CRANE SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA PRESENTS PLANET BACH

Conductor Dr. Christopher Lanz, along with soprano Dr. Kathleen Allen, tenor Dr. Kirk Dougherty and baritone Dr. Michael Koon, all members of the SUNY Potsdam Crane School of Music faculty, will present a recital titled “Planet Bach” on Tuesday, April 15, at 7:30 p.m. in the Helen M. Hosmer Concert Hall.

The recital will feature Bach’s “Cantata No. 21” and Holst’s “The Planets.”

The performance will include freshman Sarah El Houssieny from Grand Island, senior Billy Eaves from Binghamton, senior Zoe Auerbach from Poughkeepsie and junior Lydia Zervanos from Vrillisia-Athens (Greece) as student soloists. Laura Toland will provide continuo on the Hosmer organ. Members of the Crane choral groups have volunteered to participate in the chorus.

According to Dr. Lanz, Holst’s “The Planets” is the most important work ever written by the composer and will be the highlight of the recital. The piece was a substantially important element of every major orchestra’s yearly programming during the middle years of the 20th century.

Dr. Lanz is the orchestra director at The Crane School of Music. Additionally, he leads the Early Music Ensemble, maintains the harpsichords and continuo organ and teaches conducting and string music education classes.

Previously, Dr. Lanz was orchestra director and string division head at the University of Texas at Arlington. In addition, he has led youth orchestras, opera productions, new and early music organizations and other university and professional orchestras.

Dr. Lanz has received degrees from Stanford University and the Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music. He is an active instrumentalist, having performed as trombonist with the Northern Symphonic Winds and Early Music Ensemble, as violist with the Crane Symphony and as recorder soloist with the Chamber Orchestra. He has conducted honors orchestras around New York and has taken the Crane orchestras on three tours.

Dr. Allen, specializing in French melodie and contemporary opera, has performed throughout the United States in opera, operetta and musical theater revue, as well as in chamber music and recital. She has sung with such organizations as the Tacoma Opera, Kitsap Peninsula Opera, the Maryland Arts Festival, the Vocal Arts Ensemble of Cincinnati, the Oshkosh Chamber Singers and the Festival Choir of Madison.

Her previous teaching assignments include positions as an adjunct voice instructor at Pierce College in Tacoma, WA, and Dundalk College in Baltimore, MD.

Dr. Allen has received a Bachelor of Music and a Doctorate of Musical Arts degree in vocal performance from the University of Wisconsin-Madison and a Master of Music degree from the Peabody Conservatory in Baltimore, MD.

Dr. Dougherty is an assistant professor of voice at The Crane School of Music. Prior to joining the staff at Crane, he was an adjunct professor of voice at Nazareth College in Rochester.

In the summer of 2001, Dr. Dougherty served as an apprentice artist in the Central City Opera Company in Colorado, where he understudied and performed the role of Rodolfo in Puccini’s “La Boheme.”

Dr. Dougherty has received a Doctor of Musical Arts degree and a Master of Music degree from the Eastman School of Music in Rochester and completed a Bachelor of Music degree at the University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill. While at Eastman, he performed a variety of roles including Evangelist in both Bach’s “St. Matthew Passion” and “St. John Passion,” the title role in Benjamin Britten’s “Albert Herring” and Ferrando in Mozart’s “Cosi fan tutte.”

Dr. Koon is equally comfortable in concert, opera and musical theater repertoire. His specialties include French mélodie and Italian comic operatic roles.

He has sung with the Seattle Opera, Baltimore Opera, Milwaukee Opera Theater, Madison Opera, the Olympia Chamber Orchestra and the Aspen and Green Lake Music Festivals.

Dr. Koon previously taught at Olympic College and Pierce College in Washington State and in the University of Wisconsin system.

He holds Bachelor in Music degrees in voice from the Peabody Conservatory, a Master of Music degree from the Cincinnati College-Conservatory and a Doctor of Music Arts degree from the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

The event is free, and the public is invited to attend.