Pomona College’s Department of Music announces its Fall 2018 concert season featuring an eclectic offering of music from a wide range of genres, eras and musical backgrounds. Special guests will complement performances by Pomona College’s faculty artists and student ensembles.
Tania Chen, Jon Leidecker, Thurston Moore, David Toop and Gino Robar will collaborate in a special performance – co-sponsored by The Claremont Colleges Library – of John Cage’s Electronic Music for Piano. This 60-plus minute work contains Cage’s envisioned elements, which include having the artists use technology to keep a piece “current, revealing and astounding.” This concert on Sept. 28 in Bridges Hall of Music, follows the release of a new recording by the same ensemble on Omnivore Recordings. The concert is free and ticketed.
October rewinds the clock with a period chamber ensemble, the world-class London Handel Players. In a program titled “To Play before the King,” they will present works by C.P.E. Bach, François Couperin, Handel, Domenico Scarlatti and others. Hailed for “consummate skill and musicianship,” (The New York Times) the ensemble comes to Bridges Hall of Music on Oct. 28.
Faculty recitals feature performances including duo Celliola (Cynthia Fogg, viola, and Tom Flaherty, cello) and Friends in works by living American composers on Sept. 16. The annual eclectic Chamber Music Extravaganza features many of the department’s performance faculty and members of some of Southern California’s top performing ensembles, including the LA Chamber Orchestra and Long Beach Symphony – in music by Babcock, Beethoven, Broughton, Henkel and others on Oct. 17. On Nov. 4, faculty members Melissa Givens, soprano; Gary Bovyer, clarinet; Maggie Parkins, cello; and Genevieve Feiwen Lee and Jennie Jung, piano; join in the world-wide celebration of Leonard Bernstein’s centennial with Celebrating Bernstein at 100.
In addition to these performances, numerous student ensembles and faculty members will be offering a variety of concerts. Among them are the Pomona College Orchestra with pianist Lee performing Brahms’ Piano Concerto No. 1 in D Minor, and the Pomona College Choir with soprano Givens in Bach’s Magnificat. Additionally, Pomona College faculty artists will be presented in the Friday Noon Concert series co-sponsored with Scripps College.