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Santa Monica, February 14, 2005 – David Frost, producer of recordings from such major labels as RCA Red Seal, Sony Classics, Deutsche Grammophon, Naxos, London/Decca, and EMI, was presented with a Grammy Award as Classical Producer of the Year for his work on five recordings of the historic Milken Archive of American Jewish Music series at the 47th annual Grammy Awards Ceremony yesterday. The recordings, on the Naxos American Classics label, are Adolphe: Ladino Songs; Brubeck: Gates of Justice; Genesis Suite; Jewish Operas Vol. 1; and Wyner: The Mirror.

"I'm very proud to have won a Grammy, and I'm very proud that it's been because of an association with the Milken Archive," said David Frost. "Recording music that has never been recorded before is a very exciting thing because you're bringing something to life that otherwise wouldn't exist in a format that can be passed down to future generations. There's a special satisfaction in creating a document that has never been created before in any way. After all the years of work that have gone into the Archive, to be recognized like this is really a wonderful feeling."

The Milken Archive of American Jewish Music, the most comprehensive survey of music related to the American Jewish experience ever assembled on disc, was created in 1990 by Lowell Milken, chairman of the Milken Family Foundation. The Milken Archive, comprising 600 newly recorded works exploring the rich body of Jewish music—both sacred and secular—on over 50 CDs, was launched in September 2003 and has been hailed as "a dream of scholars and musicians practically since the dawn of recorded sound" by the Chicago Tribune. Since November 2004 the recordings have been distributed internationally in 57 countries by Naxos International.

"The Milken Archive is extremely proud of David Frost's contributions as producer of several world premiere recordings of American Jewish music," said Lowell Milken. "I congratulate him on this achievement."

The five Milken Archive recordings produced by David Frost reflect a wide variety of musical genres. They include Bruce Adolphe's settings of Jewish poetry dating back to the time of the Spanish expulsion in 1492, transformed into a song cycle that revels in Ladino-inspired melodies; Dave Brubeck's Gates of Justice, a cantata based not only on Jewish texts but also on quotations from Martin Luther King's speeches and Negro spirituals; The Genesis Suite, which depicts the earliest Bible stories, such as the Creation, Adam and Eve, the Flood, and the tower of Babel, composed by such major 20th century immigrant composers as Igor Stravinsky and Arnold Schoenberg, narrated by distinguished actors accompanied by full orchestra and chorus; Jewish Operas Vol. 1 is based on timeless Jewish legends and dramatic characters brought to life in Abraham Ellstein's The Golem, Robert Strassburg's Chelm, and David Tamkin's The Dybbuk; and Yehudi Wyner's The Mirror, Passover Offering, Tants un Maysele. The music on this CD ranges from secular folk and religious songs to the music of klezmer bands and consists entirely of world premiere recordings of these works.

David Frost has also won a Grammy for the Sony Classical recording Listen to the Storyteller with music by Wynton Marsalis, Edgar Meyer, and Patrick Doyle and narration by Kate Winslet and Graham Greene. He was the producer for Alicia de Larrocha's RCA recording of Granados' "Goyescas," which won both a Grammy and the Grand Prix du Disque and received a Grammy Award nomination for Classical Producer of the Year in 2001. David Frost's father, veteran record producer Tom Frost, won a Grammy for Classical Producer of the Year in 1986. Other credits include the Broadway cast album of Baz Luhrmann's production of Puccini's La Bohème for Dreamworks Records and operatic tracks for several film soundtracks, including A Midsummer Night's Dream with Renée Fleming. For several years he has been a guest faculty member at the Banff Centre, giving workshops and lectures on record producing.

For more information, please visit the Milken Archive of American Jewish Music Web site at www.milkenarchive.org.