The Sampler Concert Series makes its debut Monday, August 21, with a concert by Dr. Diana Seitz, violin. The free event starts at 7:00 p.m. at the Lee Dam Center for Fine Art, Marysville.
The concert is sponsored by the Marshall County Arts Cooperative.
“For several years we’ve talked about sponsoring a concert series that was shorter in length than traditional concerts,” said Brad Ekiss, president of the arts cooperative. “These concerts will be less than an hour and have the potential to travel throughout the county. Dr. Seitz’s performance will christen this series.”
Seitz will perform works for solo violin by Johann Sebastian Bach, Heinrich Ernst, and John Corigliano. She will perform three original hymn arrangements: “Great is Thy Faithfulness,” “Take My Life and Let it Be,” and “Amazing Grace.”
The concert will follow the history of solo violin performance.
“I plan to speak before every piece about what it means to me and how it reflects the history of violin performance,” Seitz said.
One of the pieces on the program is a variation on a famous Irish song, “The Last Rose of Summer.”
“That one was written during the Romantic era of music history,” she explained. “It is incredibly beautiful and has all of the bells and whistles that we violinists love to entertain our audiences with.”
Seitz made her debut as a soloist with a chamber orchestra in Moscow, Russia at the age of nine. She received her bachelor’s degree in violin performance from Tchaikovsky Moscow Conservatory. Forced to flee her homeland due to severe ethnic persecution, she continued her studies in the United States at the University of Oklahoma where she received her master’s degree in violin performance and her Doctor of Musical Arts.
Currently, Seitz is an assistant professor of applied violin at the University of Texas Rio Grande Valley in Edinburg, Texas. She is also the associate concertmaster of the Valley Symphony Orchestra.
“I am looking forward to this very much and hope that the audience will enjoy my concert as much as I am enjoying getting ready for it,” she said.
For more information about the concert people may contact Ekiss at 785-562-7728.
