West Chester University of Pennsylvania will honor composer Raoul Pleskow in celebration of his 85th birthday this year, with a concert of his music in Ware Recital Hall. Artists scheduled to perform include Rebecca Ansel, Karen Dannessa, Carl Cranmer, Ovidiu Marinescu, Joseph Caminiti, Marshall Taylor, and Ephraim Schafli. Works scheduled to be on the program include Due Frammenti for voice and piano, work for saxophone and piano - Fr Marshall und Ephraim, a the newest piece for solo piano, Contrasts and Returns.
Raoul Pleskow was born in 1931 in Vienna, Austria and educated in New York City. His principal teachers in composition were Karol Rathaus, Otto Luening, and Stefan Wolpe. He has been recipient of many honors, the most recent of which include awards by the National Endowment for the Arts, the Martha Baird Rockefeller Fund for Music, the National Institute of Arts and Letters, and a fellowship from the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation.