Steven Stucky is the composer-in-residence for the '12-'13 season of the Berkeley Symphony, and the orchestra will premiere his latest: The Stars and the Roses, a trio of poems by Czesław Miłosz set to music for tenor and orchestra. Miłosz, a Lithuanian poet who wrote in Polish, taught at the UC Berkeley, where he received a Nobel Laureate parking permit, literature, 1980. Stucky got his share of prizes too, and at one time taught in the shadow of the campanile. But Pulitzer winners don't get parking perks, so between residencies for orchestras such as the LA Phil or Pittsburgh, and the premieres and commissions with Philadelphia, Chicago or New-York, he now teaches composition at Cornell.

The singer for The Stars and the Roses is Noah Stewart, another familiar face thanks to his Merola and Adler participations, who is also big in the UK, apparently. And chatty with the Tattler. And the Berkeley Symphony has the run of the town while the SF Symphony is still on strike. We chatted last week on the phone with Steven Stucky, who was just returning from celebrating the Lutoslawki centenary he's helping organize -- Stucky wrote the book -- with the Philharmonia in London.