Osuga, Omagari in return concert

Orchestra will perform original compositions

Staff report

YOUNGSTOWN

The annual New Music Festival will take place Friday, Saturday and April 24, with returning guest artists Thomas Osuga, pianist, and Sho Omagari, violinist.

The duo will give three concerts Friday at area Catholic schools: St. Nicholas in Struthers, St. Joseph the Provider in Brier Hill and St. Patrick in Hubbard.

On Saturday, the two musicians will give a recital at 7 p.m. at First Congregational Church in Jefferson, Ashtabula County.

The festival will culminate in a gala concert at 4 p.m. April 24 at Sts. Peter and Paul Church, Holy Apostles Parish, at 421 Covington St., near downtown. The concert will feature “Suite for String Orchestra” by guest composer Matthew Saunders, performed by the Festival Chamber Orchestra.

Saunders is chairman of the music department at Lakeland Community College and directs the Lakeland Civic Orchestra. Before moving to Cleveland, he was director of bands at Oklahoma Panhandle University.

The Festival Chamber Orchestra also will perform Gwyneth Rollin’s “Impressions for String Orchestra.” Originally a piece for violin and piano, she transcribed it for string orchestra especially for the festival.

A graduate of the University of Calgary and Indiana University, Rollin taught at the Dana School of Music at Youngstown State University for more than 35 years. She has contributed her acumen and energy to the New Music Guild, sponosor of the festival, for many years.

The Festival Chamber Orchestra will also play the area premiere of Robert Rollin’s “African Images for String Orchestra.” Robert composed the original version under the title “Images of Africa” for the late violinist Walter Mony, who premiered it in several countries around the world.

Robert transcribed it for violin and string orchestra and recorded the new version with the Kiev Philharmonic Orchestra and Mony as the soloist.

The festival orchestra will also play Robert’s “In Memoriam, Walter Mony,” a tribute to his friendship with the late Mony.

Osuga was a music theory and composition student of Robert Rollin, Dana professor emeritus and the coordinator of the New Music Guild.

Osuga has been on the faculty of New York City’s Mannes College of Music since 1994. He and his wife, Dana alumna Li Chen Hwang Osuga, maintain a large private piano studio in Manhattan.

An internationally acclaimed solo and chamber artist, Osuga is founder and artistic director of Aurista Chamber Music, a flexible ensemble known for its metropolitan New York City performances.

He has served as co-chairman of the piano preparatory department at Mannes, has been an organizer and faculty member at international music festivals in Italy and Germany, and presently coordinates concerts at the Puffin Foundation in Tea-neck, N.J.

Omagari, a Germa-born violinist, began performing at age 5 and studied with Osuga at Mannes. Omagari has a bachelor’s degree from Mannes College, master’s from the Juilliard School of Music, and is working on his doctorat at the State University of New York at Stoney Brook.

He was the first recipient of the Circle of Wind Music Scholarship Award created in memory of the victims of 9/11 and the 3/11 Japan Earthquake.