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Orchestra highlights student talent, new music .

Each of the more than 90 students in the Princeton University Orchestra has a beloved musical instrument. So too do students of music at Princeton, some of whom even have been inspired to compose music for that special instrument.

Mackey and Wachtel receive Behrman Award for the humanities .

Princeton professors Steven Mackey and Michael Wachtel have received the University's Howard T. Behrman Award for Distinguished Achievement in the Humanities. 

Valedictorian Staude shines in the classroom and on the stage .

On his first day of classes as a freshman, Holger Staude received an unexpected invitation. Florent Masse, the instructor of his advanced French course, took Staude aside after class and -- impressed with the German native's command of the language -- urged him to join the University's French theater workshop. Staude had never considered acting. Yet, just as he did in deciding to attend Princeton, he accepted the challenge and thrived.

London calling: Journeys of musical discovery .

A collaboration established between Princeton and the Royal College of Music (RCM) in 2007 offers Princeton students the opportunity to spend the fall semester of their junior year at the prestigious conservatory and is offered as part of Princeton's Study Abroad Program. Two undergraduates, Darya Koltunyuk and Katherine Buzard, and a 2011 alumnus, Joseph Gotoff, capture the RCM experience and share how it influenced their time at Princeton and their plans for the future.

Memorial service planned for Dahlen .

A memorial service for Elisabeth Dahlen, a senior administrator at Princeton for more than 20 years, is scheduled for 2 p.m. Friday, June 3, in the University Chapel.

Peter Westergaard, music scholar and ‘composer of formidable skill’ dies at 88 .

Peter Westergaard, the William Conant Professor of Music, Emeritus, and composer of chamber music, opera and orchestral works, died June 26 at Penn Medicine Princeton Medical Center, after a brief battle with cancer. He was 88.

Being composed: The art of learning to write music .

What does composing music look like? At Princeton, composition is taught at the undergraduate and graduate level. In this story, four members of the Department of Music describe their creative process, the surprising upside of learning composition at a liberal arts university versus a conservatory, and the challenges and rewards of developing and performing new work. You can also view video clips of a work-in-progress by senior Stephanie Leotsakos and new works by Assistant Professor of Music Donnacha Dennehy and graduate student Yuri Boguinia.