his concert showcases the tremedous talent of the Grand Junction Symphony Orchestra musicians. Stravinsky and Strauss harken back to an earlier time even though they were both 20th century composers. Enjoy the musical dialogue between all four talented soloists in Haydn's Sinfonia Concertante.

Aryn Day Sweeney
Aryn Day Sweeney, principal oboe of the GJSO, was a prizewinner at the 2005 Barbirolli International Oboe Competition. A recipient of a prestigious Frank Huntington Beebe Foundation Fellowship, she received a Solo Artist Diploma from the Royal College of Music in London. She also holds a Doctor of Musical Arts degree from the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, a masters degree from Rice University in Houston, Texas and a bachelors degree (Cum Laude) from the University of Southern California. Her primary teachers have been Nancy Ambrose King, Robert Atherholt, Allan Vogel, Neil Black, and John Anderson.

Dr. Sweeney has performed with several prominent artists including Zubin Mehta, Jeffery Tate, Peter Schrier, and members of the Dallas and Houston Symphonies, and the Cleveland Orchestra. As well as giving solo recitals throughout the United States and England, she was recently a featured performer on CBC Radio 2. Dr. Sweeney has been a member of the Chicago Civic Orchestra, Windsor, Pymouth and Adrian symphonies, Orchestra X, Zephyr Wind Quintet, Orchestra Canton, the Debut Orchestra, and the American Youth Symphony. In addition, she has performed in the Sarasota Music Festival, Music Academy of the West, Hot Springs Music Festival, and the North Carolina School for the Arts International Music Program.

Being interested in scholarly research, she has had an article recently published in the International Double Reed Society Journal entitled “An Afternoons’ Conversation with Neil Black.” She teaches at Idyllwild Summer Arts Festival and has been on the faculties of Wayne State University, Wayne Community College, and currently on the faculty of Mesa State College in Grand Junction, where she lives with her husband, trumpeter Zach Enos, son Myles, and her three cats; Simone, Pixie and Jinx.

Carlos Elías
Carlos Elias has performed in solo recitals and in orchestras in the United States, El Salvador, Argentina, Bulgaria and Japan, and was the winner of the Biola University Concerto Competition in 1988 and 1989, and second place in the El Salvador Violin Competition in 1985. In 1986, he represented his country at the World Philharmonic Orchestra under the baton of Lorin Maazel. He has been a member of the Sendai Philharmonic Orchestra in Sendai (Japan), Pittsburgh Opera Orchestra, Erie Philharmonic, Wheeling Symphony Orchestra, and Assistant Concertmaster of the El Salvador Symphony Orchestra. He has participated in several music festivals, such as Congress of Strings, Aspen Music Festival (CO), Sarasota Music Festival (FL), Casals Festival (Puerto Rico), Affinis Music Festival (Japan), Western Slope Music Festival (CO), Corsi Internazionali di Musica (Italy), Raphael Trio Chamber Music Workshop (VT), and Music in the Mountains (CO).

He began his musical studies at the age of five at the National Center of Arts in San Salvador. After graduating from high school and coming to the United States, he graduated Magna Cum Laude from Biola University in California, obtaining a bachelors degree in violin performance. He earned his masters degree from the University of Cincinnati, College – Conservatory of Music and an Artist Diploma from Duquesne University in Pittsburgh. Among his teachers are Elizabeth Holborn, Mark Baranov, Valentin Stefanov, Won Bin Yim, and Hong-Guang Jia. He has also played in several master classes given by Ruben Gonzalez, Augustín Leon Ara, Dorothy Delay, Andrés Cardenes, Jacques Israelievitch, David Kim, Malcolm Lowe and Sylvia Rosenberg. He is currently Director of Strings/Orchestra at Mesa State and Concertmaster of the Grand Junction Symphony Orchestra. He and his wife, pianist Andrea Arese-Elias, gave their New York debut at Weill Hall in Carnegie Hall on March 28, 2002. Carlos Elias plays a 1985 violin by the late American maker Sergio Peresson.

Gregory Cukrov
The American bassoonist, Gregory Cukrov, began his studies on the bassoon at the age of 19. He began early bassoon studies with Harold Goltzer of the New York Philharmonic, and thereafter was accepted as student of Mr. Goltzer’s at the Manhattan School of Music in New York City, where he received his bachelors and masters degrees in music performance.

Mr. Cukrov played principal bassoon in the Jackson (Mississippi) Symphony Orchestra and the symphony woodwind quintet, and in 1983 moved to Europe and further his career as soloist where he met the late Denise de Vries-Tolkowsky, founder and directrice of the Foundation she created to aid musicians. Mr. Cukrov was given a scholarship, and encouraged to develop a career as soloist. He has participated in festivals in France, Belgium, Croatia, India, and as an active recitalist, has performed on stage and television in most European countries as well as in North America and Asia. He has received rave reviews from an enthusiastic press where ever he has performed, both as soloist with orchestra and in recital.

Mr. Cukrov was invited to perform at the Cartier Foundation in Paris in their concert series, Les Soirées Nomades, and toured India playing a series of concerts with orchestra and with piano. Since 1993, he has been member of the Quintet Anacrouse, in Paris. The quintet has performed frequently throughout France, and has recorded three CDs including of his arrangements.

Cameron Law
J. Cameron Law received his bachelors degree with University Honors and Academic Distinction in Cello Performance from Colorado State University in 1986. He completed his masters degree at the University of Michigan in 1990 where he was awarded a Music Fellowship and served as a Graduate Teaching Assistant. Mr. Law has performed as the Assistant Principal Cellist of the Fort Collins and Cheyenne Symphonies, and is currently the Co-Principal Cellist of the Grand Junction Symphony. He is also the cellist with the Mesa State College Faculty Piano Trio, and has performed with the Crested Butte Summer Music Festival.

