Masterworks Chorale to present spring concert

Sally Rochotte, Toledo Symphony timpanist, will solo at the Mozart & More concert at 7:30 p.m. Saturday in the Franciscan Center.

The Hills — St. Michael’s in the Hills Episcopal Church, to be exact — will come alive with the sound of music at 8 p.m. Saturday when Masterworks Chorale presents its spring concert. Artistic director Donna Tozer Wipfli will conduct a program titled All Things French, German and Italian.

A huge play list is in store with works by Maurice Durufle, Claudio Monteverdi, Rossini, Orlando di Lasso, and Palestrina, among others. Highlights will be Gregorian chants on which Durufle based his Requiem. Classics to be sung include J.S. Bach’s ‘‘Jesu, Joy of Man’s Desiring,’’ Franz Schubert’s ‘‘An die Musik,’’ and Johannes Brahms’ ‘‘How Lovely is Thy Dwelling Place’’ from his German Requiem.

Tickets are $20-$25 in advance or at the door of the church, 4718 Brittany Rd. in Ottawa Hills.

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Sally Rochotte, the Toledo Symphony’s ace timpanist, will step out front to play the premiere of Georg Druschetzky’s Timpani Concerto at Mozart and More 3, 7:30 p.m. Saturday in the Franciscan Center at Lourdes University, Sylvania. Resident conductor Jeffrey Pollock will lead the program.

How rare it is: Although timpanists are essential to the orchestral sound, there are few solo works written for them. Perhaps that’s because of the limited tonal range of the huge drums. The work on the program, in C Major, is one of two by Druschetzky, an 18th-century composer. It features six drums tuned to G, A, B, C, D, and E.

Rochotte, who has been with the symphony for 19 years, has a master’s degree from the Cleveland Institute of Music. With the orchestra, she has performed many other works from the limited timpani solo repertoire.

Also on the program will be three works by Mozart: Overture to La Betulia liberata and symphonies No. 32 and 36 (Linz).

Tickets are $30-$35 at www.toledosymphony.com or 419-246-8000.

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The annual Toledo Symphony Youth Orchestra Side by Side concert is at 4 p.m. Sunday in the Toledo Museum of Art Peristyle. Members of the symphony sit in with players in the Symphonic and Philharmonic groups. On the program to be conducted by Kenneth Thompson and Wasim Hawary will be music by Holst, Moussorgsky, Dvorak, and Brahms.

The highlight of the concert will be performances by the three winners of the Young Artists Competition. Led by Maestro Pollock and accompanied by the orchestra, soloists will be violinist Zachary Brandon, 14, playing a movement from Prokofiev’s Violin Concerto No. 2; violinist Valerie Peng, 16, playing two movements of the Glazunov Violin Concerto, and cellist Isabel Kwon, now a freshman at the University of Michigan, performing the first movement of the Shostakovich Concerto No. 1.

Following their performances, the young winners will each be presented with a check for $500 from the Toledo Symphony League, which sponsors and organizes the annual contest. Tickets are $10 and are available at the door or in advance at 419-246-8000.

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It will be a busy week at Bowling Green State University, where a special concert at 8 p.m. March 21 will offer music for seven bassoons played by regional musicians. A single work, Michael Gordon’s Rushes, will be performed by the septet of double reed players in Bryan Hall of the Moore Musical Arts Center. John J. Pearse will conduct the program group.

ADJective New Music LLC is presenting the event, a first hearing at BGSU of this 2011 work commissioned by the New Music Bassoon Fund of Dana Jessen, a Michigan native and San Francisco bassoonist. Admission is free.

Leading up to the bassoon blast, the BGSU University Men’s Chorus is to perform sacred and secular music at 3 p.m. Sunday in First United Methodist Church of Perrysburg, 200 W. Second St. Admission is free.

Winners of the BGSU Chamber Music Competition are to perform at 7:30 p.m. Tuesday in the Manor House of Wildwood Preserve Metropark. Wednesday’s Faculty Artist Series will feature pianist Thomas Rosenkranz in Bryan Hall at 8 p.m. Both are free.

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A rare chance to see and hear Monteverdi’s L’Orfeo, one of the earliest operas in a setting consistent with its 1607 premiere, is on tap this weekend at the Toledo Museum of Art Cloister. A cast of University of Toledo singers, dancers, actors, and musicians will perform the work at 7 p.m. Friday and 2 p.m. Saturday and Sunday.

Attendance is free but seats are limited. To reserve a seat, call 419-530-2452.

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Sax Fourth Avenue will perform at a 3 p.m. Sunday concert in the Musical Arts Series at Firelands Presbyterian Church, 2626 E. Harbor Rd., Port Clinton. This popular saxophone quartet will play arrangements of works by J.S. Bach, Danny Elfman, and George Gershwin, among other pieces.

The quartet, formed in 1991, comprises musicians from the region and plays across the musical spectrum, including works it commissions. Tickets for this concert are $15 at the door. A reception will follow.

Items for News of Music should be sent to svallongo@theblade.com at least two weeks ahead of the event.