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Dear Friends,

 

Big news: The Sorel Organization is sunsetting at the end of December 2024 as a nonprofit charitable foundation. This is not sad news, although the Sorel Board of Directors and I will miss our interactions with you - our current and past grant recipients, organizational partners, and equity allies in the music world. We have come to the decision that the best way we can continue to support the advancements of women in music FOREVER is to gift Sorel’s remaining assets into the stewardship of others!

 

Through legacy grants this year we have established five new Claudette Sorel endowments and made additional contributions to three of the four endowments already in place. Nine nonprofit organizations and institutions will carry on in perpetuity Claudette Sorel’s legacy and mission to expand opportunities and stretch the boundaries for women musicians in the fields of conducting, composition, film scoring, performance, arts leadership, technology, education, and scholarship. She was particularly interested in women composers and conductors, seeing these as measurable areas of change in gender equity.

 

THE SOREL ENDOWMENTS


  1. • American Composers Forum: The Claudette Sorel Endowment for Women in Music

           and 

  1. • American Composers Orchestra: The Claudette Sorel Endowment for Women in Music      

  2. To create The Sorel Award, operated in partnership by the two organizations, to be given to a mid-career woman composer every three years for a three-year period of support. The prize includes career development and management services, commissioning/artist fees, workshops, and the premiere of a new work at Carnegie Hall. 


  1. • American Piano Awards: Claudette Sorel Fund for Women in Music

  2. To underwrite a finalist prize at the Classical Awards competition that takes place every four years, produced by the organization formerly known as the American Pianists Association. 


  1. • National Arts Club: The Claudette Sorel Fund

  2. To be used for an annual Sorel concert, recital or other musical event celebrating women in music; established in 2002 through the Estate of Claudette Sorel, and augmented with a new additional gift.


  1. • New Music USA: The Claudette Sorel Endowment for Women in Music

  2. To provide an annual Sorel Grant to a woman composer/composers, or project benefitting multiple women composers, distributed through such New Music USA programs as Amplifying Voices, the New Music Creator Fund, and the Reel Change Fund for Diversity in Film Scoring.


  1. • New York Philharmonic: The Claudette Sorel Fund

  2. To support women conductors and composers in their Philharmonic debuts on the subscription series at Lincoln Center’s David Geffen Hall; established in 2002 through the Estate of Claudette Sorel, and augmented with a new additional gift.

   

  1. • New York University: The Claudette Sorel Screen Scoring Scholarship

  2. To endow scholarships for gifted female students in the Department’s Screen Scoring Program; established by the Sorel Organization in 2007 under the leadership of Executive Director Judy Cope, and augmented with a new additional gift.

  

  1. • SUNY Fredonia: Claudette Sorel Endowment for Music

  2. To provide support for musicians and music activities at the School of Music that raise the visibility and advancement of women in the fields of composition, conducting, film scoring, performance, arts leadership, technology and music education.

 

  1. • SUNY Fredonia: Claudette Sorel Memorial Piano Scholarship

  2. To provide scholarships for piano majors at the School of Music; established by the Sorel Organization in 2006 under the leadership of Executive Director Judy Cope.

  

  1. • Voices of Ascension: The Claudette Sorel Fund for Women in Music

  2. To develop programming by the NYC professional chorus that expands the canon of choral and ensemble music by women composers.


These organizations will provide credits in their programs and promotional materials as the Sorel endowments are used to honor the memory of pianist, educator, and philanthropist Claudette Sorel, and her parents, Elizabeth and Michel.


 

WHO WAS CLAUDETTE SOREL?

Claudette Sorel (1932-1999) was an accomplished pianist, music educator and philanthropist. Born in Paris of French-Hungarian parentage, she emigrated to the United States as a child, made her New York Town Hall debut at age 10 and performed with the New York Philharmonic at Carnegie Hall the following year. During her career Ms. Sorel made more than 2,000 concert, recital, and festival appearances and appeared as soloist with 200 orchestras, including the Boston Symphony, Philadelphia Orchestra, NBC Symphony, and London Philharmonic. A proud naturalized American, Ms. Sorel premiered works by such American composers as Lukas Foss, Peter Mennin, Paul Creston, and Aaron Copland, and her signature work was Edward MacDowell’s Piano Concerto No. 2. Ms. Sorel held professorships at the University of Kansas, Ohio State University, and the State University of New York at Fredonia, where in 1969 she was the first woman to be named Distinguished University Professor by the State University of New York’s Board of Trustees, among a faculty of 30,000.


