Spokane Symphony to present a Classical Celebration!

Dec 7, 2005

For Immediate Release

Contact: Annie Matlow 326-3136

SPOKANE: The rare December Classics concert A Time for Hope will feature music of celebration on Dec. 16 at 8 p.m. at the Spokane Opera House. Maestro Eckart Preu and the Spokane Symphony will be joined by four harpsichordists and an organist to create this classical celebration!

.The concert will celebrate the splendor and drama of Baroque music, with three of the most sonically spectacular works of J.S. Bach and Handel. Interestingly, the two Bach works are both arrangements of works originally conceived for other instruments: Bach's own arrangement of a Vivaldi violin concerto and Leopold Stokowski's transcription of a beloved Bach organ work for a massive modern orchestra. The program concludes with an equally splendiferous work: Camille Saint-Sns' iridescent Organ Symphony, in which the organ becomes an exotic color addition to the orchestra.

To make this celebration a reality, Maestro Preu has asked four fine keyboardists to join him. They are Bonnie Robinson, Keith Thomas, Linda Siverts and Greg Presley will play the rarely performed dramatic Bach Concerto in A minor for four Harpsichords. Robinson will also be the organist for the Saint-Sns' Symphony.

Greg Presley attended high school in Spokane, and studied piano with Margaret May Ott. He was a winner of many local, state, and regional competitions, including the Young Artist Award of the Spokane Music Festival, and the Washington State Music Teachers Association and Northwest Region Music Teacher's National Association High School Competition.

He graduated cum laude from Yale University and received special honors in music. His teachers at Yale were Arlene Portney and Donald Currier. Josef Raieff was his teacher at the Juilliard School where he received the William Petschek Award and a competitive teaching fellowship.

After receiving his Master of Music degree, he made a career of making music for modern dance, working at the schools and companies of Martha Graham and Alvin Ailey, and as a professor in the dance department of Florida State University. While at FSU in Tallahassee, he performed frequently on stage and composed many works for dance.

He has appeared as piano soloist with the Spokane Symphony, the Yale Symphony, and the Washington-Idaho Symphony. Since his return to Spokane, he has been the principal pianist for the Spokane Opera, concretized frequently with Kendall Feeney and Jody Graves in piano ensembles, given many solo recitals and chamber music recitals, and taught piano at Eastern Washington University and for the past four years at Gonzaga University.


Bonnie Robinson has been involved in music since she began accompanying church hymns on the accordion at age seven. Presently, she is principal organist at First Presbyterian Church of Spokane, and enjoys accompanying the Whitworth Choir and the Whitworth Women's Choir. Bonnie has also been the principal organist at Whitworth Community Presbyterian Church and taught piano at Holy Names Music Center.

Since receiving a Bachelor of Music from the Wheaton College Conservatory of Music in Piano Performance (1973), Bonnie's musical pursuits have ranged from performances with the Pittsburgh Symphony's principal cellist, Ann Martindale Williams, to sharing a piano bench and much laughter with Margie May Ott in living rooms throughout Spokane.

Linda Siverts, principal keyboard player with the Spokane Symphony since 1983, has appeared as soloist under the batons of Gunther Schuller and Fabio Mechetti. She has been featured soloist with Connoisseur Concert's Northwest Bach Festival and with regional orchestras. She has performed solo piano recitals in Spain, Germany and Australia. In 1998, she was named individual artist of the year by the Spokane Arts Commission.

Siverts has taught on the music faculties of Whitworth College, Gonzaga University and South Eastern Oregon University where she collaborated with Heifitz protg violinist Sherry Kloss. She has been master class pianist for Jean-Pierre Rampal, Lynn Harrell, and Frederika von Stade.

For many years she was pianist for the Spokane Symphony Chorale and regional Metropolitan Opera auditions. She has given numerous pre-concert talks for the symphony and has toured with symphony percussionists for the Washington State Arts Commission. She has appeared as lecturer and adjudicator statewide for the Washington State Music Teachers Association.

Currently she is an artist teacher at Holy Names Music Center where she also coaches honors chamber music students with violinist Garnik Goukasian. She likes to spend her spare time on the Pend Oreille River with her husband, Spokane firefighter Tony Yuen.

Keith A. Thomas is Principal Oboist of the Spokane Symphony, a position he has held since September 1992. A native of New Haven, Connecticut, he holds a Master of Music from Yale University, a student of Ronald Roseman and a Bachelor of Music, from the Eastman school of Music, a student of Richard Killmer. Thomas also holds the position as organist at The Cathedral of Our Lady of Lourdes. Thomas has served as principal oboist for the Colorado music festival 1996 and played for the Connecticut Chamber Orchestra before moving to Spokane.

During his years in Connecticut, he was Organist and Director of Choirs at the Plantsville Congregational Church, and upon coming to Spokane, became Organist for the Emmanuel Lutheran Church in Spokane, a position he held for several years before taking his present post at Cathedral of Our Lady of Lourdes.

Underwriters for this concert are Catherine and Pete Moy with Windermere Valley.

Tickets range from $15 to $35 and are available at the Spokane Symphony Ticket Office, 818 W. Riverside, Suite 100 or 509-624-1200; all Ticketswest Outlets; 509-325-SEAT; 1-800-325-SEAT and at www.spokanesymphony.org