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Orchestra to perform Spring Concert Sunday

By Kari VanDerVeen
March 13, 2008

The St. Olaf Orchestra will perform its Spring Concert in Boe Memorial Chapel this Sunday, March 16, at 3:30 p.m. The performance is free and open to the public, and it will also be streamed live.

Orchestra08lg
The 2007-08 St. Olaf Orchestra.
The program will include composer Bela Bartok's Concerto for Orchestra, a work that St. Olaf Orchestra Conductor Steven Amundson notes is rarely attempted by student orchestras. The orchestra will also perform Beethoven's Lenore Overture No. 3, a piece he wrote as the "curtain-raiser" for his opera Fidelio. The program also includes a piece titled Here, Now by St. Olaf student Christy Mooers '08, a theory and composition major from Seattle, Wash.

"Christy's piece is based on the idea that we should live in the moment rather than dwelling on the past or the future," Amundson says. "It uses many novel ideas to produce a gentle storm complete with wind, rain and thunder."

The ensemble
The St. Olaf Orchestra is perhaps best known for its participation in the annual St. Olaf Christmas Festival, broadcast on PBS and public radio stations nationwide. In 2007 St. Olaf became the first college or university in the nation to simulcast a live event when it broadcast the Christmas Festival live to nearly 200 movie theaters around the nation. In 2004, the St. Olaf Orchestra was chosen from hundreds of applicants to perform at the conference of the National Association for Music Education.

In addition to performing throughout the United States, and notably as Garrison Keillor's guest on a broadcast of A Prairie Home Companion, the St. Olaf Orchestra has performed internationally throughout Europe. This summer the orchestra will tour Spain.

Conductor Amundson has received numerous honors, including the Hans Haring Prize -- an international conducting competition sponsored by the Mozarteum and National Austrian Radio; Orchestra Educator of the Year by the Minnesota Music Educator's Association; and the Carlo A. Sperati Award for meritorious achievement in music from his alma mater, Luther College. In addition, professional orchestras across the country have performed his compositions.

Contact Kari VanDerVeen at 507-786-3970 or vanderve@stolaf.edu.