Fall Family Weekend concert offers variety

“The audience will have a great opportunity to hear a number of ensembles performing a huge variety of music,” says Dr. Timothy McGarvey, professor of music.

The Symphonette, under the direction of Dr. Kimberly Utke Svanoe, will open the evening with Concerto Grosso No. I in C. In the allegro movement, violinists Carrie Manifold and Jenelle Kleinhesselink and cellist Eunice Paik will be featured.

Northwestern’s A cappella Choir, directed by Dr. Thomas Holm, will perform three pieces. Their repertoire includes Suefzer by Tobias Hiller, Sleep by Eric Whitacre and Naiman Sharag by Se Enkhbayar, which will feature Brandon Lenderink as a tenor soloist.

Dr. Utke Svanoe will return to the stage to conduct the Women’s Choir. Their first selection will be What God Hath Done, is Rightly Done by William Walton. Student conductor Larissa Poppen will direct the group’s performance of Let’s Imitate Her Notes Above with Svanoe on piano and Morgan Weis on the cello.

The concert will also feature three Northwestern music faculty members playing a six-hands piano piece, Valse by Sergei Rachmaninoff. Dr. Luke Dahn, Dr. Heather Josselyn-Cranson and Dr. Juyeon Kang will all play together on one piano.

The Heritage Singers, under the direction of Holm, will perform Time Pieces by Stephen Chatman and He Came Down, a traditional Cameroonian song, arranged by Nancy Grundahl. The second piece will feature Sarah Fisher as a soprano soloist and percussionist Samantha Schouweiler.

McGarvey will lead the Symphonic Band in their performance of two works to close the concert. The ensemble’s first piece, When Jesus Wept by William Schuman, communicates the empathy and compassion of Christ when he mourned with those who loved his friend Lazarus. Mambo Furioso by Brant Karrick embodies the rhythmic style of famous percussionist Tito Puente.