The Sorel Organization

Claudette Sorel was a tireless advocate for women in music. In 1996 she established the Elizabeth and Michel Sorel Charitable Organization, Inc. as a 501(c)(3) private foundation, named for her parents. After her death in 1999, the Sorel Trustees carried on her mission to expand opportunities and stretch the boundaries for women musicians in the fields of conducting, composition, film scoring, performance, arts leadership, technology, education, and scholarship. For nearly 15 years and until her untimely death in 2019 the Sorel Organization was led by Executive Director Judy Cope, who established Sorel Medallions in Recording, the Sorel Classics label, the Sorel Medallion Choral Composition Contest, the Claudette Sorel Piano Competition for high school-aged pianists at SUNY Fredonia, Sorel Legacy Medallions for excellence, composer residencies in the UK and USA, and multiple scholarships and commissions.

 

ADDITIONAL FINAL GRANTS IN 2024

 

  1. • Boulanger Initiative

  2. Grant to expand the Boulanger Initiative Database, which provides users with access to thousands of works by nonliving, historical women composers and, when available, links to find the score and recordings so these pieces can be located and performed. #halfofhumanityscomposers 


  4. • Institute for Composer Diversity

  5. Grant to SUNY Fredonia's School of Music for general support of ICD and the expansion of the Composer Diversity Database. ICD encourages the discovery, study, and performance of music written by composers from historically excluded groups. 


  1. • Music & Arts Programs of America, Inc.

  2. Legacy grant to continue producing recordings featuring music by women composers past and present. M&A now owns and distributes the Sorel Classics catalog of recordings. 


  1. • NYU Screen Scoring Program

  2. Scholarships for female graduate students in the screen scoring program to attend the 2024 Music & Moving Image Conference. 


  1. • SongFest

  2. Unrestricted funds to support future SongFests and the SongFest-Sorel Composer Mentor Program


  1. • Sparks & Wiry Cries

  2. Legacy grant to fund two songCircle projects, a new Sparks initiative for women creatives to curate, produce, and create in the realm of art song.



IN THE NEWS


Trailblazer: Conductor JoAnn Falletta

At the Dallas Symphony Orchestra’s Women in Classical Music Symposium in November, conductor JoAnn Falletta received the Award of Excellence. It recognizes a woman in the field who has paved the way for others and is investing in the future of the industry. She’s also celebrating 25 years as music director of the Buffalo Philharmonic, where she became the first woman to lead a major American orchestra. Their recordings have won multiple Grammy Awards and they are nominated again this year for Best Orchestral Performance. “She’s a champion of new and undiscovered music, an advocate for community engagement, and a leader in breaking glass ceilings for women conductors,” writes Jeff Lunden in a fascinating Symphony Magazine profile of JoAnn’s career: Trailblazer: JoAnn Falletta. And read the Violin Channel’s interview: JoAnn Falletta Talks Career, Legacy, and Advice.

 


The Needle is moving for Women Conductors

When Claudette Sorel passed away in 1999, she left a bequest to the New York Philharmonic for women conductors to perform with the orchestra annually. The fund has supported appearances by Marin Alsop, Karina Cannellakis, Jane Glover, Emmanuelle Haim, Susanna Mälkki, Ruth Reinhardt, Jeannette Sorrell, Simone Young, Xian Zhang, and most recently, Keri-Lynn Wilson, music director of the Ukrainian Freedom Orchestra. Keri-Lynn is also only the fourth woman ever to lead the Metropolitan Opera Orchestra. The Met supercharged that statistic this past season when four women conducted four different productions in a single week in Spring 2024! Read the Associated Press story: Met Opera hosts four female conductors in landmark week.




Orchestra Repertoire Report 2024

Are U.S. orchestras performing more music by women composers and composers of color? This latest report from the Institute for Composer Diversity, in partnership with the League of American Orchestras, offers trends, charts and analysis of programming by orchestras across the country, and compares this past season’s programming to previous seasons. Progress is real, and small changes can make big impacts... Download the 2024 report.

