Annual Flute Ensemble Festival Announced

The annual Flute Ensemble Festival, featuring Filene Concert Series guest artist Mary Kay Fink, is scheduled Saturday, Nov. 15, in Filene Recital Hall.

A 1 p.m. concert will feature Mary Kay Fink, solo piccoloist of the Cleveland Orchestra, and Nicholas Underhill, pianist and composer. Tickets, available at the door, are $5 general admission; and $2 for students and senior citizens. At 2:30 p.m., a free master class is scheduled, and at 5:15 p.m., a free flute ensemble concert is planned. Jan Vinci, senior artist-in-residence at Skidmore, coordinated the event.

Participating ensembles include groups from Skidmore, the College of Saint Rose, the Central New York Flute Association, Schenectady County Community College, and Williams College, among others. The festival is made possible at Skidmore through the support of the Lincoln and Therese Filene Foundation of Boston.

Flutist Mary Kay Fink has been the Cleveland Orchestra piccoloist since 1990. She received a bachelor of music degree from Oberlin College Conservatory of Music and a master of music degree from the Juilliard School. In 1986 she won the National Flute Association Young Artist Competition and gave her formal debut recital in 1987 at Carnegie Recital Hall.

She appears frequently as a soloist with the Cleveland Orchestra and has also appeared as soloist with the Ohio Chamber Orchestra, the New Jersey Symphony, the Bismark Symphony, the Madison Symphony, and as a youth soloist with the Milwaukee Symphony.

She formerly was a member of the New Jersey and Madison symphonies, and performed as an extra with the New York Philharmonic on many occasions. She currently teaches at the Cleveland Institute of Music.

In Cleveland she is an active recitalist and chamber musician. In addition to standard repertoire, she has performed extensively on baroque flute as a member of the Cleveland Camerata and has regularly debuted new chamber works as a member of
the Cleveland Chamber Collective.

Pianist and composer Nicholas Underhill has performed solo recitals in New York, Boston, Chicago, Cleveland, and Rome. His numerous New York appearances include his 1985 debut at Carnegie Recital Hall, a 1987 performance at Merkin Concert Hall, and a June 1993 concert in Weill Recital Hall.

He has recently performed with the Cleveland Ballet, the Lakeside Symphony Orchestra under the direction of Robert Cronquist, the San Jose Symphony, and the Cleveland Ballet Orchestra under the direction of Dwight Oltman.

Underhill’s chamber music performances have included programs at the Strings in the Mountains Festival in Colorado, the Chautauqua Festival, and at the Cleveland Museum of Art. He performs regularly with his wife Mary Kay Fink and other members of the Cleveland Orchestra in the Cleveland Chamber Collective, of which he is a director and founding member.

Re-emerging as a composer within the last four years, Underhill’s recent commissions have been for the Cleveland Orchestra, the Ohio Music Teachers Association, the Cleveland Flute Club, and the Fortnightly Musical Club, among others. His works have been performed in Weill Recital Hall and at the National Flute Association, and have been recorded on Centaur.

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