UCLA obtains a $1.5 million grant from the Lowell Milken Family Foundation to further American Jewish music development
UCLA's Herb Alpert School of Music Receives Major Donation for American Jewish Music
The UCLA Herb Alpert School of Music has received a significant donation from Lowell Milken, a prominent alumnus of the university, to establish the Lowell Milken Fund for American Jewish Music. This fund aims to advance cutting-edge research, artistic creativity, and interdisciplinary collaboration in the field of American Jewish music.
The Lowell Milken Archive of Jewish Music, founded in 1990 by Lowell Milken, is a comprehensive collection of over 600 recordings, 800 hours of oral history, videos, photographs, and scholarship. The new fund will build upon this archive, furthering the mission and impact of the Milken Archive of Jewish Music.
The fund will support students pursuing advanced degrees in music focused on Jewish traditions, producing educational content such as video series on Jewish liturgical music, and sponsoring concerts and events that showcase diverse Jewish musical heritages. One such student is violinist Adam Millstein, a DMA candidate who receives a scholarship from the Fund.
The fund will also produce educational video series like the "Stories of Music," which explores topics like Jewish liturgical music in the United States, enhancing both scholarly and public understanding of this genre. Furthermore, the fund will contribute to community-engagement initiatives through collaborative concerts like "East Meets West: A World of Jewish Music," celebrating Sephardic, Ashkenazi, and Mizrahi traditions in vibrant performances that bridge cultural divides and connect diverse audiences through music.
The three-day conference, co-presented with the UCLA Alan D. Leve Center for Jewish Studies, will feature performances of new compositions, panel discussions, and lectures on heritage, innovation, and interactivity. The conference, titled "American Culture and the Jewish Experience in Music," will be held in November.
Judith Smith, dean of the UCLA Herb Alpert School of Music, stated that the gift substantially advances the school's commitment to the field of Jewish music. Lowell Milken believes the school is uniquely positioned to further the mission and impact of the Milken Archive of Jewish Music.
This donation is part of the $4.2 billion UCLA Centennial Campaign, scheduled to conclude in December 2019. Milken has been a generous supporter of UCLA, having donated $10 million to the law school in 2011, establishing the Lowell Milken Institute for Business Law and Policy, the largest single gift in the law school's history. The Lowell Milken Family Foundation has also donated $1.5 million to the UCLA Herb Alpert School of Music.
The school will use the fund to present concerts and symposia to engage and educate the community, and to leverage the unique advantages of its three departments: ethnomusicology, music, and musicology. The fund's inaugural program, American Culture and the Jewish Experience in Music, will be a significant step in the first significant research and study of American Jewish music. The conference will focus on the long-term continuities that American flexibility and enterprise have made available to Jewish performers, composers, cantors, collectors, and thinkers.
The Milken Archive of Jewish Music has received ASCAP and Grammy awards, and this new fund is expected to further its prestige and influence in the field. The Lowell Milken Fund for American Jewish Music is set to play a central role in preserving, evolving, and disseminating American Jewish musical heritage at the UCLA Herb Alpert School of Music.
- The Lowell Milken Fund for American Jewish Music, established at UCLA's Herb Alpert School of Music, will not only support students in music education focused on Jewish traditions, but also produce educational content such as video series on Jewish liturgical music and sponsor concerts showcasing diverse Jewish musical heritages.
- In addition to funding educational video series like "Stories of Music," exploring Jewish liturgical music in the United States, and community-engagement initiatives like "East Meets West: A World of Jewish Music," the Lowell Milken Fund for American Jewish Music will also contribute to research and study of American Jewish music, aiming to be a significant step in the first comprehensive research and study of this field.
