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 2010 Spring Concert:
Love & Loss…Famous Operas
Saturday, March 13, 7:30 pm
- pre-concert talk at 6:45 pm; of Lycoming College
Sunday, March 14, 3:00 pm
- pre-concert talk at 2:15 pm; Dr. Gary Boerckel
Zion Lutheran Church
- 5th and Market Street, Sunbury ()
Soloists: Jill Gardner, Zachary Stains
Co-sponsors: Francis and Caryn Powers, Hudock Moyer Wealth Management
LOVE, LOSS, TREACHERY, SACRIFICE! You'll experience them all in SVC's spectacular Opera Choruses concert! Featuring well-known choruses from famous operas, you'll enjoy excerpts from Bizet's Carmen (remember the “Toreadors” song?), Wagner's Lohengrin, Gounod's Faust, Verdi's Macbeth, and many more. Opera music is often featured on television, in commercials, as orchestral pieces, and on stage—you'll hear beautiful choruses you know and tunes you'll recognize.
- learn about opera stories behind each song.
performing Musetta in Quando m'en vó (Musetta's Waltz) from La Boheme.
MEET THE ARTISTS
 Jill Gardner - soprano
Noted for her "effortlessly produced, rich voice" (Opera News), American soprano Jill Gardner is quickly establishing herself among today's leading operatic heroines, specializing in the lyrico-spinto repertoire. Over the past two seasons, the young soprano marked her Lyric Opera of Chicago debut performing Nedda in I Pagliacci, her Florida Grand Opera debut as Musetta in La Bohème, her Boston Lyric Opera debut as Mimi in La Bohème, her Madison Opera debut as Marguerite in Faust, her Hawaii Opera Theater debut as Countess Charlotte Malcolm in A Little Night Music, as well as performing the role of Margaret Johnson in the first opera house performances of The Light in the Piazza at Piedmont Opera.
Upcoming performances include opening Boston Lyric Opera's 2010 - 2011 season in the title role of Tosca, Lìu in Turandot at the Arizona Opera, the title role of Suor Angelica with Charlotte's Opera Carolina, Helmwige in Die Walküre at Hawaii Opera Theatre, Beethoven's 9th Symphony and Vaughan Williams' Serenade to Music with the Syracuse Symphony and Lìu in concert performances of Turandot with the Piedmont Opera. In the summers of 2005 and 2006, Ms. Gardner was a member of the prestigious Young American Artist Program at the Glimmerglass Opera, where she created the role of Madame Loiseau in the world premiere of Stephen Hartke's The Greater Good, which was recorded on the Naxos Label. Additional engagements from recent seasons include Syracuse Opera (Hanna Glawari/The Merry Widow), New York Opera Projects (title role in Susannah), Mercury Opera Rochester (title role in Tosca and Donna Anna/Don Giovanni), Tri-Cities Opera (Countess/Le Nozze di Figaro, Violetta/La Traviata, Cio-Cio San/Madama Butterfly) and in concert with Opera Omaha. A frequent soloist with the Susquehanna Valley Chorale, Ms. Gardner has been heard over the past four seasons in such varied repertoire as Brahms Requiem, Vaughan Williams' Sea Symphony and Hodie, Verdi's Requiem and Rutter's Requiem.
 Zachary Stains - tenor
Praised for the beauty of his voice and the power of his characterizations, tenor Zachary Stains is gaining widespread recognition for roles ranging from Monteverdi, Handel, and Mozart, to Donizetti, Rossini, and Verdi.
Lauded for his portrayal of Lurcanio in Handel's Ariodante at the Spoleto Festival Dei Due Mondi in Italy (Dynamic DVD), he has also won rave reviews for his title role in Vivaldi's Ercole sul Termodonte conducted by Alan Curtis and recorded there in a John Pascoe production (Dynamic DVD).
Also on DVD he appears in Les Arts Florissant's highly praised production of Monteverdi's Il ritorno d'Ulisse in patria, and on CD as Tiridate alongside Joyce DiDonato in Handel's Radamisto with Alan Curtis and Il Complesso Barocco.
Recent and upcoming engagements include concerts in Switzerland with French pianist Michel Dalberto, guest artist with the Susquehanna Valley Chorale with soprano Jill Gardner, and the 2010 Spoleto USA Festival in Charleston, SC.
Mr. Stains appeared with the Susquehanna Valley Chorale last season in Britten's St. Nicholas.
 PRE-CONCERT TALK
Dr. Gary Boerckel
Gary Boerckel is a concert pianist, conductor, lecturer and chairman of the music department at Lycoming College. He has appeared as soloist in piano concertos by Beethoven, Schumann, Gershwin, Mozart, and Bach with the Jupiter [New York City] Symphony, the Northeastern PA Philharmonic, the Williamsport Symphony, the Williamsport Chamber Orchestra and the Susquehanna Valley Symphony and has performed solo recitals in college, university, and community artist series throughout the country.
At Lycoming College—and in collaboration with the Williamsport Symphony Orchestra—Dr. Boerckel has directed over thirty operas, operettas, and musicals, and has conducted major choral works by Mozart, Fauré, and Rutter in Williamsport and at the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception in Washington, D.C.
Dr. Boerckel has been chairman of the Lycoming College Department of Music since 1983 and served for thirteen years as director of the College's Honors Program. Since June 2004, he has been the host of Music to My Ears, every Sunday at 1 pm on WVIA/WVYA public radio. |