Law has conducted the Grand Junction Symphony, the Colorado All-State String Orchestra, the New Mexico All-State Orchestra, the University of Wyoming’s Festival of Strings, and the Colorado State University Summer Music Camp Orchestra, and serves as the Camp Director for the CASTA Middle School String Camp. He was presented with the Grand Junction Chamber of Commerce Outstanding Educator Award in 1999.In 2002, he was named the Colorado String Teacher of the Year and received the Sylvan Excellence in Education Award. He has served as a clinician and adjudicator throughout Colorado, Utah, New Mexico, Wyoming, and North Dakota and has composed several pieces for school string orchestras. His piece Dorian Waltz was performed at the 2004 Midwest Band and Orchestra Clinic in Chicago. Mr. Law is currently the Director of Orchestras at Grand Junction High School and West Middle School and adjunct Cello Instructor at Mesa State College.

IGOR STRAVINSKY
b Oranienbaum, near St. Petersburg, June 5, 1882
d New York, April 6,1971

Tonight’s performance, beginning with Stravinsky’s Octet, highlights some of the remarkable individual talent within the GJSO.

The most famous composition of
Stravinsky’s so-called neoclassical period is arguably The Soldier’s Tale, composed in 1918; however, a number of other notable pieces were written in this style, such as: Ragtime, Pulcinella, and the Octet for Wind Instruments. The term “neoclassical” refers to a reversion to a simplified classical style, classical forms and smaller orchestrations. The Octet is scored for flute and clarinet, pairs of bassoons, trumpets and trombones. How this instrumentation came about is somewhat unclear. In Stravinsky’s Chronicles, he states: “I only began to write this music without knowing what form it would take. I only decided that point after finishing the first parts, when I saw clearly what ensemble was demanded by the contrapuntal material, the character and structure of what I had composed.” However later in his Dialogues, he indicated the following:

The Octour began with a dream, in which I saw myself in a small room surrounded by a small group of instrumentalists playing some attractive music. I did not recognize the music, thought I strained to hear it, and I could not recall any feature of it the next day, but I do remember my curiosity—-in the dream—-to know how many the musicians were. I remember, too, that after I had counted them to the number eight, I looked again and saw that there were playing bassoons, trombones, trumpets, a flute and a clarinet. I awoke from this little concert in a state of great delight and anticipation and the next morning began to compose the Octour.

The first performance of the Octet came about when Koussevitsky visited Stravinsky in order to heal bad feelings between the two resulting from a botched premiere of the Symphony for Wind Instruments, which Koussevitsky had conducted. Stravinsky agreed to present another piece in Koussevitsky’s Paris concert, but only if Stravinsky could conduct. The result was the first performance of the Octet, October 18, 1923, and the beginning of Stravinsky’s conducting career.

FRANZ JOSEPH HAYDN
b Rohrau, Austria, March 31, 1732
d Vienna, May 31, 1809

We now continue the showcasing of the talented GJSO member by presenting Haydn’s charming Sinfonia Concerante.

After Prince Nikolaus Esterhazy’s death in 1790 (where Haydn was employed for some thirty years), Haydn was invited to London by the famous impresario, Johann Peter Soloman to present a series of concerts of Haydn’s music. His arrival was initially greeted with acclaim and he was awarded a doctor’s degree from Oxford University. However, disillusionment soon set in and his compositional prowess came under scrutiny. A rival series to the Soloman Concerts, were the Professional Concerts who recruited Ignaz Pleyel, a pupil turned rival of Haydn’s, to engage in a kind of competition with Haydn’s Soloman Concerts. Pleyel presented a Sinfonia Concertante in January of 1792 to substantial public acclaim, a concert at which Haydn was in attendance. Salomon advertised a Sinfonia Concertante by Haydn to be performed that coming March. Haydn labored furiously to honor the impresario’s request, and the performance was a great success for Haydn and Soloman which led to the triumphant presentation two weeks later of the Surprise Symphony.

A holdover of the Baroque concertro grosso, the Sinfonia Concertante is a concerto for a group of instruments with orchestral accompaniment. It had long been a favorite of Pleyel’s Paris audiences, and may have developed a following in London with Pleyel’s arrival there. This is Haydn’s only substantive work of this type, but it neverthe- less shows elements of Haydn’s genius. The entrance of the soloists in the first Allegro is a surprise, as they enter before the opening orchestral tutti is completed. The slow movement has a reduced accompaniment in the orchestra, and gives the soloists ample opportunity for musical display. The typical Rondo of Haydn’s Finale contains a unique surprise: the violin interrupts the thematic material to perform a short cadenza, almost mocking an operatic recitative. Undoubtedly, this was an intentional solo for Soloman, who played the violin solo in the first performance.

RICHARD STRAUSS
b Munich, June 11, 1864
d Garmish-Partenkirchen, September 8, 1949

Perhaps inspired by Stravinsky’s neo-classical compositions, Richard Strauss also composed two lesser known suites in the neo-classical style. Dance Suite after Couperin is also a throw-back to an earlier age, in this case the French Court of the late 17th century. Its eight movements each combine two or more harpsichord pieces (in the case of the Gavotte – five pieces) of Francois Couperin (1668-1733) into one movement, the only exception being the final March which only uses one. Strauss followed Couperin’s musical material closely in the parts of the movements that he selected, resulting in longer movements in clear sectional forms.

This work was composed when Strauss was Director of the Vienna State Opera (1919-1924). Although intended as a concert suite, and more often heard as such, these dances were first performed as a ballet by dancers of the Vienna State Opera Ballet, choreographed by Heinrich Kroeller and conducted by Clemens Krauss, as part of the Carnival festivities in Vienna on February 23, 1923.