KINGSTON, R.I. – September 28, 2011 – If you love the sound of brass, don’t miss the first concert of the 2011-2012 University Artist Series at the University of Rhode Island on Sunday, Oct. 16. Guest Faculty Artist Gabriel Langfur with special guest trombonist Bruce Tychinski, assistant professor of low brass, University of Delaware, will offer a program that highlights the amazing versatility of the trombone and is being performed in Delaware and at Boston University in addition to the URI date. Pianist Julie Nishimura will accompany.
The concert will be held at 3 p.m. in the URI Fine Arts Center Concert Hall, 105 Upper College Road, Kingston. Admission is $10 general public, $5 students, with tickets available at the box office starting 45 minutes before the show. A masterclass by Tychinski will follow, starting between 4:30 and 5 p.m.
The concert will feature jazz-influenced works by Charles Small and Richard Peaslee and much more. Langfur says, “Peaslee’s Arrows of Time, which Bruce is playing, is a very popular virtuoso showpiece for the modern trombonist. David Gillingham, whose bass trombone sonata I’m playing, is an important composer in the world of concert bands, and his love of science fiction comes through clearly in his melodic but also highly chromatic music. Bruce is also playing Improvisation No. 1 for Solo Trombone by Enrique Crespo, which is an avant-garde tour-de-force. These pieces are all charged and exciting, and we balance that with Eric Ewazen, who writes highly melodic, very tuneful music emphasizing all the lyricism we’re capable of.”
Langfur is bass trombonist for the Rhode Island Philharmonic and Vermont Symphony Orchestras, and performs frequently with the Boston Symphony and Pops, the Boston Ballet Orchestra, the Boston Modern Orchestra Project, and Opera Boston. He has performed many solo recitals in the eastern U.S. and on recordings with numerous symphony orchestras and ensembles. He gave the premiere of Raymond Premru’s That Time of Year for bass trombone and marimba on the Dame Myra Hess Series at the Chicago Public Library, broadcast on National Public Radio. In 2005, he premiered Aaron Berkowitz’ Concerto for Bass Trombone and Ensemble with noted contemporary ensemble Alarm Will Sound directed by Alan Pierson. He also performed as a guest for that ensemble’s debut at Carnegie Hall. He was a member of the Orion Trombone Quartet, First Prize winners at the 1989 Coleman Chamber Music Competition in Pasadena, California.
In addition to a busy freelance performing career, Langfur is managing director of the Chameleon Arts Ensemble of Boston and Artist Representative for the S. E. Shires Company, a leading manufacturer of custom brass instruments. Besides teaching at URI, he is Lecturer of Bass Trombone at Boston University’s College of Fine Arts, and has served on the faculties of the Longy School of Music, Brown University, the Vermont Youth Orchestra Association and Boston Youth Symphonies.
Tychinski has performed as a soloist and chamber musician throughout the United States and internationally. He has toured Europe three times as a soloist and conductor and recently performed as a member of the William Cramer Trombone Choir at the International Trombone Festival. Also an active clinician in the Northeast, he has recorded with many orchestras, chamber groups and jazz ensembles. He is principal trombonist of the Gulf Coast Symphony in Biloxi, Mississippi, and is a member of the Nittany Trombone Quartet and the Washington Trombone Ensemble. He has also performed with orchestras in the south and midwest, the Eugene Opera and many others, as well as with many well-known popular artists.
At the University of Delaware Dr. Tychinski teaches applied lessons on trombone and
euphonium, directs the trombone choir and UD Slides jazz trombone ensemble and teaches low brass methods. He holds Bachelor and Master of Music in Trombone Performance degrees from Penn State University and the Doctor of Musical Arts in Trombone Performance degree from the University of Kansas. Prior to his appointment at the University of Delaware, Dr. Tychinski taught at the University of Southern Mississippi, St. Norbert College and the University of Northern Iowa.
Pianist Julie Nishimura has been a guest artist at more than 30 college campuses. She has performed in the chamber music series of Carnegie Hall’s Weill Recital Hall, the Philadelphia Orchestra and the Delaware Symphony Orchestra, and is a perennial favorite at the Delaware Chamber Music Festival and California Summer Music. At Strings International Music Festival, she has given recitals with cellists Hai-Ye Ni and John Koen, violinist Carrie Dennis, contrabassist Harold Robinson and violists Choong-Jin Chang and Rachel Ku. Highlights of her recent season include recording solo piano works by Stephen Holochwost for Albany Records; vocal music of African-American women composers with a UD faculty artist, soprano Marie Robinson; horn and piano works by Paul Basler with hornist Cynthia Carr; and performing as guest artist at Yale University, Ball State University and the University of Virginia.
A native of San Francisco, Nishimura began her piano studies at the age of seven with Alla Sviridoff. Subsequent studies were at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music, the New England Conservatory and the Longy School of Music. Celebrating 21 years as faculty accompanist for the University of Delaware Department of Music, Nishimura has performed more than 350 collaborative recitals and 40 opera and scene-study performances with their Opera Workshop and Opera Theatre. As secondary faculty, she also teaches sight-reading at the keyboard and accompanying/chamber music.
The URI Concert Hall is handicap-accessible, and parking is available in the lot behind the Fine Arts Center, off Bills Road. For more information, please contact the URI Department of Music, 874-2431, or check the website: www.uri.edu/music.