Egg Harbor, Wis. (November 9, 2022) – The Peninsula Music Festival’s Winter Chamber Music Series, February Fest, will return to the Donald and Carol Kress Pavilion in Egg Harbor on the Sundays of February 5, 12, and 19, 2023. Performances begin at 2:00pm and will last one hour. Tickets NOW ON SALE, with only 100 seats available per concert, so reserve your seats today by calling PMF’s Box Office at (920) 854-4060 or visit www.musicfestival.com.
Kicking off the 3-concert Series on February 5 will be two esteemed members of the Festival Orchestra – Alex Ayers (violin) and Paul Hauer (violin, piano) in a unique and exciting program featuring Mozart Sonatas for Violin and Piano in E minor and A major; Glière’s Violin Duets, Op. 49 Nos. 7-12; Konsert Caprice over Norse Melodies by Halvorsen; Bartók’s Romanian Folk Dances, and Caprice Basque, Op. 24 by Pablo de Sarasate.
Alex Ayers (violin) is a native of Wisconsin and has played violin with the Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra since 2013. Alex studied at Indiana University with Mimi Zweig and Alex Kerr. He has performed collaboratively with Joshua Bell, Alex Kerr, Jaime Laredo, Gilles Apap, and Soovin Kim at IU. Alex was a member of the Indiana University String Academy’s Violin Virtuosi ensemble for two years, performing in the group’s concert tours to France and Argentina. He has played at the Castleton Festival under Lorin Maazel and currently plays in the Peninsula Music Festival Orchestra every summer. Alex received an honorable mention in the 2015 ASTA National Solo Competition; was a semifinalist in the 2010 WAMSO Young Artist Competition; the 2009 Lennox Young Artist Competition and was the grand prize winner of the Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra’s Stars of Tomorrow Competition in 2006.
Paul Hauer (violin, piano) joined the Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra in the fall of 2016. Solo concerts have brought Mr. Hauer to the countries of Germany, Greece, France, the Czech Republic, and the Philippines. Chamber music and orchestral concerts have brought him to Italy, San Marino, Singapore, Mexico, and China. Before moving to Milwaukee, he was Principal Second Violin of the Evansville Philharmonic Orchestra and performed regularly with the Indianapolis Symphony Orchestra and the Louisville Orchestra.
Mr. Hauer traveled to Athens in May of 2015 to participate in the 4th Leonidas Kavakos International Masterclass. One month earlier, he performed the Sibelius Violin Concerto with the Springfield Symphony Orchestra. Other honors include winning the Indianapolis Matinée Musicale Collegiate Competition in 2013, which resulted in a performance at the Indiana Landmarks Center with pianist David Keep. In the summer of 2011, he toured Europe with the Denver Young Artists Orchestra as the
soloist for the Barber Violin Concerto. While serving as teaching assistant to Addison Teng, he performed and taught lessons with the Teng Studio on their international tours. He is a founding member of the Fulton Chamber Players, a classical music ensemble uniting world-class artists to present exceptional programs.
Mr. Hauer’s first violin lessons were with Gloria Schroeder and Ferenc Fenyő, and studied afterwards with Stéphane Tran Ngoc, Carol Leybourn, and Catherine Walby through the Lawrence Academy of Music. Hauer received his degrees from Oberlin Conservatory and Indiana University’s Jacobs School of Music, and his principal teachers include Addison Teng, David Bowlin, and Alex Kerr. As a teacher, Mr. Hauer is on faculty at the Fulton Summer Music Academy, and coaches strings at the Milwaukee Youth Symphony Orchestra and Maranatha Baptist University. Mr. Hauer is a native of Fond du Lac, Wisconsin, and performs with the Peninsula Music Festival each summer.
The February 12 concert welcomes back Festival Orchestra Principal Horn Richard Britsch and Principal Pianist Christi Zuniga. Both are excited to be returning to Door County this Winter to collaborate on a program featuring Mozart’s Horn Concerto No. 3 in E-flat and Sonata No. 14 in C minor, Franz Strauss Horn Concerto in C minor, Mendelssohn’s Six Songs Without Words, and the Horn Concerto No. 1 by Richard Strauss.
Richard Britsch (horn) Peninsula Music Festival’s principal horn, Richard Britsch has been coming to beautiful Door County every August since 1992. He occupies the Drs. David and Margaret Thompson principal horn chair of the Grand Rapids Symphony. He came to Michigan from the Sarasota Symphony, the Southwest Florida Symphony of Ft. Meyers, and the Florida Orchestra of Tampa Bay. He performs regularly with the Detroit Symphony Orchestra and has performed as guest principal horn with the Milwaukee Symphony, the Toledo Symphony and Taegu City Symphony in Taegu, Korea. He also toured with London’s Royal Philharmonic Orchestra.
Rick received his education at the University of South Florida in Tampa where his primary teacher was Ralph Froelich. He has participated in the Southern Illinois Music Festival, the Florida Music Festival, American Institute of Musical Studies in Austria, and the Sewanee Summer Music Center. As a soloist, Rick has performed with the Southern Illinois Music Festival, Peninsula Music Festival, Southwest Florida Symphony and Sarasota Symphony. He has been a soloist with the Grand Rapids Symphony on several occasions for its Richard and Helen DeVos Classical Series and for its Great Eras Series in St. Cecilia Music Center.
