Student Finance Board funding as a reason to take this step.
"Hopefully, we will be recognized after that and be allowed to participate directly in the activities fair," Pioli said.
Asher maintained that he would continue to adhere to the rules in the future.
"We receive many inquiries during the year for participation in the fair," Asher said. "Academic departments, outside vendors and many non-recognized student groups ask to participate. In order to be consistent the fairest thing is to follow our guidelines."
"However, to assist those groups who are not student organizations yet or who simply function like one in many respects, we permitted them to have a table nearby in the student center," Asher continued. "This way students who are members of those groups, as well as students who may like to join, still had an opportunity to connect. This seemed to work, so I anticipate that we will continue this practice next year."