Front Range Piano Quartet to Perform at UW May 14

The University of Wyoming Department of Music will present the Front Range Piano Quartet at 7:30 p.m. Wednesday, May 14, in the Buchanan Center for the Performing Arts recital hall. The concert is free and open to the public.

The Front Range Piano Quartet features UW Department of Music Professor Theresa Bogard, piano; Karen Becker, cello; Glêsse Collet, viola; and Erik Peterson, violin.

For its inaugural season, Front Range Piano Quartet has introduced audiences to new works as well as treasured gems of the piano quartet repertoire. The UW recital program will include Brazilian/American composer Clarice Assad’s “Z Sonata” and American composer Paul Schoenfield’s energetic, jazzy and ever-popular piano trio “Café Music.”

Bogard is a dynamic, versatile performer dedicated to expanding the canon of traditional piano repertoire. Her extensive discography includes recordings ranging from solo piano to chamber music collaborations, from music of living composers to her specialty in fortepiano and historical performance practice.

As a recipient of a coveted Fulbright grant, Bogard explored her interest in historical performance practice and fortepiano studying at the Royal Conservatory of The Hague in the Netherlands. That same year, she was a top prizewinner in the International Mozart Fortepiano Competition in Bruges, Belgium.

Peterson was a member of the Colorado Symphony for 29 years, as well as many other American orchestras, and continues to perform with the Ivy Street Ensemble, Canto Deo Choir and Colorado Bach Ensemble.

He has performed in the great concert halls of Europe as principal second violinist of the American Sinfonietta on several international tours. An active teacher in the Denver metro area, Peterson has a large studio of talented violinists and also has taught for Colorado State University, Rocky Ridge Music Center, Denver Young Artists Orchestra and the Denver School of the Arts.

Peterson is dedicated to chamber music performance and promotion and community outreach.

Collet is an award-winning violist originally from Brazil. She served as principal violist with the Symphony Orchestra of Teatro Nacional de Brasília (Brazil) and has been a viola soloist with conductors Claudio Santoro, Osvaldo Colasso, Gerald Kegelmann, Piero Bastianelli, Elena Herrera and Claudio Cohen. She is a longstanding member of the critically acclaimed Quarteto de Brasília.

Becker is an active soloist and chamber player who has performed throughout the United States as well as in Europe, Mexico and Puerto Rico. She is a faculty artist with the Red Lodge Music Festival in Montana, the Omaha Conservatory of Music Institute and the Ameropa Chamber Music Festival in Prague, where she performed in several prestigious venues.

Becker tours regularly as a soloist and chamber player and is a member of Trio Nuovo. She is concertmaster of Lincoln’s Symphony Orchestra, as well as the Concordia String Trio. She is a former member of the Omega String Quartet, quartet-in-residence for Lutheran Music Program and former principal cellist for both the Ensemble Eduardo Melkus and the International String Orchestra. 

For more information, call Kathy Kirkaldie, UW Fine Arts coordinator, at (307) 766-2160 or email kirisk@uwyo.edu.