U. sets 'Robertson Concert'

The University of Utah music department looks to the future in training musicians and composers, but it also looks to the past in preserving those connections.

"Like the ones that we have with Leroy Robertson," said Robert Walzel, chairman of the U. music department

"It is part of what we do," he explained, "and a meaningful part of our mission. And so the Robertson concert is a special time for us, as a music school, to remember our roots and remember where we came from."

The "Robertson Concert," as it is called, occurs every two years. According to Walzel, it's a chance for students and the general public to hear Robertson's music. "Leroy Robertson is an internationally respected composer. His music is performed still all over the world. We think it's important that someone who was such an important leader for our school of music, and such a wonderful composer from the state of Utah, that we have an opportunity and obligation to keep his music alive in performance."

The two big pieces on the program are Robertson's "American Serenade" for string quartet and Mozart's Clarinet Quintet, K. 581. There will also be a song cycle, "Three Songs from the Shadow," and two instrumental pieces —Sonata No. 6 for Two Treble Instruments and Keyboard, and "Lullaby from the Rockies."

The American Serenade, said Walzel, is a very big and challenging work, written for string quartet. "It's a piece that you don't get to hear very often because, for one thing, it's so difficult. So it's just a great opportunity to hear that music."

The work was originally premiered by the Roth String Quartet in 1945 and has enjoyed popularity in North and South America, and Europe. On Monday, the performers will be Utah Symphony concertmaster Ralph Matson, his wife, Barbara Scowcroft, on violin, Scott Lewis on viola and John Eckstein playing cello.

"The 'Three songs from the Shadow' are going to be performed by one of our really outstanding students, Tyler Nelson," Walzel said. "Jeffrey Price will be the pianist for those, but those are really interesting and fun songs, and Tyler will do them beautifully, absolutely beautifully."

Flutist Susan Goodfellow, violinist Jean Bradford and pianist Norene Emerson will present the sonata.

This work is a collaboration between colonial composer Giovanni Gualdo, who had only left indications for the bass line and harmony, and Robertson, who wrote a piano part to complete the work for modern performance.

The "Lullaby from the Rockies" will follow, a work based on a Ute Indian melody that Robertson transcribed during visits to the Ute tribe.