(PRINCETON, NJ) -- The Westminster Conservatory Faculty Recital Series continues with An Evening of Chamber Music on Sunday, March 13 at 7:30pm in Bristol Chapel. The program will feature Phyllis Alpert Lehrer and Ena Bronstein Barton, piano; Melissa Bohl, oboe; and guest violinist Alexei Yavtuhovich. They will perform music of Mozart, Beethoven, Brahms, Leone Sinigaglia and G.F. Malipiero. Admission to the recital is free and all guests will be asked to review and complete an assumption of risk agreement. Masking is optional.
The Barton Lehrer Duo will perform the Sonata in F, K. 497 by Mozart and selections from Brahms' Hungarian Dances. Ms. Lehrer and Alexei Yavtuhovich will perform Beethoven's Sonata in C minor, op. 30 no. 2 for violin and piano. Ms. Barton and Melissa Bohl will perform the Improvviso Pastorale of G.F. Malipiero and Twelve Variations on a Theme of Franz Schubert for oboe and piano by Leone Sinigaglia.
Melissa Bohl is the principal oboist of the New Jersey Capital Philharmonic Orchestra, the Orchestra of St. Peter-by-the-Sea, the Bravura Philharmonic Orchestra, and the American Repertory Ballet Orchestra. She plays oboe and English horn with the Plainfield Symphony and performs regularly with many other area musical organizations, including the Garden State Symphonic Band and the Central Jersey Symphonic Orchestra. At Westminster Conservatory she teaches oboe and is head of the woodwind, brass, and percussion department. She also coordinates two faculty performance series at Westminster Conservatory: The Kaleidoscope Chamber Series and the noontime series Westminster Conservatory at Nassau. Ms. Bohl has degrees in music from the Eastman School of Music, the University of Notre Dame, and Princeton University. Her principal teachers were Jerry Sirucek, Robert Sprenkle, and Ray Still. She is the artistic director and chair of the Princeton University Summer Chamber Concerts Committee.
Guest violinist Alexei Yavtuhovich was born in Belarus, where he earned a bachelor’s degree at Sokolovsky’s Musical College and a master’s degree in violin performance from the Belarusian Academy of Music in Minsk, Belarus. At age 17 he won of the Republic of Belarus National Young Violinists competition. As a member of the Belarus State Concert Orchestra, the Belarus State Chamber Orchestra, and the Belarus String Quartet, he has performed in Ukraine, Russia, Germany, France, the Netherlands, Norway, Spain, and other European countries.
Since his immigration to the United States in 1996 he has devoted himself to a range of activities, from coaching and mentoring young hockey players to providing IT services. In 2015 he restarted his artistic career, performing with multiple organizations in the tri-state area and touring in Belarus as soloist with Gomel Chamber Orchestra. In 2018 he founded the Collegium Musicum, serving as the organization’s president and artistic director. He continues to perform as a soloist and chamber musician.
Born in Santiago, Chile, pianist Ena Bronstein Barton began her career in South America, touring her native continent. After winning a national piano competition, she traveled to New York to study with Claudio Arrau and Rafael de Silva. Her New York debut at Town Hall was received with critical acclaim. Since then, Ms. Barton’s career has taken her across the United States, back to South America, to Europe, the Near and Far East, Australia and New Zealand. Among her engagements abroad was an extended tour of Israel and Europe, highlighted by performances as soloist with orchestras in Jerusalem, Luxembourg and Rome.
Ms. Barton has received many honors throughout her career, including an invitation to attend the Casals Festival, a Martha Baird Rockefeller Grant that resulted in a solo recital at Lincoln Center’s Alice Tully Hall, and the 1996 Distinguished Artists Piano Award by Artists International. Her chamber music performances have included appearances with violinist Jaime Laredo and the Guarneri Quartet. Her piano partnership with pianist Phyllis Alpert Lehrer spans more than 35 years. For many years Ms. Barton served as head of the piano department at Westminster Conservatory and as a member of the piano faculty of Westminster Choir College of Rider University.
Phyllis Alpert Lehrer is known internationally as a teacher, performer, clinician, author, and adjudicator. She has given master classes, workshops and enjoyed an active concert career as a soloist and collaborative artist in the United States, Canada, Central and South America, Asia, and Europe. Ms. Lehrer is professor of Piano emerita at Westminster Choir College, and she continues to serve on the faculty of Westminster Conservatory. Her collaboration with duo piano partner Ena Bronstein Barton includes two CD’s featuring duets of Mozart, Schubert, and Debussy, and two-piano works of Laurie Altman, Mozart, Schumann, and Rachmaninoff. Recent publications include five volumes of the great piano repertoire, Classics for the Developing Pianist, co-edited with Ingrid Clarfield, along with accompanying study guides. Ms. Lehrer received a bachelor’s degree with music concentration from the University of Rochester and Eastman School of Music and a master’s degree in piano from the Juilliard School of Music. Her honors include being selected as an MTNA Foundation Fellow in 2007, NJMTA Teacher of the Year for 2012-2013, the Westminster Merit Award from the Westminster Alumni Association in 2019, and the National Conference on Keyboard Pedagogy/Frances Clark Center Lifetime Achievement Award for outstanding dedication to the field of music and piano teaching.
Bristol Chapel is located on the historic Princeton campus of Westminster Choir College, 101 Walnut Lane.
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