Tuesday, February 7, 2012

ACE tapped for NY festival


The Atlantic Chamber Ensemble, organized last year by members of the Richmond Symphony and other performers and teachers in Central Virginia and Hampton Roads, has been named ensemble-in-residence for this summer’s Lake George Music Festival in the Adirondacks of New York.

ACE, whose members include violinists Susanna Klein and Ross Monroe Winter, violist Kimberly Sparr, cellist Jason McComb, double-bassist Fred Dole, flutist Ann Choomack, oboist Shawn Welk, clarinetist Ralph Skiano, bassoonist Martin Gordon, French horn player Deb Fialek and pianist Maria Yefimova, will stage its own concerts and mentor and perform with students, who come to the festival from some of the leading American conservatories. Alexander Lombard, the festival’s executive director, said the ensemble’s “talent, ambition, and innovation” made the coming residency “exactly the association we were looking for.”

The group next performs locally with Amaranth Arts Dance and guest violinist Jeanine Wynton at 4 p.m. Feb. 19 at First Unitarian Universalist Church, 1000 Blanton Ave. at the Carillon. Tickets are $15. For more information, call (917) 414-3112 or visit http://www.acensemble.org/