Mike Strickland Trio with Elizabeth Strickland

Jazz Trio October 3, 2009
First Church of God, Red Bluff

Pianist/composer Mike Strickland is one of the Northwest's most popular performers and concert artists. As a solo performer, or with his duo, trio, or quartet, Mike presents a hybrid of jazz, popular, and original music.

A gifted arranger and stylist, Mike's eclectic concert sets might include jazz classics, romantic film themes, Mississippi blues, piano-busting boogie-woogie, and gorgeous original music. His extremely popular arrangements and recordings of Pachelbel's Canon in D, Windmills of Your Mind/Classical Gas Medley, and Beethoven's Ode To Joy have been best-sellers on Apple iTunes and audience favorites at concerts.

Bella Sorella

Soprano Ensemble November 17, 2009
First Church of God, Red Bluff

Bella Sorella – Nova and Susanna Jiménez (sopranos) with piano and violin accompaniment – is an award-winning vocal ensemble that combines classical and contemporary styles in melodic duets like nothing you've ever heard. Bella Sorella lays a bedrock of operatic method underneath a patina of classical, pop, and Broadway sounds, seamlessly combining the likes of Queen, Puccini, and the Broadway hits of Bernstein in one show. Bella Sorella will perform musical arrangements by acclaimed composer, arranger, and Bella Sorella's new music director, Ed Goldfarb. They will also be accompanied by accomplished violinist, Joyce Lee.

Bella Sorella’s ethereal music, magnetic stage presence and remarkable personal story has earned them acclaim and recognition throughout the United States and abroad. With music that spans more than 300 years and seven languages, Bella Sorella has dazzled audiences in live performances, and on television and radio. Trained at the renowned New England Conservatory of Music in Boston, MA, the duo breaks the soprano mold: Bella Sorella is young, beautiful, charming and has voices to match. Their personal story is as compelling as their voices are beautiful. They have been best friends since their first days at college, and they married brothers, hence the name Bella Sorella, or "Beautiful Sister." Bella Sorella was named the 2007 Vocal Group of the Year at the 17th annual Los Angeles Music Awards in Hollywood California and the 2007 Independent Vocal Group of the Year by the Hollywood F.A.M.E. Awards at the world famous Whisky a Go Go.

BONUS CONCERT: North State Symphony Holiday Concert

Symphony Orchestra December 19, 2009
State Theatre, Red Bluff

Come join us as we celebrate the season with holiday favorites! We will be joined by the Red Bluff Masterworks Chorale, directed by Mark Franklin.

Program:
Orchestra and Chorus
For Unto Us a Child is Born - from Handels' Messiah
Jesu, Joy of Man's Desiring - Bach
Hostia - from Saint-Saens' Christmas Oratorio
Instrumental Highlights
Brandenburg Concerto #4 - Bach (with Kyle Wiley Pickett and Yael Ronen, flutes, and Terrie Baune, violin)
Canon and Gigue - Pachelbel

La Catrina Quartet

Chamber Music February 18, 2010
First Church of God, Red Bluff

Founded in 2001, the La Catrina Quartet has a triple mission: to work closely with living composers in order to promote the performance of new music, to promote Mexican and Latin-American art music, and to perform the masterworks of the string quartet repertoire. Its members have played as soloists with a variety of orchestras in Mexico and the United States and given recitals in Japan, England, the United States, and Mexico. Currently the Quartet-in-Residence of the Western Piedmont Symphony and the Chamber Music Festival of San Miguel de Allende, Mexico, the La Catrina Quartet has already given multiple world premieres of works written for them, such as Our Hands Were Tightly Clenched, a string quartet by composer Zae Munn.

California Guitar Trio

Guitar Ensemble March 10, 2010
State Theatre, Red Bluff

With a whirlwind of instrumental styles fusing classical, rock, blues, jazz, world music, progressive, as well as the quintessential California musical genre surf music, the California Guitar Trio's stunning virtuosity and sly sense of humor have earned them an enthusiastic following and wide notoriety, with significant crossover in the progressive, acoustic and classical music scenes.

North State Symphony

Symphony Orchestra May 16, 2010
State Theatre, Red Bluff

The North State Symphony was created in 2001 from the merger of the Chico and Redding Symphonies. The musicians of the orchestra include professionals and community members as well as students and faculty members of California State University, Chico. The origins of the North State Symphony can be traced back to 1905, when the first orchestra formed at what was then the Chico State Normal School. Thus 2005 was celebrated as the 100th anniversary of symphonic music in the North State area.

Program:
Haydn: Lo Speziale Overture
Lowell Liebermann: Clarinet Concerto (Jon Manasse, clarinet)
Dvorak: Symphony No. 8