Tucson Repertory Orchestra will do something this weekend that it has never done in its dozen-year existence.
Instead of putting a 50-piece orchestra on the stage at Grace St. Paul’s Episcopal Church on Saturday, Aug. 26, and performing a behemoth symphony, the group will split into small ensembles for its first-ever chamber concert.
“A lot of (the musicians) wanted to do small ensembles but a lot of times they don’t have a place to play chamber music,” TRO’s founder and Music Director Toru Tagawa said. “We’re giving that opportunity to people (musicians and audience) who want that.
Tagawa started the TRO as a reading orchestra in summer 2011, inspired by his experiences with the National Repertory Orchestra training program in Colorado. For the first year, the musicians met once a month to practice and play a variety of repertoire.
In July 2012, the volunteer orchestra, whose members include retired and active professional musicians, educators and University of Arizona Fred Fox School of Music students, played its first concert. Since then, they have performed two or three concerts a year.
Tagawa, a violinist who teaches at Canyon del Oro High School and is the music director of the Sierra Vista Symphony, and his violinist wife, Laura, join a quintet that also features violist Emily Chao, cellist Marguerite Salajko and pianist Shu Ching Cheng to open Saturday’s program with Brahms’s Piano Quintet.
The concert’s second half will feature TRO’s Assistant Conductor Yudai Ueda leading small ensembles in Mozart’s Serenade No. 11 and Gipss’ “Seascape.” Featured performers include Lendanear Harmonie, flutists Mindi Acosta and Sierra Norris; Margot Schultz and Chris Zatarain on oboe and English horn; clarinetists Christie Blute and West Sansom; bassoonists Matthew Dutczak and Tamara Smith; and Eric Holm and Mary Monaghan on horn.
A brass quintet also will perform, Tagawa said.
Saturday’s concert begins at 3 p.m. at Grace St. Paul’s Episcopal Church, 2331 E. Adams St. Admission is free but donations are accepted online at tucsonrepertoryorchestra.org/donate. Details at facebook.com/TucsonRepertoryOrchestra.
