Western New York Chamber Orchestra, conducted by artistic director Glen Cortese, will perform at 3 p.m. Sunday, Oct. 16, at St. Bonaventure University’s Regina A. Quick Center for the Arts. This is the second presentation in the current Friends of Good Music performance season. 

 

The orchestra will be joined after intermission by the Fredonia Chamber Choir with chorus conductor Dr. Vernon Huff for a performance of Franz Schubert’s Mass No. 2 in G-Major D. 167, which will feature vocal soloists from the choir. 

 

To start the concert, the orchestra will perform the beautiful tone poem “Siegfried Idyll” by Richard Wagner, which the composer wrote as a birthday present for his wife, Cosima, and later incorporated into his opera “Siegfried.” Also on the program will be Maurice Ravel’s orchestra suite “Ma mère l’Oye,” or “Mother Goose.” The piece was written as a five-movement piano duet in 1910. In 1911, Ravel orchestrated the work and dedicated it to small children.

 

The Western New York Chamber Orchestra has a 33-year history of excellence serving Chautauqua County. The musicians’ love of music and of this orchestra brings them from all over Western New York and Pennsylvania to rehearse and perform together. This ensemble of outstanding players includes faculty at the Fredonia School of Music (SUNY Fredonia) and professional musicians from Buffalo, Rochester, and Erie, Pennsylvania. 

 

Cortese begins his 17th year as orchestra conductor. He is also in the fourth season as artistic director of the Schenectady Symphony Orchestra and is conductor emeritus of the Oregon Mozart Players. His recent guest engagements have included The Three Tenors concert in Tirana, Albania, to celebrate the 10th anniversary of the independence of Kosovo, RTSH Radio Orchestra (Albania), Emerald City Opera, Opera Fort Collins, Wolftrap Opera, The Charleston Symphony, the Sapporo Festival Orchestra, the Slovak Radio Orchestra, the Sofia Philharmonic, the Hong Kong Sinfonietta, the Mexico City Philharmonic, Colorado Springs Philharmonic, the Paducah Symphony Orchestra, the Lafayette Symphony, the Billings Symphony, the Lyric Opera of Cleveland, and the Annapolis Symphony. 

 

Single tickets for this performance are $20 at full price, $16 for senior citizens and St. Bonaventure employees, and $5 for students. For tickets and information, call The Quick Center at (716) 375-2494.

 

For each Friends of Good Music performance, The Quick Center will open its galleries one hour before the performance and keep them open throughout the intermission. Regular gallery hours are noon to 5 p.m. Monday through Friday, and noon to 4 p.m. Saturday and Sunday. 

 

Museum admission is free and open to the public year-round. For more information, visit www.sbu.edu/quickcenter.  

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About the University: The nation’s first Franciscan university, St. Bonaventure University is a community committed to transforming the lives of our students inside and outside the classroom, inspiring in them a lifelong commitment to service and citizenship. St. Bonaventure was named the #5 regional university value in the North in U.S. News and World Report’s 2022 college rankings edition.