Concert 1
Thursday, October 5, 2023
Concert 7:00 pm
(new start time!)
Reception 6:00 pm
Concert Lineup
Click here for the concert program.
Download and print your own.
Brahms – Academic Festival Overture
Elgar – Pomp & Circumstance March No. 1
Donald Grantham – Everyone Sang
(composed in commemoration of the Schreiner Centennial)
-Haley Dove Montoya, soprano soloist
Lalo – Cello Concerto in D Minor.
-Qizhen Liu, cello soloist
CONDUCTOR’S NOTES
Institutions of higher education have long been associated with great symphonic music, and for our first concert of the 2023-2024 season, the Symphony of the Hills celebrates the Centennial of Schreiner University, our host and co-sponsor for our 22-year history. In addition to the academic side of training musicians, colleges and universities regularly commission composers to write music for their celebrations, including some of the great composers like Johannes Brahms. Of course, one of the most famous pieces heard at most school graduations is the trio section of Sir Edward Elgar’s Pomp and Circumstance Military March No. 1, first used as such by Yale University in 1905. The military tenor of this work make it even more significant given Schreiner University’s history as a military institute.
To celebrate their Centennial, Schreiner commissioned internationally known composer Donald Grantham to write a work for soprano and orchestra. Everyone Sang will be premiered at a free campus performance on September 18, and repeated for the Symphony of the Hills subscribers at our first concert of the season on October 5. Haley Dove Montoya will perform the soprano solo featuring Siegfried Sassoon’s poem of the same name that is enshrined on a wall at The Hague.
The final work on this celebratory program is the passionate cello concerto of Eduard Lalo, performed by symphony principal cellist, Qizhen Liu. Dr. Liu has strong academic credentials, including a doctorate in music from, yes, Yale University.
QIZHEN LIU
Cellist Qizhen Liu has performed throughout North America, Europe, and Asia as a solo, chamber, and orchestral musician. Qizhen is a prizewinner in the 2015 Kansas City Music Club Competition, 2014 MTNA Young Artist String Solo Competition, 2014 Sigma Alpha Lota Competition, 2012 Sorantin International String Competition, and Internationaler Jugendmusikwettbewerb in Ehigen, Germany. She has appeared in Fontainebleau Music Festival (France), Zephyr Chamber Music Festival (Italy), Schleswig Holstein Music Festival (Germany), Morningside Bridge Music Festival (Canada), Aspen Music Festival, Music Academy of the West, Kneisel Hall Chamber Music Festival, and Sarasota Music Festival in USA.
Qizhen has been the principal cellist of the Symphony of the Hills since 2018. Meanwhile, she is a member of the San Antonio Philharmonic.
In addition to her performing, Qizhen currently teaches at University of Incarnate Word. She has also taught as adjunct instructor of cello at Ottawa University, as faculty member at Morse Music Academy at Yale School of Music, as teaching assistant at Casalsmaggorie Music Festival in Italy, as teaching artist at Music Bridge Program at University of Missouri, Kansas City Conservatory of Music, and Aspen Music Festival P.A.L.S. Summer Education Department.
Qizhen Liu holds a BM in Cello Performance and BA in German Studies at Bard College. She earned a graduate degree of music from Yale School of Music and a Doctorate of Music Arts from University of Missouri, Kansas City.
Haley Dove Montoya
Haley Dove Montoya, lyric soprano, has been performing classical music since 2000. A native of Seattle, WA, Haley received her Bachelor of Arts degree in Music/Vocal Performance from Whitworth University in Spokane, WA, in 2004, and her Master of Music degree in Music/Vocal Performance from the University of Colorado, Boulder, in 2012. She has had the honor of performing roles in opera, music theater, works with symphony orchestra, oratorio, in concert series, and as a recitalist. Alongside performing, Haley has taught private voice lessons since 2003, and applied voice at Schreiner University since 2017. Haley is currently the Music Director of traditional worship at Kerrville First United Methodist Church and appreciates singing and directing a variety of musical styles. She loves spending time with her husband Ben and their two children, Elias, and Isla.
Donald Grantham
Composer Donald Grantham is the recipient of numerous awards and prizes in composition, including the Prix Lili Boulanger, the Nissim/ASCAP Orchestral Composition Prize, First Prize in the Concordia Chamber Symphony’s Awards to American Composers, a Guggenheim Fellowship, three grants from the National Endowment for the Arts, and First Prize in the National Opera Association’s Composition Competition. His wind ensemble music has been recognized with three first prize awards in the NBA/William D. Revelli Composition Competition, and with two first prize awards in the ABA/Ostwald Band Composition Contest. His music has been praised for its “elegance, sensitivity, lucidity of thought, clarity of expression and fine lyricism” in a Citation awarded by the American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters. His works have been performed by the orchestras of Cleveland, Dallas, Atlanta and the American Composers Orchestra among many others, and he has fulfilled commissions in media from solo instruments to opera. His music is published by Piquant Press, Peer-Southern, Warner Bros., G. Schirmer and E. C. Schirmer, and many of his works have been commercially recorded. Grantham resides in Austin Texas and is Frank C. Erwin, Jr. Centennial Professor of Music at the University of Texas at Austin. With Kent Kennan, he is coauthor of THE TECHNIQUE OF ORCHESTRATION (Routledge).
