UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. -- The Penn State Horn Ensemble will present a concert at 12:10 p.m. Thursday, Feb. 20, in Eisenhower Chapel. Appearing on the School of Music's Bach's Lunch concert series, highlights will include transcriptions of keyboard and orchestral music by Johann Sebastian Bach, a set of three pieces by Edvard Grieg arranged for horn ensemble and arrangements of music from the Disney films "Beauty and the Beast" and "Pocahontas." Penn State horn professor Lisa Bontrager coordinates the horn ensemble. She is assisted by faculty conductor Darrin Thornton, and graduate students Benjamin Firer and Drew Welkie. Admission is free.
Program
"The Ascension" -- Paul Basler (Lisa Bontrager, conductor)
Preludium XXII (from "The Well Tempered Clavier, Vol. 1") -- Johann Sebastian Bach, arranged by L. E. Shaw (Benjamin Firer, conductor)
Sicut Locutus Est (from "Magnificat, BWV 243") -- Johann Sebastian Bach, transcribed by A. M. Miller (Benjamin Firer, conductor)
"Norwegian Suite" -- Edvard Greig, arranged by Cynthia Carr (Darrin Thornton, conductor)
Prelude (from "Holbers Suite, Op. 40") The Last Spring (from "Elegiac Melodies," Op.3 No. 2) Rötnams Knut (from "Album for Baritone and Men’s Voices, Op. 30")
Relics (from "Recollections for Horn Octet") -- Douglas Hill (Darrin Thornton, conductor)
"Beauty and the Beast" -- Alan Menken, arranged by April Strong (Benjamin Firer, conductor)
"Colors of the Wind" -- Alan Menken, arranged by April Strong (Drew Welkie, conductor)
The Penn State Horn Ensemble, formed in 1985, showcases the finest hornists on campus. Comprised of music majors and talented hornists from outside the School of Music by audition, this 20-member ensemble meets in spring semester and is most often Penn State horn ensemble divided into quartets. By invitation, this group performed at the 1997 Symposium of the International Horn Society, held in Rochester, N.Y., and was invited to perform at the 2001 Symposium in Kalamazoo, Mich. The Penn State Horn Ensemble also performed at a Mid-West Regional Horn Workshop in Ypsilanti, Mich., as well as at the Eastern Division Music Educators National Conference in Connecticut.
The ensemble has made numerous appearances at clinics of the Pennsylvania Music Educators Association. Directed by Lisa Bontrager, the ensemble's vast repertoire encompasses original works and arrangements of romantic, baroque, classical, impressionist and popular music. For more information, visit the Penn State horn studio website.