Music: May 2009 Archives

This coming Friday and Saturday evening, May 29 and 30, at 7:30 pm, the Tulsa Boy Singers will perform a spring concert of classical selections by Mozart, Holst, Mendelssohn, and others, and songs from the musical Camelot. Admission is $5 (or pay as you can). Donations above and beyond would be appreciated. Proceeds provide needed funds to keep Tulsa's oldest choral organization in operation.

The performance will be held in the beautiful Gothic Revival sanctuary of Trinity Episcopal Church, at 5th and Cincinnati in downtown Tulsa. A reception with refreshments, provided by the TBS parents, will follow each performance.

On the program:

• Mendelssohn, Hear My Prayer. You may know it by its plaintive final movement, "O, for the wings, for the wings of a dove."
• Mozart, Missa in C (K. 259), the "Organ Solo mass"
• Stephen Paulus, Sing Creations Music On, a setting of a poem by John Clare.
• Andre J. Thomas, I Dream a World, a setting of a poem by Langston Hughes.
• Gustav Holst, Homeland. The music is Jupiter's theme from The Planets. The lyrics of the first verse are from the British patriotic hymn, I Vow to Thee My Country, by Sir Cecil Spring-Rice. Arranger Z. Randall Stroope has written two additional verses.
• Lerner and Loewe, Selections from Camelot, including the title song, "I Loved You Once in Silence," "How to Handle a Woman," and "If Ever I Should Leave You."

I've had the chance to hear TBS perform a couple of times this spring, and they're as good as I've ever heard them. Not only are these young men developing their musical gifts, they learn teamwork and self-discipline through the TBS program.

If you have a son or know a boy, somewhere between the ages of 8 and 18, who is interested in music and singing, bring him along Friday or Saturday night. Director Casey Cantwell will hold brief auditions following each performance.

Barthelmes Conservatory will celebrate its fifth anniversary with a special concert this coming Tuesday night, May 19, 2009, at 6 p.m., in the Bernsen Center, 708 S. Boston in downtown Tulsa, in the Grand Hall on the 4th floor. Admission is free. About two dozen students will perform short pieces.

For a story in the latest Urban Tulsa Weekly, Holly Wall spoke with Aida Aydinyan, executive director of the conservatory about the school's history and mission:

"All (of Barthelmes') 63 scholarship students are unique and have fascinating personal stories," said Aydinyan. "However, two of them ... are the first two students to be graduating from the Conservatory Music School program but also that these very first graduating students have been accepted to higher education institutions because of the Conservatory. These amazing and significant happenings deserve to be recorded and achieved.

"It is an incredible feeling to realize that we have invested in the future of these scholarship students and the pride derived from the fact that we indeed prepared them for success in college and performing arts field," she said.

I'm proud to say that my daughter (shown above) was selected to perform a short solo piano piece and my son will perform as part of an ensemble. Another ensemble piece will be performed by Bo Willis and Kiersten Morales on violin, Drew Crane on piano, Emma Hardin on cello, and Zac Hardin on bass. (Emma and Zac play bluegrass cello and bass for Rockin' Acoustic Circus, so Tuesday is a chance to hear their classical side.) I heard this quintet's performance at a studio concert last week -- marvelous. Bo Willis is graduating from the Barthelmes Music School program and will attend the University of Tulsa on a full scholarship.