ARTS AND ENTERTAINMENT

Music @ St. Albans will present a classical music concert on Sunday, April 28, 2019 from 3:00 to 5:00 p.m. at St. Albans Episcopal Church in Davidson. The artists will be the Mannheim Rocket, an ensemble based in Northern Virginia that performs chamber music using authentic instruments and stylistic performance practices of the classical to early-romantic periods. Thanks to a generous grant from the Town of Davison, the Orchestra will also play a free concert at the Davidson Public Library the next day, April 29, at 2:30 p.m.  It will also put on a series of musical demonstrations at the Ada Jenkins Center that same day, beginning at 4:00, for elementary and middle school students participating in the LEARN WORKS program.

The public engagement exhibited by this series of concerts helps fulfill the mission of Music @ St. Albans to increase access to musical arts to residents of Davidson and the surrounding communities of Lake Norman. The concert series is supported by ticket sales and grants from the Arts and Science Council and the North Carolina Arts Council. M@SA puts on eight concerts a year on Sunday afternoons at St. Albans. It also presents house concerts once or twice a year in private homes. M@SA makes a special effort to showcase the talents of younger artists by featuring outstanding students from local classical music teachers in a young artists concert held before the main performance on Sunday afternoons. With the performances in April, M@SA is taking its music out of St. Albans church and into the community.

Other community outreach events have included its participation in the Davidson Culture Bites event held on the Green last August. At a recent Sunday concert, it partnered with DavidsonLearns to allow the performance musicians to talk to the audience about their instruments and careers. WDAV collaborates with M@SA to provide publicity spots, interviews with performers, and broadcast performances.

The Mannheim Rocket Orchestra owes its name to the Mannheim School of the latter half of the 18^th century and the compositional technique created there of including a swiftly ascending arpeggio into the melodic line of an orchestral piece. The Orchestra has been performing as a period ensemble since 2013.

Music @ St. Albans has been producing concerts once a month on Sunday afternoons in St. Albans Episcopal Church since 2004. The organization was formed originally as a ministry of St. Albans Episcopal Church, but for at least five years, it has been an independent 501c3 corporation with its own Board of Directors and Musical Director. It presents a highly varied musical program through its concert year, with performances from artists representing Celtic, bluegrass, jazz, classical, baroque, and gospel traditions.