8th Annual Faculty Composers Recital
KEENE, N.H., 02/17/09 - The eighth annual Faculty Composers Recital will take place at 7:30 p.m. on Thursday, March 5, 2009, in the Alumni Recital Hall of the Redfern Arts Center on Brickyard Pond. Admission is $10 for the general public and $5 for KSC students, senior citizens, and youth ages 17 and younger. For tickets, call the box office at 603-358-2168.
The KSC Faculty Composers Recital is becoming a popular and anticipated spring event. This year’s recital will feature works by Flynn Cohen, Elaine Broad Ginsberg, José Lezcano, Christopher Swist, and Craig Sylvern. The program will also feature the KSC Percussion Ensemble and the KSC Chamber Singers, as well as faculty and guest artists.
Ginsberg compositions have been performed at the St. Moritz International Choral Festival in Switzerland, at Merkin Hall and the 92nd Street Y in New York City, at the American Conference of Cantors Convention, and at the International Trombonists’ Workshop. She has received the Guild of Temple Musicians Young Composers Award and the Mu Phi Epsilon Composition Competition Award. Ginsberg teaches courses in music theory, aural skills, and composition at Keene State, and she conducts the Hampshire College Chorus in Western Mass.
Lezcano’s music has captivated audiences on four continents. He has earned numerous awards, including The New Hampshire Music Teacher’s Association Composer of the Year in 2002 and 2007. He has released several CDs individually and with others. His chamber works with guitar, published by Alry and Tuscany, have been performed by major artists including Ricardo Cobo, Antigoni Goni, Duo Fresco, Brett Deubner, the Alturas Duo, and William Bennet. A recent CD by Ms. Goni, Songs from the New Village, on Koch International, includes Lezcano’s “Sonatina Tropical.”
Swist is the principal percussionist with the New Britain Symphony, and performs in the percussion sections of the Ridgefield and Waterbury symphonies. He composes in a wide variety of genres that explore both the traditional and the experimental. His instrumentation pallet encompasses a great deal of marimba literature as well as chamber music, orchestral music, and electronic music. His compositions have been performed across the United States and Canada as well as in Europe, Brazil, and Argentina. They are published in the United States by Marimba Productions Inc. and in Europe by Edition Svitzer.
Sylvern, a tenor saxophonist, is an associate professor and past chairperson of the Music Department at Keene State. He has performed with symphony orchestras in Florida, South Carolina, Ohio, California, New York, Connecticut, and New Hampshire and toured for many years as tenor saxophonist with Keith Brion and his New Sousa Band. Currently he performs as a member of the Keene Jazz Orchestra. Sylvern established and coordinates the annual Faculty Composers Concert now in its eighth year.
