Bi-College Music Ensembles Perform This Month

As the holiday season approaches, the Bryn Mawr-Haverford student music ensembles offer performances of both choral and instrumental music. A brief overview:

On Sunday, Dec. 10, at 3 p.m. in Marshall Auditorium at Haverford, the Bi-College Chorale will present selections from Duke Ellington's Sacred Concerts with the Tyrone Brown Big Band. Guest artist DeVonne Gardner, who was one of the original performers of the music when it was first presented to the public in the 1960s and 70s, will perform as a soloist alongside student soloists whom she has coached: John Bower HC '07, Julie Eubank HC '08, Hilary Leichter HC '07, Bethany Morrow HC '08, Natalee Smith BMC '08, John Washington HC '10, and tap dancers Marcelina Chavira BMC '07, Sebastian Moore HC '09 and Maeve O'Hara BMC '08. The chorale, led by Haverford Associate Professor of Music Tom Lloyd, has about 160 members, drawn from the student bodies, faculties and staff of Haverford and Bryn Mawr Colleges as well as the surrounding community.

On Thursday, Dec. 14, at 8 p.m. in Founders Great Hall at Haverford, the Bi-College Chamber Singers, a choir of 30 student voices also led by Lloyd, will present "A Kwanzaa Holiday Celebration," a selection of music it will perform during its upcoming January tour of Ghana. The songs illustrate the seven principles of the African-American holiday of Kwaanza. The program, which celebrates music of Africa and the African Diaspora, includes pieces by Duke Ellington, Ghanaian composer Walter K. Blege, Venezuelan composer Alberto Grau, as well as traditional African-American songs and carols.

Student chamber-music ensembles, directed by Haverford Assistant Professor of Music Heidi Jacob, will perform two concerts at Bryn Mawr and one at Haverford over the course of the next two weeks:

Wednesday, Dec. 13, at 7:30 p.m. in Bryn Mawr's Goodhart Music Room, works by Richard Brodhead, Cynthia Folio Barber, Dmitri Shostakovich and Johannes Brahms.

On Monday, Dec. 18, at 7:30 p.m. in Haverford's Roberts Hall, Marshall Auditorium, works by Franz Doppler, Ludwig von Beethoven, Maurice Ravel, Antonio Vivaldi and Johann Gottlieb Graun.

Tuesday, Dec. 19, at 7:30 p.m. in Goodhart Music Room, works by Robert Schumann, Erwin Schulhoff, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Heitor Villa Lobos, Franz Schubert and Pyotr Ilych Tchaikovsky.

All performances are free and open to the public. For more information, e-mail nmerriam@haverford.edu or call (610) 896-1011.

<<Back to Bryn Mawr Now 12/7/2006

Next story>>