University News
WIU Music Faculty To Perform In The Quad Cities
February 19, 2001
 WIU music faculty Kevin Nichols and John Vana will perform a concert at 7 p.m. Saturday, March 10 at the Butterworth Center in Moline, IL. Faculty assistant Jenny Perron will also perform at the concert. |
MACOMB, IL John Vana, Kevin Nichols and Jenny Perron , members of Western Illinois Universitys music department, will perform a concert at 7 p.m. Saturday, March 10 at the Butterworth Center in Moline, IL.
The concert will begin with "Tableaux de Provence" composed by Paule Maurice. Other pieces to be performed include "Divertimento" by Akira Yuyama, "Six Studies in English Folk Song" by Ralph Vaughan Williams, "Two Movements for Marimba" by Toshimitsu Tanaka, "Sonata, Opus 29" by Robert Muczynski and "Crossroads Songs" by Evan Chambers.
Vana, Nichols and Perron will perform again at 7 p.m. Friday, March 16 at the Quad City Arts Center. Both concerts are open free to the public. For more information call 309/298-1544.
The concerts are partially sponsored by Musical Instrument Reeds International, Inc. The March 16 concert is also sponsored by the Quad City Center for the Arts.
Vana earned a masters degree in saxophone performance from the University of Michigan. He has recorded for composer William Albright and with the San Francisco Quartet, of which he is a former member. He has presented recitals and master classes at the New England Conservatory, the University of North Texas, Interlochen Arts Academy, McGill University in Montreal, Quebec and the National Taiwan College of Arts in Taipei, Taiwan. Vana has also presented the world premieres of works by award-winning and noted composers John Harbison, Larry Thomas Bell and Gunther Schuller. Vana is an associate professor of music in saxophone at WIU.
Nichols, assistant director of bands at WIU, directs the Jazz Band and one of the percussion ensembles at Western. He is also the drumline instructor/arranger for the Marching Leathernecks. During the summer months, he has been a percussion instructor and jazz band director for WIU Summer Music Camps. He is the director of the Central Illinois Youth Percussion Ensemble in Peoria and has directed both concert and marching percussion ensembles throughout Illinois. Nichols holds masters degrees in jazz pedagogy and percussion performance from Northwestern University. He has performed with the Peoria Symphony Orchestra, the Galesburg Symphony Chorus, the Central Illinois Jazz Society Big Band and colleague John Murphy and the John Murphy Trio.
Perron earned her masters degree from the University of Montreal and her doctoral degree from the Eastman School of Music. She has performed extensively in Canada and the United States. Her recitals have been broadcast on Radio-Canada and National Public Radio. She has worked as a collaborative artist with several renowned teachers at the Eastman School of Music and prestigious competitions in the United States, Canada and France. Additionally she has received scholarships and prizes from Le Conseil de Arts du Quebec, the Canadian Music Competition, the Bucknell University Quartet program, Le Centre dArts Orford, McGill University and the Eastman School of Music. In June 2000 Perron performed in Carnegie Hall in New York for former WIU saxophonist Adam Pendleton . Perron is a faculty assistant at Western Illinois University.
Posted By: University Communications (U-Communications@wiu.edu)
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