WBFO will broadcast a recent concert featuring Buffalo composers.By Bill Raffel, WBFO
Buffalo, NY – While you?re trimming the turkey on Thursday, be sure to tune in WBFO for a special concert called Heard in Buffalo. Good morning. I?m Bill Raffel with Music Notes.
A few weeks ago, you might remember my conversation with Roland Martin about a concert featuring composers who were either born or lived in Western New York for awhile. Well, recording engineer Mike Brydalski and I were there at Saint Joseph?s University Church to capture the sounds of the Freudig Singers and Trinity Episcopal Choir. And we?ll bring you the concert Thursday afternoon (11/27) at two.
This work Love Ye the Lord was written by Frederick Slee, of Slee Hall fame. In addition to being a violist, he was a prominent local attorney who in addition to law also studied music composition at Harvard.
Other featured composers also have UB connections. Paul Hindemith, Aaron Copland, and Ned Rorem all taught here. Ron Martin is currently on the Music Faculty, and one of his works will be featured a song cycle called a Northeast Gardeneners Year.
Other works by contemporary Buffalo composers will also be featured. A setting of Psalm 150 by Chet Mais and Dona Nobis Pacem by Persis Vehar.
Vehar composed this work after traveling to the former Yugoslavia and hearing about the impact of the bloodshed. As part of Thursday?s broadcast, you?ll hear conversations with all these composers, plus some musical surprises. And what would be a tribute to Buffalo without a piece by Harold Arlen, as arranged by former UB Music Professor Livingston Gearhart.
So I hope you?ll join me for this tribute to Western New York composers with the Freudig Singers directed by Roland Martin and the choir of Trinity Episcopal Church led by Tim Socha. Thats Heard in Buffalo, Thursday afternoon at 2 p.m. on WBFO. And if you expect to be in town for the holidays, I?m sure relatives will understand why youre canceling your plans to catch this broadcast. But if that?s out the question, turn on their computer and hear the program online through WBFO.org.
The Buffalo Philharmonic is now releasing its second recording on the Naxos label, featuring works of Elmira native Charles Thomlinson Griffes. And this Friday (11/28) and Saturday (11/29) at 8 p.m., Assistant Conductor Ron Spigelman will conduct a tribute to music of the World War II era.
Tonight (Monday 11/24) at 8 p.m., the Greater Buffalo Youth String Orchestra performs in Temple Beth Zion at the corner of Delaware and Barker.
Flutist Cheryl Gobetti Hoffman gives a free half hour recital Friday (11/28) at 12:30 p.m. in Saint Paul?s Cathedral downtown.
French Violist Antoine Tamestit gives a free recital Sunday (11/30) at 3 p.m. in Kleinhans Music Hall, sponsored by the Buffalo Chamber Music Society.
And for holiday music, The Saint Paul?s Cathedral Choir of Men and Boys joins the ensemble N.Y.S. Baroque for the annual presentation of Handels Messiah in the Cathedral, while the Orchard Park Chorale sings in Orchard Park Presbyterian Church at 4369 South Buffalo Street. Both performances take place Sunday (11/30) at 3 p.m.