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ASU Trumpet Professor to Present Recital

January 31, 2011

Dr. John Irish, associate professor of trumpet at Angelo State University, will perform a recital on Monday, Feb. 7, in the ASU Carr Education-Fine Arts Building, 2602 Dena Drive.

The 7:30 p.m. recital will be in the EFA Building’s Eldon Black Recital and is open free to the public. Irish will be joined by Tarleton State University music faculty members Dr. Cara Pollard on trumpet and Dr. Leslie Spotz on piano.

Irish and Pollard will present music for trumpet in solo and duet settings, including two solo pieces by Belgian trumpet virtuoso and composer Theo Charlier. Four movements from “Toot Suite” by French jazz pianist and composer Claude Bolling will also be featured.

Also on the program will be works from the Baroque for two trumpets, duets from the modern era by Poulenc and Delibes, as well as a work for two trumpets by Rafael Mendez. Two pieces from the jazz repertoire will be performed with accompaniment by a jazz trio.

An 11-year ASU faculty member, Irish also holds the principal trumpet chair with the San Angelo Symphony Orchestra and is a founding member of Jazz Concho, made up of local jazz musicians. He recently returned from Taiwan and Australia, where he performed a solo recital and took part in a trumpet ensemble at an international conference where three world premiere performances of works by Australian and American composers were presented.

Pollard is an active recitalist in addition to her duties at Tarleton State. Prior to coming to Tarleton, Pollard was a visiting assistant professor at Texas Tech University. She performed in the Festival of Trumpets at the International Trumpet Guild Conference in Harrisburg, Pa., in 2009 and in Sydney, Australia, in 2010. In 2004, she performed in the Buenos Aires Festival Internacional de Musica.

Spotz is a 50-year veteran pianist and has made solo performances at Moscow University’s Tchaikovsky Hall, South Bank Center of London, the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C., and the Academy of Music in Philadelphia. She has also toured Germany, played concerts in Italy at the Lorenzo de’Medici Institute and performed at the inauguration of Philadelphia’s Kimmel Center.

For more information, call the ASU Department of Art and Music at 942-2085.