NOW RESCHEDULED for 4 p.m. Sunday, May 5

By Peter Alexander April 2 at 10 a.m.

Boulder will have one less orchestra after this weekend.

The Colorado Pro Musica Chamber Orchestra will play their last concert Saturday (7:30 p.m. April 6; details below), after 17 years of steadfast leadership from conductor and artistic director Cynthia Katsarelis. Katsarelis recently moved from Colorado to South Bend, Ind., where she is on the faculty of Sacred Music at Notre Dame University.

With Katsarelis, Pro Musica’s philosophy has been to to introduce composers from under-represented groups while featuring local soloists. In keeping with this approach, the final program will present two works by women—Starburst by living composer Jessie Montgomery to open the concert, and the Symphony No. 3 by 19th-century French composer Louise Farrenc—and a soloist from the CU faculty, guitarist Nicolò Spera playing the Fantasía para un gentilhombre (Fantasy for a gentleman) by Joaquin Rodrigo.

Montgomery’s Starburst is a short but colorful piece for strings composed in 2012 that has become a popular concert opener. The composer just won a Grammy for her Rounds for piano and orchestra, in a recording by pianist Awadagin Pratt and the ensemble A Far Cry. Pratt will perform Rounds at the Colorado Music Festival this summer (July 25 and 26 at Chautauqua Auditorium).

“It’s become a canonic piece, and it’s a really fabulous opener,” Katsarelis says of Starburst. Pro Musica played it once before, but “it’s good to repeat repertoire sometime,” she says, “especially if it’s right for the program and to highlight the Grammy win.”

 Rodrigo wrote his Fantasía para un gentilhombre in 1954 for the celebrated guitarist Andres Segovia, who gave the premiere in 1958. It has four movements based on dances written for guitar by the 17th-century Spanish composer Gaspar Sanz. 

It has become one of the best known concertos for classical guitar. Katsarelis and Spera selected it for this concert, in part because she feels that it fits well with Ferrenc’s symphony. “When you’re working with a soloist, you want to give them the choice and then see whether it fits what you are already thinking,” she explains. 

“It works really well with Ferrenc because it is a neo-classical work built on 17th-century pieces,” Katsarelis says. “Ferrenc was an extremely well versed composer, and another part of her was involved in reviving early music for keyboard. Her husband was a publisher, and together they did like 15 volumes of treasures for the keyboard, all stuff that wasn’t being played at the time.”

Ferrenc studied both piano and composition in Paris. A successful concert pianist, she was appointed professor of piano at the Paris Conservatory in 1852, the only woman to hold that rank in the 19th century. Known as an excellent teacher, she had many students who had distinguished careers.

As a composer, she stuck to the traditional forms for the symphony, of which she wrote three, and other genres. “She had modern sensibilities, like Mendelssohn and Schumann,” Katsarelis says, but “she doesn’t go the way of program music. Even though she doesn’t write programs, her themes seem to be kind of epic.”

The symphony is in four movements, following the standard pattern of the 19th century: An opening fast movement in sonata form, followed by a slow movement, a scherzo and a finale. 

“The first movement has two introductions, a slow one that introduces melodic and harmonic ideas, and then a fast introduction whose main role is to build up the energy to the exposition,” Katsarelis says. “The first theme has the feel of a rustic dance, and the second major theme is like a lyrical waltz.

“The second movement is what you expect, a slow movement (with) long gorgeous melodies. The third movement is a scherzo, fast and kind of breathless. While it’s moving it’s going through really distant keys, but that gives it the sheen of color, and then the finale has soaring melodies.”

Now settled in South Bend, Katsarelis has already started to build bridges with the local musical community. She has already conducted the South Bend Symphony in a concert with soloists from Notre Dame, and she has plans to continue that collaboration. Looking ahead, “we have aspirations for some pretty big stuff,” she says of her work the the orchestra. “We agreed that we had similar aspirations, and everybody wants more, so that’s really great.”

In the meantime, Saturday’s concert will be a farewell for Boulder for Katsarelis and the Pro Musica. “The plan was to have a really great season and to end with a bang and a party, and to be really proud of everything we accomplished,” Katsarelis says. “I’ll miss the musicians in the orchestra. I’ll miss the patrons and the donors, and the whole vibe of discovery that we always had. 

“My heart is full of gratitude. I want it to be a happy farewell, with happy memories of all that we accomplished.”

* * * * *

“Nicolò!”
Pro Musica Colorado Chamber Orchestra, Cynthia Katsarelis, conductor
With Nicolò Spera, guitar

• Jessie Montgomery: StarburstJoaquin
• Rodrigo: Fantasía para un gentilhombre (Fantasy for a gentleman)
• Louise Farrenc: Symphony No. 3 in G Minor

NOW RESCHEDULED:
4 p.m. Sunday, May 5
Mountain View Methodist Church, 355 Ponca Place, Boulder

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