Rick was a founding member of the Florida Wind Quintet and the Emerald Brass. The Emerald Brass has concertized and given master classes all over the United States and won First Prize in both the Fischoff National Chamber Music Competition and Summit Brass/Yamaha International Brass Competition. Their compact disc, Jewels, is a collection of the group’s favorite music not originally written for brass ensemble.
Rick is senior affiliate professor of horn at Grand Valley State University, where he is a member of the Grand Valley Brass Quintet and the Grand Valley Winds, both which concertize and give master classes all over Michigan. The Grand Valley Winds traveled to the Czech Republic in 2018 to present concerts and master classes in conjunction with an annual festival celebrating the music of composer, Leos Janacek.
Previously, Rick was a faculty member at Cornerstone University, Calvin University, Grand Rapids Community College, and he has taught at the University of Tampa. He also has been on the faculties of the American Festival for the Arts in Houston, Texas; Luzerne Music Center in upstate New York’s Adirondack Park; and Manatee Community College in Bradenton, Florida.
Christi Zuniga (piano) has been Principal Keyboardist with the Omaha Symphony Orchestra since 2000, is a native of Atlanta, Georgia and earned her Bachelor of Music degree in Piano Performance from Clayton State University, where she studied piano with Jeannine Morrison. She received a
Master of Music degree in Chamber Music and Accompanying from the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia, where she studied with Vladimir Sokoloff and Keiko Sato. She has previously performed with the Atlanta Symphony, the Charleston Symphony, and the Curtis Symphony Orchestra, which served as the resident orchestra of the Evian International Music Festival in France in 1990, under the leadership of Mstislav Rostropovich.
Before coming to Omaha, Zuniga was the staff accompanist and class piano instructor at Clayton State College, south of Atlanta. In addition to regular engagements with the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra, she also performed with fellow orchestra members and accompanied Atlanta Symphony Chorus rehearsals. Since 2016, Christi has served as Principal Keyboardist with the Peninsula Music Festival in Door County, WI.
As an accompanist, she has worked with performers in master classes taught by Jean-Pierre Rampal, Yo-Yo Ma, Isaac Stern, Lynn Harrell, Elly Ameling, David Gordon, Peter Lloyd, Bonita Boyd, and Paula Robison. She has collaborated with many visiting artists, including Joseph Alessi, Thomas Bacon, Patrick Sheridan, Cindy Ellis, and Peter Verhoyen.
In addition to her full-time position with the Omaha Symphony, Ms. Zuniga accompanies musicians in and around Omaha for various concerts and competitions. She resides in Ralston, Nebraska with her husband and their Chihuahuas.
The final concert on February 19 will feature Washington Island native, virtuoso, and recipient of PMF’s 2019 George Verheyden Memorial College Scholarship – Jonathan Bass. Jonathan just returned from an intensive musical semester abroad in Paris and will dazzle with an all-French program showcasing Rameau’s Gavotte et six doubles; Fauré’s Thème et variations, Op. 73; Ravel’s Sonatine; Île de feu II by Messiaen; Images, Series II by Debussy, and Chaminade’s Caprice Impromptu Op. 153.
Jonathan Bass (piano, winner of PMF’s 2019 George Verheyden Memorial College Scholarship) is currently a senior at Lawrence University in Appleton, WI, where he studies primarily with Dr. Michael Mizrahi and Bill Carrothers. Jonathan has been named a winner in numerous competitions,
including the Lawrence Concerto Competition, Miroslav Pansky Memorial Concerto Competition, and Wisconsin MTNA Competition. A recipient of the Marjory Irvin Prize and the Margaret Gary Daniels Keyboard Performance Award, Jonathan also holds a Lawrence University Accompanying Fellowship and has collaborated extensively in both the choir and opera departments. In addition to his solo playing, Jonathan performs regularly in both chamber music and jazz combo settings, and frequently accompanies both singers and instrumentalists across campus. Jonathan is a graduate of Interlochen Arts Academy where he studied with Dr. Michael Coonrod and is also an alumnus of numerous summer music festivals, including Birch Creek, Rocky Ridge, Brevard, and the Decoda Chamber Music Festival, for which he was awarded a full-tuition fellowship.
Jonathan made his orchestral debut in 2019, performing the first movement of Rachmaninoff’s second piano concerto with the Birch Creek Symphony Orchestra. Dedicated to expanding the repertoire of music performed regularly by pianists, Jonathan recently helped create a modest database focused on chamber works with piano by contemporary and historically underrepresented composers and has given multiple world premieres of new music.
Jonathan began his musical education on Washington Island at age three, taking lessons from Diane Kahlscheuer, and is extremely grateful for the unfailing support that Door County has shown him ever since.
Reserve your seats today!
$75 Series Subscription (only available for purchase via phone)
Single Tickets – $30
Students/Children – $10; any Series, any seat, any time!
For reservations call (920) 854-4060, or visit us online at www.musicfestival.com.
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