One weekend, two major Cornell concerts

MOUNT VERNON – Cornell music ensembles will be joined by special guests for two major concerts this weekend in King Chapel. Both concerts are open free to the public.

The Cornell Chamber Orchestra will be joined by the professional Palisades Ensemble on Friday, April 25, at 7:30 p.m. Professor Martin Hearne directs the Cornell Orchestra and The Palisades Ensemble, comprised of Cornell faculty members and professional musicians from Eastern Iowa. The Palisades Ensemble will perform Gounod’s “Petite Symphony” and the Cornell Orchestra will perform Beethoven’s Symphony No. 2 in D Major.

Cornell Concert Choir and Chamber Singers’ Spring Concert is 3 p.m. Sunday, April 27. The choirs are under the direction of Lisa Hearne. Joyce Strabala is the piano accompanist. Joining the Cornell singers will be Solon High School’s Bella Voce, conducted by Joel Foreman, a 2005 Cornell music education graduate.

Bella Voce will open the concert with Eric Whitacre’s “A Boy and a Girl” and Moses Hogan’s “Elijah Rock,” before joining the college Chamber Singers for two pieces.

“Joel Foreman is distinguishing himself as an outstanding young director in the state, and we are excited to host his choir,” said Lisa Hearne.

Concert Choir and Chamber Singers will feature “Les Chansons des Roses,” by Grammy-award winning American composer Morten Lauridsen. Popular for its mystical, sensuous sounds, Lauridsen’s cycle of five Rainer Maria Rilke poems has become one of the world’s most-performed works.

Hornist Joni Rice, senior, and baritone Matt Roberts, junior, both music performance majors, will be soloists in works from “Cantos Alegres” by Paul Basler.

Roberts will also be featured soloist in the American spiritual “Let Me Fly.”

Senior Ruby Skarin is soprano soloist with Chamber Singers for Alice Parker’s spiritual “By An’ By.” Their set includes a Renaissance madrigal, a Palestrina motet, and Randall Stroope’s “I Am Not Yours” on poetry by Sara Teasdale.