2005 will bring a significant new CD of the music of Judith Lang Zaimont. Naxos will release "Sacred Service for the Sabbath Evening" as part of the prestigious Milken Archive of American Jewish Music CD series.

The work is also featured as part of the Sacred Masterworks episode of the 13-part radio series, American Jewish Music from the Milken Archive with Leonard Nimoy, a production of the Milken Archive of American Jewish Music and the WFMT Radio Network.

For more about the CD and radio series, visit http://www.milkenarchive.org/.

"Pure Colors", a disc of Judith Zaimont's recent music for smaller forces will feature many of her Minnesota artist colleagues in works they have been touring with in recent years. Included will be "WIZARDS" (piano), "Astral" (viola ), "Tanya Poems" (cello), "Virgie Rainey" (soprano, mezzo and piano), and "Bubble-Up Rag" (flute and piano).

The most significant recent performance of music by Judith Lang Zaimont was the January 22 World Premiere of her "Stillness Ð Poem for Orchestra" by the Rockford Symphony, Steven Larsen conducting.

The Rockford Register Star said this about the performance:

"The music included opportunities to explore the many different sounds available to many different instruments and included dissonance, rhythmic palpitations, ethereal harmonics and a principal pitch of G sharp that weaved in and out of the work. From a purely compositional and musical perspective, the work was an excellent piece, well-crafted and well-presented...."

"Stillness", a single 18-minute movement in three panels, slow-fast, slow, was conceived and completed in sketch-score during a Spring 2004 residency at Copland House - a magical environment providing utter quiet and long stretches of available time in which to ponder and focus intensely. Only in such a place could a work of such specific and fragile nature as this be realized. It was jointly commissioned by the Rockford Symphony Orchestra, along with the Mississippi Symphony Orchestra with Crafton Beck and the University of Wyoming Symphony Orchestra with Michael Griffith, the latter of which will perform the work on March 2 in Laramie, Wyoming.

Other important recent performances include:

"Growler" - scene one of "Symphony for Wind Orchestra in Three Scenes- February 4 at the 2005 International Festival of New Music at Florida State University.

"Tanya Poems" for solo cello - January 31 (Minneapolis) and Feb. 7th (St. Paul): performed by Tanya Remenikova. She reports about the February 7 performance, "The performance went well, my colleagues and the audience loved the music."

"ASTRAL ... a mirror life on the astral plane" for solo viola - February - various locales on Texas recital tour Ð performed by Korey Konkol

Spring 2005 Performances:

"Zones" Ð Piano Trio No. 2 - March 1 at Prairie View A & M in Houston and March 2 at Cypress-Fairbanks Community College, outside of Houston - performed by a trio led by pianist Vicki Seldon.

"From the Folk" for wind quartet - Spring 2005 (date TBD) Ð performed by the Contemporary Music Ensemble of the University of Minnesota. Also scheduled for performance at Mannes College in New York this coming May

"Parallel Play" for saxophone quartet - March 31 Ð performed by CASE Sax Quartet

"Jupiter's Moons" for solo piano- Summer 2005 recital tour Ð performed by Lydia Artymiw

A Look Ahead to Season 2005-2006:

"Stillness- Poem for Orchestra" - Mississippi Symphony Orch. Date TBA

"Parallel Play" - Presidio Sax Quartet (Tucson, Arizona) recital tour and recording for new CD.

"Dance/Inner Dance" for flute, oboe and cello at Queens College in New York Ð performers TBA.

Read Kyle Gann's American Composer appreciation of Judith Zaimont's music here.

For more information about the music of Judith Lang Zaimont, visit her online at http://www.jzaimont.com. For any other information about the composer, please contact Jeffrey James Arts Consulting at 516-586-3433 or jamesarts@worldnet.att.net.