Challenge - Spring/Summer 2012 - Tiffin University

Art, Music and Theatre
38 | SPRING / SUMMER 2012 | CHALLENGE
Music
Hip Hop Producer to Serve as
Artist-In-Residence
TU’s Music Department
announced
that hip hop producer,
J Rawls, will
serve as Artist-In-
Residence. Rawls
will join the TU
Music Department
as it launches its
first coursework
J Rawls
for the new major
in Professional Music; the only commercial/popular music
performance degree in Ohio.
During the 2012-13 academic year, he will present twelve
convocations and workshops focusing on hip hop, music
production, and music industry related topics. These free
lecture-demonstrations will be open to all TU students and
the general public.
His Columbus-based production company and record
label continues to make an impact in the national hip hop
scene. He is in high demand as a DJ for top clubs and private
functions around the country. Rawls holds a bachelor’s degree
in business from the University of Cincinnati, a master’s
degree in education from Ashland University, and is pursuing
a doctorate in higher education administration from Ohio
University.
For more information about TU’s Music Department,
please visit www.tiffinmusic.com or email gig@tiffin.edu.
YouTube Sensation to Attend Tiffin
University
A young singer whose performances
have earned her YouTube channel
more than two million views
will attend Tiffin University this fall
to pursue a degree in Professional
Music.
Heather Traska, 18, has generated
enormous internet buzz for
her singing and her elaborate
Heather Traska
videos, which feature advanced
multi-screen editing and Broadway-caliber
costumes, makeup and hair design. All done with
one microphone, camera and laptop, and produced from her
tiny bedroom in a small Wisconsin town.
She has enrolled in TU’s new bachelor’s degree program
in Professional Music, which is one of just a handful of commercial
music performance programs in the nation, and the
only one of its kind in Ohio.
TU’s ProMusic degree also uniquely allows students to
combine music performance with media production as a primary
area of study. Traska will study in both voice and video
editing and design, as well as courses in music composition
and arranging, recording studio production, and performance
on guitar, bass, drums and keyboard.
Self-taught as a singer, arranger, recording engineer and
video editor, Traska’s viral YouTube creations includes an a
cappella medley of Disney songs that got her noticed worldwide,
and was featured in an article in The Huffington Post.
In the eight-minute video, she sings lead and background
vocals to 13 songs from animated Disney films, and recreates
costumes and makeup of 30 different characters.
Traska’s videos can be seen at www.youtube.com/
heathertraska. Information about Tiffin University’s ProMusic
Degree can be found at www.tiffinmusic.com/majors/
promusic/,or from the TU Music Department at gig@tiffin.
eduor 419-448-3366.
ProMusic Festival
TU’s Music Department hosted its annual ProMusic Festival
in April at the Ritz Theatre in Tiffin.
More than 30 school bands,
choirs, vocal jazz groups, and pop
a cappella groups participated in
this two day event and professional
artists presented concerts
each evening.
Included was the Denverbased
band, Euforquestra. This
seven member group played
“high intensity global dance music.”
Euforquestra is a percussion
and horn driven blend of modern
music that fuses Afrobeat, reggae,
dub, funk, rock, soca, and
highlife with traditional sounds
from Cuba, Brazil, West Africa,
and beyond. Euforquestra was
joined by TU’s groups, Sound
& Silence, which blends rock,
R&B, and hip hop styles, and,
The InBetween, which plays a
crowd-pleasing mix of rock, funk,
and soul.