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Merritt awarded McKnight Fellowship

By Mara Kumagai Fink '11
June 14, 2011

Associate Professor of Music Justin Merritt recently received a $25,000 fellowship from the McKnight Foundation's Arts Program.

The award will enable him to work on a new opera set in a small college in the 1940s. "It is a huge boost to win an award like this," Merritt says. "It both opens new opportunities and is a tremendous affirmation of the work I've been doing."

The fellowships reward and support the artistic excellent of Minnesota composers. Winners are decided upon by a three-member panel of nationally recognized composers and musicians.

The McKnight Foundation's Arts Program began in 1981 to support individual artists financially to allow them to have purely "creative" time to work. They give around $1.7 million in grants for the arts across Minnesota every year.

Contact Kari VanDerVeen at 507-786-3970 or vanderve@stolaf.edu.