Katherine Tseung, cellist and winner of the Pomona College Orchestra 2016 Concerto Competition, will be featured this month with the orchestra, along with soprano Ursula Maria Kleinecke. The concerts will be held in Bridges Hall of Music (150 E. Fourth St., Claremont) at 8 p.m. on Friday, Feb. 24 and at 3 p.m. on Sunday, Feb. 26. Both concerts are free and open to the public.
Tseung, a second-year Scripps College student who hails from the San Francisco Bay Area, will perform Haydn’s Cello Concerto in D Major. Pomona College Orchestra Music Director Eric Lindholm says of Tseung, “Katherine plays this concerto with great personality and a beautifully lyrical tone. It is a return to the ballroom elegance of the late 18th century.” Prior to arriving at Scripps College, Tseung was principal cellist in the Palo Alto Chamber Orchestra, where she performed as a soloist in Haydn’s Divertimento in D Major, Tchaikovsky’s Variations on a Rococo Theme and Schumann’s Cello Concerto in A Minor. In 2014, as part of a string quartet, she took first place at the United States Open Music Competition in the Instrumental Ensemble category and two years earlier took third place in the same competition. A neuroscience major, she studied cello with Irene Sharp and has taken lessons at Pomona College with Roger Lebow and Maggie Parkins.
Kleinecke, a Pomona College faculty performer, also joins the orchestra in this program. Born in Mexico, Kleinecke has particular interest in music of the Americas and has performed works by many American and Latin American composers such as Bruce Babcock, Peter Boyer, Mark Carlson, Daniel Catán, Alberto Ginastera, Carlos Guastavino, John Harbison, Jaime León, Diego Luzuriaga, Juan B. Plaza, Theodoro Valcárcel and Heitor Villa-Lobos. She has performed in Scandinavia, Europe, Mexico and the U.S. Her recordings include an album of boleros and other Mexican and Latin American popular songs with her late father, pianist Tito Enriquez; Songs of Lee Hoiby with pianist Maria Pérez-Goodman, released on Albany Records; and In the Catalan Style with guitarists Gregg Nestor and Adam Pettit.
The Pomona College Orchestra has a long tradition as an important creative and cultural outlet for the students, faculty and staff of The Claremont Colleges. Its roster for these concerts includes representatives from all five undergraduate colleges, Claremont Graduate University, and the greater community. Last fall, the orchestra’s two programs presented music by Mendelssohn, Ravel, Strauss, and Barber’s violin concerto, with faculty soloist Sarah Thornblade, and the season-ending collaboration in April will be with the Pomona College Choir and Grammy®-award winning baritone Nmon Ford in Mendelssohn’s Elijah.
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PROGRAM:
Haydn:............................................ Cello Concerto in D Major
Katherine Tseung, cello
Bernstein:........................................ Jeremiah (Symphony No. 1)
Ursula Maria Kleinecke, soprano
Tchaikovsky:................................... Romeo and Juliet
Additional Upcoming Faculty & Guest Performances
Programs are ticketless and free, with open seating.
Chamber Music with Faculty and Friends
8 p.m. Saturday, March 4, 2017
Bridges Hall of Music, 150 E. Fourth St., Claremont, CA 91711
“Poised, ravishing” (The Guardian), the Eclipse Quartet members: Sara Parkins and Sarah Thornblade*, violins; Alma Fernandez, viola; and Maggie Parkins, cello, are joined by Kira Blumberg, viola; and Eric Lindholm*, cello, for Schoenberg’s Verklärte Nacht and music by Flaherty, Lindholm and others.
Brass Extravaganza
3 p.m. Sunday, March 5, 2017
Bridges Hall of Music, 150 E. Fourth St., Claremont, CA 91711
Faculty artists Ray Burkhart, trumpet; Phil Keen, trombone; Stephen Klein, tuba; and Jennie Jung, piano, are joined by friends in a concert of music by Bach, Burkhart, Flaherty, Gabrieli, Handel, Marcello, Piazzolla and others. Additional performers include: Jim Grinta, Richard Chasin, and John Aranda, trumpet; Annie Bosler and Rachel Berry, horn; Loren Marsteller and Ken Kugler, trombone/euphonium; and Beth Mitchell, tuba.
Baroque Chamber Music
3 p.m. Sunday, March 26, 2017
Bridges Hall of Music, 150 E. Fourth St., Claremont, CA 91711
Cornucopia Baroque Ensemble: Alfred Cramer* and Lindsey Strand-Polyak, baroque violins; Aki Nishiguchi, baroque oboe; Carolyn Beck*, baroque bassoon; Roger Lebow*, baroque cello; Jason Yoshida*, theorbo; Graydon Beeks*, harpsichord, perform music by Handel and others.
Chamber Music with the Mojave Trio
8 p.m. Saturday, April 1, 2017
Bridges Hall of Music, 150 E. Fourth St., Claremont, CA 91711
Mojave Trio: Sara Parkins, violin; Maggie Parkins, cello; and Genevieve Feiwen Lee*, piano, perform music by Schumann, Shostakovich and others
Chiaroscuro: Light and Dark in Art Song with soprano Melissa Givens
3 p.m. Sunday, April 2, 2017
Bridges Hall of Music, 150 E. Fourth St., Claremont, CA 91711
This Grammy Award-winning soprano is joined by pianist Shannon Hesse for a program of music by Bolcom, Haydn, Martucci, Mendelssohn, Poulenc, Purcell and Strauss. Opera L hails Givens for her “clear, expressive voice, bright, strong and yet with tinges of vulnerability, laced with seamless legato and tasteful phrasing.”