Organist Vaughn Mauren, from St. James’s Episcopal Church, West Hartford.
Join us for half-hour organ concerts featuring St. John’s magnificent Austin pipe organ, on the first Sunday of the month, January through June, 12:30 p.m. with local organists. Free!
Rick Erickson, organ and harpsichord.
Johann Sebastian Bach’s Art of Fugue with hauntingly beautiful dance interpretation by a renowned troupe based in New York.
Co-sponsored by the Hartford Chapter, American Guild of Organists.
Check out the preview video:
Description of SYREN Modern Dance:
SYREN Modern Dance is a New York based modern dance company with a history of bringing music and dance to international audiences for over a decade. “The Art of Fugue” recently premiered in NYC at Holy Trinity Lutheran Church and audiences were “transported out of the grind of day to day life into this truly immersive work of beauty”. The dance was created at Holy Trinity itself, with Bach’s The Art of Fugue as the centerpiece of the production. The dance explores definitions of beauty while searching for its existence in a world filled with media, speed, detachment, and exploitation. Modern dance movements range from large, sweeping runs and leaps to small intricate arm gestures and partnering work. The live organ accompaniment heightens the senses, evoking imagery and inspiring movement from every crevice, step, and pillar. The piece was created to be adapted in various spaces, with the central movement ideas allowing for re-adaption of spatial arrangements, levels, use of aisles and other specific details that differ from space to space.
The Art of Fugue is choreographed by Kate St. Amand and is performed by Rick Erickson, Donald Meineke, Sonja Dale, Jean-René Homehr, Xuexin (Nico) Li, Darcie Perkins, Lynn Peterson.
SYREN Modern Dance is a New York based company founded in 2003 by Lynn Peterson and Kate St. Amand. Using live music and collaborations with visual artists, they bring vivid work to audiences from New York to Paris. SYREN has been presented at Jacob’s Pillow Dance Festival, Symphony Space, Dance Theater Workshop, Green Space, Cité Universitaire, The Riverside Theatre, and Queens Theatre in the Park, among others. It has been supported by grants from NYC’s Department of Cultural Affairs, Queens Council on the Arts, Harkness Space Grants (92nd Street Y), residencies at DanceNOW/NYC’s Silo and DTW’s Outer/Space, and was commissioned by Purchase College. Central to SYREN’s mission is pairing vigorous motion with live onstage music to bring dance back to where it started – in dialogue with live music. SYREN has collaborated with Galeet Dardashti, Artemis Chamber Ensemble, Steeplechase Arts & Productions, Lauren Cregor Devine, and Yonah Zur to bring numerous performances to the public that feature dance with live music. SYREN has worked with students at Purchase College, Mark Morris Dance Center, Yale University, Nutmeg Conservatory for the Arts, Greater Hartford Academy of the Arts, and Westminster School, among others. For five years, SYREN has enjoyed engaging in “Dance on Canvas“, a Partnership with the Art Students League of NY where visual artists capture the company’s dynamic motion through sketch sessions. www.syrendance.org
Organist Ben Gessner, a student at Trinity College.
Join us for half-hour organ concerts featuring St. John’s magnificent Austin pipe organ, on the first Sunday of the month, January through June, 12:30 p.m. with local organists. Free!
Organist Kari Miller, from Central Baptist Church, Hartford, will perform music of Johann Sebastian Bach, as well as an interesting set of hymn-preludes by Dale Wood. Click here for the full program.
Kari Miller began her musical life with piano lessons at the age of five. Organ lessons came some years later, and Ms. Miller held her first church position and gave her first organ recital while still a teenager, in her native state of Washington. She continued her musical training as a pianist, earning a Diploma from The Curtis Institute of Music and a Masters and DM in Piano Performance from Indiana University.
Ms. Miller is currently Director of Music and organist at Central Baptist Church in Hartford, where she plays a 4-manual Austin organ. Her noontime organ series, now in its 7th season, is held monthly on the ‘third Thursday’, November through May. Kari is an active member of the Greater Hartford Chapter of the American Guild of Organists, currently serving as Dean.
Join us for half-hour organ concerts featuring St. John’s magnificent Austin pipe organ (check out the history of this organ at www.reddoormusic.org/organ), on the first Sunday of the month, January through June, 12:30 p.m. with local organists. Free!
Organist Natasha Ulyanovsky joins us for the second Pipes Alive! concert of the season. Joining her is Max Schwimmer, saxophone, in a unique program featuring works of Bach, Bozza, Hurd, and Matitia, entitled Windy Sounds of Winter.
Join us for half-hour organ concerts featuring St. John’s magnificent Austin pipe organ, on the first Sunday of the month, January through June, 12:30 p.m. with local organists. Free!
Download and print: Full-size Poster – Letter-size Poster
Buster Keaton’s classic “The Navigator” (1924), with improvised organ accompaniment by Jason Roberts, former music director at St. James’s Church, West Hartford, now Associate Organist at St. Bartholomew’s Church, New York.
