Faculty among those to perform this weekend

The UNC Department of Music has planned back-to-back concerts this weekend, featuring its own faculty as well as outside musicians.

They will perform “Music on the Hill” at 8 p.m. tonight in Gerrard Hall and “An Evening of Song” at 8 p.m. Saturday in the Hill Hall Auditorium.

The theme for tonight’s performance is “France and More Romance,” in which the music department is highlighting guest artists the Vega String Quartet.

UNC piano professor Mayron Tsong and violin professor Richard Luby will be performing with the quartet for one piece.

“The Vega Quartet has played here many times before. I consider them one of the very best young quartets in the world,” Luby wrote in an e-mail.

They will join the quartet for the performance of “Concerto in D, Op 21, for Violin, String Quartet and Piano,” by Ernest Chausson.

Tsong said the piece is a combination of excitement and intimidation.

“The piano part is very difficult,” she said. “This piece isn’t performed live very often for this reason.”

She said she performed the Romantic piece before in graduate school.

“I actually have wanted to play this piece for a while. It’s a gorgeous piece. In my opinion, it doesn’t get played enough,” Tsong said.

As well as the Chausson piece, tonight’s performance will feature music by Felix Mendelssohn and Joseph Haydn.

Saturday’s “An Evening of Song” will showcase some of the music department’s voice and piano faculty. Singers will be performing a set of songs of their choice.

“These songs are united by a common theme, composer or poet,” wrote Jeanne Fischer, a faculty member with the music department, in an e-mail. “My songs, for instance, are all modern British settings of Shakespeare texts.

“I enjoy singing my set of songs because I so love Shakespeare. Not only is the music beautiful, but the texts are gorgeous as well.”

Valentin Lanzrein, also a faculty member, will be performing a selection of Hugo Wolf pieces with text by various German poets.

Faculty member Melissa Martin will be performing a set of French songs that have Spanish influences.

There are six sets featuring 11 different music department faculty members.


Contact the Arts Editor at artsdesk@unc.edu.