Chamber music coming to Robbinston

ROBBINSTON – Chamber music soon will be a part of the summer offerings in this small village.

Sponsored by the Robbinston Historical Society and the Harald Saeverud Chamber Music Program, this is the second summer concert series, and it begins at 7 p.m. Thursday, July 19. Concerts also are scheduled for Thursday, July 26; Sunday, July 29; and Monday, July 30. The concerts will be held at the historical society’s Grace Chapel.

“What could be more exciting or stimulating than chamber music played by a top-notch group in a venue such as our society’s 125-year-old church,” Carol Hollingdale, the society’s vice president said in a prepared release. “The acoustics of our former summer colony chapel are outstanding, and the musicians are world-class.”

Two years ago when the group held its last concert series and summer music camp, more than 200 concert lovers attended, and the series raised more than $1,000 for the historical society and its visitor center, Bob Henkel, director of the historical society, said.

Two of the four Robbinston concerts will be played by the Nor’easter String Quartet, four musicians who also are members of the Bangor Symphony Orchestra, the press release said. The quartet will play on July 26, and their music will include works by Haydn, Borodin, Saeverud and Biss. At the July 29 concert their program will include works by Debussy, Haydn and Saeverud.

The first concert begins at 7 p.m. Thursday, July 19, with a solo violin performance by Trond Saeverud, a Robbinston resident, who is the founder and artistic director of the Harald Saeverud Chamber Music Program. Norwegian composer Harald Saeverud was Trond’s grandfather.

All four concerts will include music composed by Harald Saeverud. “I always wanted to include some of my grandfather’s music,” the grandson said in the release. Also this year, Trond Saeverud said his grandfather’s 20 duets for two violins would be played in the last three concerts. In the first concert, Trond Saeverud will play his Elegy for solo violin.

The concert series will conclude at 7 p.m. Monday, July 30, when students attending the summer music camp held in Robbinston by Trond Saeverud will play their final “graduation” program at the chapel. Eight students, 12 to 15 years old from Southwest Harbor, Eastport, Perry and Machias, will attend the camp and make up two string quartets for their final performance.

Saeverud is concertmaster of the Bangor Symphony. He conducts the orchestra at the University of Maine at Farmington and heads the newly formed Passamaquoddy Bay Symphony Orchestra in Washington County. He is a member of the Robbinston Historical Society.

Other members of the quartet are Lynn Brubaker of Machiasport, who is co-concertmaster at the Bangor Symphony; Laura Gallucci, a Bangor music teacher and freelance musician; and cellist Marisa Solomon of Bangor.

Suggested donation is $10. The Grace Chapel is located on Route 1 in North Robbinston next to the historical society’s visitors center.