The Navigator: A rich young fool and the equally wealthy young lady who has rejected his marriage proposal find themselves alone — together — the soul passengers of a cast-adrift ocean liner. Among Buster Keaton’s best work, this film is a brilliantly realized example of superior comedy craftsmanship.
Jason Roberts is Associate Music Director at St. Bartholomew’s Church in New York City. An active recitalist, he has recently presented programs for national conventions of the Association of Anglican Musicians and the American Guild of Organists. He is winner of the 2008 AGO National Competition in Organ Improvisation and the 2007 Albert Schweitzer Organ Competition, and he has been a finalist at competitions in St. Albans, England and Haarlem, The Netherlands. Jason is a graduate of Rice University, the Yale Institute of Sacred Music, and the Manhattan School of Music, where his teachers included Clyde Holloway, Martin Jean and McNeil Robinson.
(Snow date, Sunday, January 10, 7:00 p.m.)
Festal organ works for the new year begin the Pipes Alive! series of concerts, which were highly popular during last season. Arrive early to get a good seat!
Click here for concert program.
Join us for half-hour organ concerts featuring St. John’s magnificent Austin pipe organ, on the first Sunday of the month, January through June, 12:30 p.m. with local organists. Free!
It was a fabulous day with 200 in attendance! Check out the printed program by clicking here.
Download and print: Full-size Poster – Letter-size Poster
The St. John’s Adult and Youth Choirs;
Scott Lamlein, director; Floyd Higgins, organ.
In the tradition of King’s College, Cambridge, prepare your soul for the Christmas miracle with carols for choir and organ. This event is a long-standing tradition at St. John’s – a “must” to center your soul during the Advent season.
Congregational Hymns: Once in royal David’s City (Irby, descant Halley); O little town of Bethlehem (Forest Green); O come all ye faithful (Adeste Fideles, descant Willcocks)
Carols by the Choir:
Tomorrow shall be my dancing day (Gardner)
Adam lay ybounden (Ord)
I wonder as I wander (Rutter)
People, look east (Steel)
O little one sweet (Bach)
Ave Maria (Bruckner)
A Christmas lullaby (Forrest)
The shepherds’ farewell (Berlioz)
The first nowell (Paulus)
No small wonder (Edwards)
Check out last year’s Lessons and Carols here.
Lecture Presentation on the Music of The Beatles
Multimedia Presentation by Aaron Krerowicz
One of only two professional Beatles scholars in the world, Aaron Krerowicz graduated from Butler University with a Bachelor’s of Music in Theory & Composition in 2008, from Boston University in 2010 with a Master’s of Music in Composition, and from the Hartt School of the University of Hartford with a Graduate Artist Diploma in the same discipline in 2012.
In November 2011, Aaron won a research grant through the University of Hartford to study the Beatles. The results of this on-going venture have been presented through well more than one hundred analytic presentations at universities, libraries, continuing education programs, and community centers throughout the United States. His full repertoire and history can be found on his website, www.aaronkrerowicz.com.
Aaron also teaches adult-level courses on the history of rock ‘n’ roll, piano playing, the music of Star Wars, baseball, naked-eye astronomy, and origami.
Download and print the flyer here: Letter Size – Large
Download the printed program here: Charlotte Beers Plank Organ Program
Former student of Ralph Valentine, and St. John’s “native daughter,” Charlotte returns from Oberlin with a moving program of music well suited to St. John’s landmark Austin organ.
Charlotte Beers Plank is the organist and choral accompanist for Christ Episcopal Church in Oberlin, Ohio, where she has been serving since 2010. She is active as a recitalist and freelance musician in Northeast Ohio. Charlotte is also an experienced pianist, and serves as accompanist for a variety of choral groups throughout the area.
In May 2011 Charlotte earned her Bachelor of Music in organ performance and Bachelor of Arts in German Studies from Oberlin College and Conservatory of Music. As a merit scholarship student, Charlotte studied organ with Jack Mitchener. Her previous teachers include David Boe and Ralph Valentine. In January 2010 Charlotte was awarded a prestigious award from Oberlin’s Creativity and Entrepreneurship program. The Conservatory Initiative Grant (CIGSIE) enabled her to spend four weeks working at a Lutheran church in Herrenberg, Germany. Pursuing her interests in sacred music and German under the tutelage of Ulrich Feige, Charlotte interned as a choral and vocal accompanist, organist and continuo player.
Charlotte also studied voice while a student at Oberlin, studying with Nancy Zylstra and others. In 2009, Charlotte had a lead role in Charpentier’s chamber opera Les arts florissants, which was performed at the Early Music Festival in Boston. She sang soprano in Collegium Musicum and the Baroque Ensmble, and performed various works by new composers.
Charlotte is currently in her final semester of her Master’s of Library and Information Science at Kent State University. She is pursuing a career in music librarianship, and hopes to continue to find new ways to incorporate music into her life. She and her husband Aidan, an accomplished double-bassist, live in Oberlin with their cat, Lily.