Concerts cheer up the winter

Fight postholiday blues with beautiful sounds from Caltech student groups. Beginning Friday, January 23, at 8 p.m., the chamber music program will celebrate its 25th year with its annual concert series. With their usual venue, Dabney Lounge, under construction, the students will perform this year in Ramo Auditorium.

More than 20 small ensembles will present selections including trios by J. S. Bach, Beethoven, Mendelssohn, and Dvorák; a piano duet by Hindemith; Mozart, Brahms, and Shostakovich quartets; and a Schumann quintet. Students are coached by Delores Bing, chamber music director; Allen Gross, piano ensemble instructor; and several Donald E. Hudson Visiting Artists.

The series will continue the next weekend with a festival of chamber-music concerts on Friday the 30th and Saturday the 31st, both at 8 p.m., and the annual Super Bowl Alternative Concert on Sunday, February 1, at 3:30 p.m. Says Bing, “This final event of the series takes place during the big game, and is dedicated to those who prefer chamber music to football.”

For those who prefer something a little jazzier, the Caltech Jazz Bands, directed by William Bing, will perform on Saturday, January 24, at 8 p.m. in Beckman Auditorium. This concert will feature the music of Charles Mingus, of whom the New Yorker observed, “For sheer melodic and rhythmic and structural originality, his compositions may equal anything written in western music in the twentieth century.”

Bing notes that Mingus’s “wonderful” works are enhanced by their titles, such as “Fables of Fabus,” “Goodbye Pork Pie Hat,” Moanin’,” “Oh Lord, Don’t Let Them Drop That Atomic Bomb on Me,” and “Haitian Fight Song.” The performance will also feature pieces by musicians who had influenced the composer, including Thelonious Monk and Charlie Parker, as well as solos by graduate students Jay Bartroff and Kjerstin Easton.

All performances are free and open to the public. For more information, contact Public Events at 1 (888) 2CALTECH, (626) 395-4652, or events@caltech.edu, or visit www.events.caltech.edu. Individuals with a disability can call 395-4688 (voice) or 395-3700 (TDD).
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