August 30, 2002
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Portland, Ore. … Chamber Music on Tap, the popular Oregon Symphony chamber music series that presents four-star music in a brew pub setting, opens its sixth season with the Ethos String Quartet on Wednesday, Sept. 18, at 6 p.m. in the Heritage Room at BridgePort BrewPub. Chamber Music on Tap, sponsored by BridgePort Brewing Company, is presented by Fortissimo, the Symphony's young professional volunteer organization. The BridgePort BrewPub is located at 1313 N.W. Marshall.
Symphony Assistant Principal Viola Charles Noble, Heather Blackburn (cello), Denise Huizenga (violin) and Tylor Neist (violin) comprise the Ethos String Quartet, which has been called "a combination of ambition, commitment and intensity" (The Oregonian). This Portland-based ensemble has deep roots in the musical community of Oregon and the Pacific Northwest. They have been regular performers at Chamber Music on Tap; their last concert was in September of 2002 when they performed works by Barber, Beethoven, Dvorák and Mozart. The program for this concert will include: the Haydn Quartet in F minor, Op. 20, No. 5 (complete); the Beethoven Quartet in F major, Op. 75 "The Harp" mvts. II and III; and the Tchaikovsky Quartet in D major, Op. 11, mvt. I or the Dvorak Quartet in F major, Op. 96 "American," mvt. I. The group also will be joined by Mara Lisa German (viola) and Phil Hanson (cello) for the Brahms Sextet.
Chamber Music on Tap is held every third Wednesday of each month from September through May. The concerts provide audience members the opportunity to interact with musicians and socialize while sampling the brewery's homemade pizza and handcrafted, award-winning ales in the pub's unique building, a 100-year-old former rope factory.
Tickets are $6 for Fortissimo members, $10 for the general public and may be purchased in advance at the Oregon Symphony Ticket Office (923 S.W. Washington), Monday through Saturday, 9 a.m. to 5 p.m., or charged by phone at 503-228-1353 or (800) 228-7343. Tickets also may be purchased at the door, if available. All proceeds from the evening benefit Fortissimo.
Heather Blackburn, a founding member of the Ethos Quartet, is an active chamber musician and educator throughout the Pacific Northwest. Heather has performed with many Northwest summer festivals including the Sunriver Music Festival, Cascade Festival of Music (Associate principal cello), the Ernest Bloch Music Festival (Bloch Composer's Symposium Quartet), and the Oregon Bach Festival. Heather has also been a featured performer with the De Rosa Chamber Players "Wednesdays in Spring" Series.
As an educator, she has coached chamber music with Samuel Sanders and Earl Carlyss and presented seminars on the Bach Cello Suites at the Evergreen Music Festival (Olympia, WA), and the Max Aronoff Viola Institute (Seattle, WA). Ms. Black burn has also held teaching positions at the Multnomah Arts Center in Portland and Salisbury State University in Maryland.
Ms. Blackburn holds degrees from the Peabody Conservatory and Washington State University, where her primary teachers included Stephen Kates and Christopher von Baeyer.
Denise Huizenga, a founding member of the Ethos Quartet, made her fall 2000 debut as a soloist with The Oregon Symphony after four seasons as a violinist with the ensemble. In addition to her commitment to The Oregon Symphony, Ms. Huizenga is also a member of Portland's foremost contemporary music group, the Third Angle New Music Ensemble. Ms. Huizenga's former experience has included the position of associate concertmaster in the Fort Wayne Philharmonic Orchestra in Indiana and performances with the Freimann String Quartet.
An avid chamber musician, Denise was a semi-finalist in the 1997 Fischoff National Chamber Music Competition as a member of the Mendota String Quartet. As a result, the group was invited to perform at Minneapolis' Orchestra Hall for the Juilliard Quartet. In 1999 the Mendota Quartet were artists in residence at the "Ives the Commuter" conference in New Jersey, where they were critically acclaimed for their "stimulating level of excitement and clarity of line". The group also performed in master classes for such renowned artists as Janos Starker, Samuel Rhodes and the Lark Quartet.
Charles Noble, a founding member of the Ethos Quartet, joined the Oregon Symphony as Assistant principal violist in 1995, serving as Acting principal for one season. Charles was a winner of the 1993 Seattle Ladies Musical Club Competition, and he received the 1995 C.D. Jackson Award by a faculty vote during his second summer at the Tanglewood Music Center. In 1995, Mr. Noble received the Israel Dorman String Prize at the Peabody Conservatory of Music, where his most influential teachers included Roberto Diaz, Michael Tree, Joseph dePasquale, Joyce Ramée, and William Watson.
Mr. Noble's chamber music studies include a Graduate Fellowship at the University of Maryland with the Guarneri Quartet, and coachings with Leon Fleisher, Earl Carlyss, Norman Fischer, Ron Thomas, and Julius Levine. As a soloist, Mr. Noble has performed Bach's Brandenburg Concerto No. 6, Mozart's Sinfonie Concertante, and Joseph Castaldo's Viola Concerto with the Oregon Symphony and appeared with the Chico Symphony, Vermont Youth Orchestra, Tacoma Youth Symphony, and the Portland Youth Philharmonic. Mr. Noble's recital credits include the Mt. Angel Bach Festival, the Ernest Bloch Festival, and the Cascade Festival of Music.