Presidential Chamber music series returns

The Presidential Chamber Music Series returns with fully live performances for the fall 2021 semester. The NMT Performing Arts Series presents the New Mexico Bach Society performance at 7:30 p.m. Thursday, Sept. 30, at the Macey Center auditorium.   The concert will also be live-streamed on NMTPAS’s Facebook & YouTube channels.

The four annual concerts in this series are sponsored by New Mexico Tech President Stephen G. Wells, and all shows in the series are free to attend.  NMT’s Covid safety requirements at Macey Center include providing proof at the door of vaccination or a negative Covid test within 7 days of the performance, wearing a mask and providing contact tracing info.

Some facets of life change rapidly, becoming popular and then disappearing, the victims of public fads or changing technology. Others, like time-honored art and music, last for years and even centuries, a testament perhaps to humanity’s search for the eternal. Such is the genre of classical music. Johann Sebastian Bach is one of the earliest and best-known musician/composers, having lived in Germany during what is called the Baroque period. Music lovers don’t need to know much about the times or the music to enjoy this concert, as notes and explanations will be given during the performance.

The program will feature two instrumentalists (piano and flute) and four singers performing cantatas (narrative pieces of medium length) and arias (solos) as well as instrumental works. The vocal selections for the evening are from music Bach wrote while he was in charge of music at St. Thomas Church in Leipzig, Germany. These include pieces from his “Passions,” telling the story of Jesus’s betrayal and crucifixion.

The New Mexico Bach Society is comprised of New Mexico musicians who are members of the New Mexico Performing Arts Society. The statewide non-profit brings high-quality performances to venues around the state and also trains young performers.

Thursday’s concert will be directed by Franz Vote, who has been called the “singer’s director” and who has led concerts in the Metropolitan Opera and collaborated with such prominent operatic artists as Luciano Pavarotti and Placido Domingo.

Musicians include Linda Marianiello, flutist, who has formed chamber music groups in Munich, Chicago and New England and taught at universities Yale and Cornell, and in Wisconsin, Illinois and China. She also is the executive director of the NMPAS.

New Mexico Tech’s Chamber Music Series began over 30 years ago, as the vision of Adam Gonzalez, faculty in the NMT Music Program under Director Michael Iatauro. Supported by then-President Laurence Lattman, the program continued to be funded by President Daniel H. Lopez and now by President Stephen G. Wells.  In addition, this year’s Presidential Chamber Music Series concerts are also supported by the Susan Miller Memorial Endowment.

For more information about this and other PAS concerts, visit nmt.edu/pas or call 575-835-5688.