The Bradley community tuned in on Nov. 4 for the first faculty recital of the year, “Music Among Friends.” Held in the Dingeldine Music Center, the recital featured three professors from the Bradley Music Department.
Over the course of the two-hour event, Kyle Dzapo, Aaron Wilbert and Chee Hyeon Choi played a combination of trio pieces and solo pieces from the baroque to 20th century on piano, flute and oboe.
Dzapo, the flute player and music history professor, and Wilbert, the oboe player and music professor, both said they were planning for a collaborative event.
“I’ve always wanted to play a program with Aaron, the oboist, so he chose the duos,” Dzapo said. “He narrowed down the trio sonatas to a couple and then I chose the Quantz from those, and then the Dring has always been a piece that we’ve loved and so we wanted to do that together.”
The songs for the show were “Trio Sonata in C Minor, QV 2: Anh, 5” by Johann Joachim Quantz, “Concertstück” by Joachim Andersen, “The Secret Garden of Arirang” by Heeyoung Yang, “Three Romances for Violin and Piano, Op. 22” by Clara Schumann and “Trio for Flute, Oboe, and Piano” by Madeleine Dring.
The songs, besides for the ability of playing with others, were picked with consideration of diversity and inclusivity.
“We programmed the second half of the performance [with pieces] composed entirely by female composers,” Choi, an assistant professor, said. “So we not only presented pieces by well known male composers, but the audience should know some of the pieces were written by women as well.”
Choi joined in on piano for the performance. She learned to play as her family was involved with a church that used music in their service, naturally her family sang and played instruments. Her aunt was teaching piano lessons for the church, who ended up teaching Choi how to play the instrument.
Meanwhile, Dzapo and Wilbert both started their musical journey in sixth grade. Dzapo was attracted to the sound of the flute, but Wilbert wanted an instrument that stood out from the rest of the band, so he opted for an oboe.
The Department of Music has more performances planned for the rest of the fall semester. Information can be found on its website.