 


ACCLAIM FOR SOREL-SUPPORTED RECORDINGS


Anna Shelest expands her Donna Voce series  

Fanny Mendelsohn’s Das Jahr (The Year) and Mel Bonis’ Femmes de Légende (Women of Legend) are featured on pianist Anna Shelest’s Donna Voce, Volume 2: Women of Legend. “This is a great recital, expertly played,” writes reviewer James Harrington in Fanfare magazine. “Based on Shelest’s work here, I cannot imagine why [Das Jahr] has not received more recordings and performances. It is more exciting and adventurous than Tchaikovsky’s Seasons and is firmly a major piano suite from the Romantic era.”

 

The third installment of Anna’s series of recordings of music by women composers will be released on the Music & Arts label in February 2025. It features concerti (with conductor Neeme Järvi and the Estonian National Symphony Orchestra) and solo piano pieces by Clara Schumann and Cecile Chaminade.

 


Quynh Nguyen raves for Tailleferre recording

“The Flower of France - Germaine Tailleferre Works for Piano offers a very generous helping of pieces by Les Six’s only female composer, performed with striking beauty by pianist Quynh Nguyen,” writes Jerry Dubins in Fanfare magazine. American Record Guide concurs: “A treasurable body of music, lovingly and effectively played by Quynh Nguyen who does the music proud, and this can be unreservedly recommended.” Many of these pieces are rarely played or recorded, and Quynh’s album is a welcome addition to the canon.



BBC Music Magazine’s Recording of the Month 

BBC Music Magazine selected composer Augusta Read Thomas’ Terpsichore's Box of Dreams for its June 2024 “Recording of the Month.” The album includes the world premiere of her “Carnival,” commissioned and performed by the SUNY Fredonia Wind Ensemble with bassoonist Nadina Mackie Jackson, under the direction of Dr. Paula Holcomb. With a Sorel Medallion in Recording grant, “Carnival” capped Dr. Holcomb’s multi-year project to commission and record wind ensemble music by women and other underrepresented composers. How rare is it for a wind ensemble to spotlight a female composer, soloist, and conductor at the same time? Perhaps a first?



UPCOMING SOREL-SUPPORTED EVENTS

January 2025:

Announcement by the American Composers Forum and American Composers Orchestra of the inaugural recipient of The Sorel Award


February 7, 2025:

NYC songSLAM Competition at National Sawdust, produced by Sparks & Wiry Cries


February 7, 2025:

Music & Arts releases pianist Anna Shelest’s Donna Voce, Volume 3, with music by Clara Schumann and Cecile Chaminade; Neeme Järvi conducts the Estonian National Symphony Orchestra


March 6-8, 2025:

Composer Jennifer Higdon continues her Sorel Visiting Artist residency at SUNY Fredonia’s School of Music


April 4 & 5, 2025:

American Piano Awards Concerto Finals with the Indianapolis Symphony


April 8, 2025:

Sorel Medallion event with composer Jessie Montgomery at NYC’s National Arts Club


April 8, 2025:

Voices of Ascension’s Voices of Mannahatta concert; Danielle Jagelski, composer and conductor; Judy Cope Memorial Fund for Women in Music


May/June 2025:

SongFest, the annual art song festival and training program, takes up residence at Marlboro in Vermont


In closing - here and literally - it has been a privilege to lead the Sorel Organization over the past four years. I offer grateful thanks to all who have provided time, help and advice. You are all Sorel Advisor Advocates! Special thanks to those who have served on the Sorel Board of Directors since its founding, and especially to JoAnn Falletta and Walter T. Killmer, Jr. for this journey we have taken together. Both knew Claudette Sorel well, and Walter, in particular, has been vitally involved with the foundation at each and every step of the way. We treasure the memory of Judy Cope, who gave her heart and soul to the talented female beneficiaries of the Sorel Organization. I also thank Kendra Harvey at Sterling Foundation Management, and Dmitri Shelest, who helped Judy found the Sorel Classics label, for making the organization run so smoothly. And finally, let us thank Claudette Sorel herself, for her philanthropy and her vision of a more equitable music world.

 

Sincerely,

Wende

 

Wende Persons

Managing Director, Board of Directors

The Sorel Organization


Expanding opportunities for women in music


The Elizabeth & Michel Sorel Charitable Organization is ceasing operations on December 31, 2024.



The Sorel Organization is committed to creating change in today's music world by focusing our grant support to: 


  1. •Amplify the voices of underrepresented composers


  1. •Advance gender and racial equity in classical music


  1. •Expand the classical music canon for future generations




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