2019 Concerto Competition Winners Take Center Stage Sunday

April 11, 2019

In one of the DePauw University School of Music’s most anticipated events of the year, winners of the annual Concerto Competition will take center stage as soloists with the University Orchestra on Sunday, April 14. The concert, conducted by the orchestra’s music director Orcenith Smith, will be given at 4 p.m. in Kresge Auditorium of the Judson and Joyce Green Center for the Performing Arts, 605 S College Avenue.

This year’s outstanding student soloists, in order of appearance: senior violinist Katherine Allen from Chicago, will perform Ravel’s bold Tzigane; junior Amelia Smerz from Downers Grove, Ill., will play Elgar’s Cello Concerto in E Minor (Mvt. IV); senior Lindsey Welp of Jasper, will perform Tomasi’s Concerto for Alto Saxophone (Mvt. I); junior Connor Locke, a mezzo-soprano from Riverside, Mo., will sing“Nobles seigneurs, salut!” from Meyerbeer’s Les Huguenots; and sophomore Abigail Foehrkolb, from Saint Louis, will play Séjourné’s Concerto for Marimba (Mvt. I). Tenor David Young of League City, Texas, will then present two songs from Richard Strauss’s Vier Lieder, and soprano Amalia Crevani, a sophomore from Milford, N.J., will follow with the enchanting doll song, “Les oiseaux dans la Charmille” from Offenbach’s opera Les contes d’Hoffmann.Sunday’s program will conclude with Tatsuya Katsuhara, from Tokyo, Japan, performing the first movement of Tchaikovsky’s majestic Piano Concerto No 1.

The contest, which is held in collaboration with the DePauw School of Music, includes two rounds of competition in late February. This year’s preliminary round, judged by DePauw music faculty, consisted of 36 entrants performing in the categories of voice, string instruments, brass, percussion, and woodwinds. Those musicians selected for the final round performed again two days later adjudicated by judges from outside DePauw. The students who scored the highest total points in the final round were selected as winners.

“We applaud all of these students’ hard work,” said Professor Smith, coordinator of the annual competition, “and the continuing work of their teachers as we present this year’s winners.”

General admission to the 2019 Concerto Winners’ Concert is $5. Tickets for seniors, children and all students, are free, thanks to season sponsors Judson and Joyce Green. To obtain tickets online, visit depauw.edu/music. The venue’s box office also is open for in-person purchases Monday through Friday from noon to 4 p.m. and 90 minutes prior to each ticketed performance.

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