Sunday, April 17, 2011, 3 P.M.
Mount Vernon Music Hall
402 Leftwich at Yates, Mt. Vernon, TX
He will be joined by MVM Players and guest violist April Kondrat, performing Mozart’s Quintet for Horn and Strings, a one-movement Piano Quartet by Gustav Mahler and the famous Trio for Horn, Violin and Piano by Johannes Brahms.
This will be Geoffrey Winter’s second time performing for MVM audiences, having wowed listeners two years ago playing with the American Horn Quartet.
Geoffrey Winter is a member of the American Horn Quartet and serves as Principal Horn of the Beethoven Orchestra of Bonn, Germany. He grew up on Mercer Island near Seattle, Washington and started playing horn at the age of six. He attended the University of Washington and the University of Southern California, studying with hornists Vince Derosa, Jim Decker and Christopher Leuba. During his college years he performed with the Summer Wagner Festival Orchestra as well as the 5th Avenue Theater in Seattle.
His first professional appointment was for the position of Associate Principal Horn in the Municipal Symphony Orchestra of Caracas, Venezuela in 1982. Shortly thereafter he was awarded the 3rd Horn/Associate Principal Horn position with the Philharmonia Hungarica in Marl, in Germany. In 1988 he became Principal Horn of what was then called the Orchestra of the Beethovenhalle in Bonn.
Mr. Winter has won many solo and ensemble competitions in Germany and in countries around the world, with solo prizes in Markneukirchen (1988) and Munich (1989), and prizes as a member of the American Horn Quartet in Japan (1995), Belgium (1985) and Hungary (1984). His solo appearances have taken him throughout North and South America, Central and Eastern Europe, the Far East and Australia. In his chamber music activities he has toured the world, performing and teaching in Europe, North and South America, Japan, China, Australia and South Africa.
April Kondrat is Principal Violist with the Plano and Irving Symphony Orchestras and performs with the Dallas Symphony Orchestra and Dallas Opera Orchestra. She also performs chamber music with various ensembles including ProMusica, an organization dedicated to raising scholarship money for young musicians.
An avid music educator, Ms. Kondrat has a viola studio of twenty aspiring young musicians, and often provides master classes for local schools. For five years she was the Director of Education for the Plano Symphony, and developed programs designed for the youth of Collin County.
Ms. Kondrat created a musical experience for preschoolers that she has performed throughout the region at numerous bookstores, preschool programs and libraries. She attended the Eastman School of Music in Rochester, NY for her Bachelor of Music degree and earned her Master of Music degree at the University of Northern Colorado. Ms. Kondrat resides in Plano with her husband, Jeremy, Director of Bands at Plano Senior High School, and their three children.
Tickets are $10 for MVM members, $15 for non-members. Students are admitted free. (Children 8th grade and younger must be accompanied by an adult ticket holder.)
For more information call Mount Vernon Music at 903-563-3780, or visit www.mountvernonmusic.org.
