Dear members of SEAMUS,
There are many wonderful new things to direct your attention to at this, the start of our 2014 – 2015 membership year. First, you should notice that we have a new SEAMUS logo and complete look for SEAMUS as a whole. We can thank in particular Adam Vidiksis for making this happen, through his countless hours of work over the past several months. He helped us find and contract Punkt Digital to provide graphic design and web hosting, and he generally shepherded the entire process of updating and stabilizing our web-based materials.
This brings us to the new SEAMUSonline.org website. It is here that you will find the new member’s portal, where you can renew your membership and create a member profile. As we continue to develop the member’s area, you will find content that is not available to the general public, reflecting our efforts to provide improved value for your membership. There will be a store for SEAMUS recordings and swag, and additional content TBD. We welcome your comments and input on what you would like to find on the website and what we can do to make it a meaningful part of SEAMUS membership.
Related to the new SEAMUS website, I am happy to announce that the submissions portal for the SEAMUS 2015 National Conference is now launched and open for your submissions. Please keep in mind that the deadline for submissions is October 31! This year’s conference at Virginia Tech–hosted by Ico Bukvic, Eric Lyon, and Charles Nichols–promises to be quite wonderful and I hope to see you there.
I hope you received your copy of Music from SEAMUS, vol. 23 in June. It features works by Jeffrey Hass, Butch Rovan, Cort Lippe, Christopher Chandler, David Gedosh, Chester Udell, Elliot Patros, and Halim Beere. And since following each year’s conference, I have always wondered whose work would be included on the next CD, I would like to share with you the results of this year’s voting, so we don’t need to wonder until next May. The composers whose work will be included on Music from SEAMUS. vol. 24 are Per Bloland, Scott Miller, Ted Coffey, Joo Won Park, Chin Ting Chan, Nina Young, and John Nichols III. For more information on the conference, please visit the official conference website here <http://seamus.music.vt.edu/main/>
Finally, it is the time of year when I ask for members to nominate candidates for Board positions which will be open in the following year. The positions that are open are Vice President of Programs, Secretary, and Treasurer. If you are interested in serving on the board, or if you know someone whom you believe would be an excellent board member, please nominate yourself or them for one of the positions. The deadline for nominations is October 17. Please email me if you have questions about the positions or anything related to the board elections. Email your nominations directly to me, Scott Miller <[email protected]>.
We are working on new opportunities for SEAMUS members and I look forward to announcing them in coming Newsletters. In the meantime, welcome to the new membership year, please submit your work to the conference, and don’t hesitate to share your ideas for making everything SEAMUS does more valuable to you.
Scott L. Miller
President, SEAMUS