Shepherd School’s Al-Zand garners Phi Beta Kappa Teaching Prize

Shepherd School’s Al-Zand garners Phi Beta Kappa Teaching Prize

BY MIKE WILLIAMS
Special to the Rice News

The plaudits of his students are music to Karim Al-Zand’s ears.

The Lynette S. Autrey Assistant Professor of Composition and Theory at the Shepherd School of Music is this year’s winner of the Phi Beta Kappa Teaching Prize, given to the assistant professor at Rice who earns the highest marks from students.

	KARIM AL-ZAND

”I feel very honored to receive this award, especially since it reflects the assessments of my own students,” Al-Zand said. ”The Shepherd School has terrific undergraduates, very gifted in both the classroom and on the concert stage, and I’m flattered to think that my teaching has had an impact on them.”

Al-Zand is accustomed to applause, having worked as a successful composer since earning his Ph.D. in 2002 at Harvard University, where he spent his off hours directing and composing for a big-band jazz ensemble. He earned his bachelor’s in music at McGill University in Montreal.

His compositions range from orchestral to choral to chamber music, with a nod to the connection between music and other arts — and even technology, the proof of which is in listening to “Lingering,” a 23-second ring tone for cell phone. The piece was recently premiered as part of a “ring cycle” presented by Houston’s contemporary music group Musiqa, of which he is a founding member and vice president. (The ring tones themselves can be downloaded at www.musiqahouston.org.)

”Overall, I try to emphasize that knowing something about the structure and the technical aspects of music doesn’t diminish music’s beauty or emotional impact,” he said of his teaching style. ”I like to stress that our appreciation and our performance of music are only enhanced by this sort of understanding.

”For my composition students, it’s a little different, since they are ‘inside’ their music already, so to speak. In lessons, we talk more about getting ‘outside’ of the piece they’re writing, to consider shaping it from a listener’s and performer’s perspective as well as their own.”

You can hear samples of Al-Zand’s compositions at www.alzand.com.

His awards include the prestigious Sackler Composition Prize, the ArtSong Prize and the Louisville Orchestra Competition Prize. His areas of scholarly interest include music theory as it relates to jazz, counterpoint and improvisation (reflected in his dissertation on the solos of Cannonball Adderley) and ear training, for which he co-developed an online application called Hearing AID.

The Phi Beta Kappa Teaching Prize recipient is chosen by a committee based on students’ evaluations of assistant professors.