"ENCUENTROS," AN EVENING OF MUSIC AND SPANISH DANCE, TO BE PRESENTED AT BARD COLLEGE ON WEDNESDAY, APRIL 28.

ANNANDALE-ON-HUDSON, N.Y.-"Encuentros," or encounters, an evening of music and Spanish dance, will be presented by The Bard Center at Olin Hall, Bard College, on Wednesday, April 28, at 8:00 p.m. Cellist Luis Garcia-Renart and pianist Todd Crow will perform selections from Bach, Albéniz, Granados, and de Falla, accompanied by Spanish dancing by Kati Garcia-Renart. The performance at Bard College is free and open to the public.

Luis Garcia-Renart titled this program "Encuentros" as it calls to mind the informal salons and parties in Spain at which ideas were aired and encountered in discussion. "I grew up listening to Bach and flamenco music," he says. "These were my father's loves." The performance is dedicated to the memory of Garcia-Renart's father, José Garcia Borrás, and marks the thirtieth anniversary of his death.

Kati Garcia-Renart says that at first she found the idea of dancing flamenco to Bach "bizarre, but as soon as I began to listen and improvise, I found that Bach and Spanish dance speak a similar language. From both a musical and a dance perspective, developing the choreography was a collaborative effort," she says. "My father [Luis] and I agree that if Bach were alive today he would approve of this new partnership."

The first time that the father-daughter ensemble performed a selection of Bach -continued- and flamenco together was last September, at a Bard concert celebrating the birthday of composer Joan Tower. With the success of that collaboration, the idea of a full-length program evolved. Todd Crow, with whom Luis Garcia-Renart has performed and collaborated since 1969, was happy to join the endeavor. Or as Kati Garcia-Renart puts it, "He was brave enough to except our invitation."

Works to be performed on April 28 are Suite No. 2 in D Minor and an Allemande and Courante from Suite by J.S. Bach; Evocación, El Puerto, and Rumores de la Caleta (Malequeña) by Isaac Albéniz, two Tonadillas and Intermedio "Goyescas" by Enrique Granados; and "Danza del Moninero" from El Sombrero de Tres Picos, "El Circulo Mágico" from El Amor Brujo, and Seis Canciones Populares Españoles by Manuel de Falla. A selection of flamenco dances familiarly associated with Spain, as well as Spanish regional and classic Spanish dance will be performed. Kati Garcia-Renart choreographed three of the dances, and two were choreographed by her teachers, Mercedes y Albano and Mercedes León.

For further information about the performance, call 914-758-7425.

Performers: Todd Crow, pianist, has been widely acclaimed for performances in North and South America and in Europe. The New York Times has described his playing as "heroic," also citing his "endless flair, color, and stamina." In recent years he has appeared as a soloist with orchestras in the United States, England, the Czech Republic, Venezuela, and elsewhere. He has given recital and chamber music performances at the Berlioz/Dutilleux festival in Manchester, England, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and Washington's National Gallery of Art, and with the St. Luke's Chamber Ensemble at the Brooklyn Museum, Weill Recital Hall, and Alice Tully Hall. He made his London orchestral debut at the Barbican Center with the London Philharmonic in 1986 and in 1992 made his Carnegie Hall debut as soloist with the American Symphony Orchestra. He is music director of the Mount Desert Festival of Chamber Music in Northeast Harbor, Maine. In addition to many appearances at the Bard Music Festival, he has played at the Casals Festival, Music in the Mountains, and the Maverick Concerts, among others. His recordings of Liszt's transcription of Berlioz's Symphonie fantastique and works by Sergei Taneyev are scheduled to be released in 1999. Crow is an honors graduate of the University of California and The Juilliard School; his teachers have included Irma Starr, Erno Daniel, Ania Dorfmann, and Emanuel Bay. He is professor of music at Vassar College, Poughkeepsie.

Kati Garcia-Renart, Spanish dancer and choreographer, is a graduate of Bard College, where she majored in dance and began studying flamenco under Aileen Passloff. In 1990 she -continued- went to Spain to continue her work in flamenco and other Spanish dance forms. She studied with Mercedes y Albano and Mercedes León, as well as with La Cintia. During that time, Garcia-Renart performed in various theaters in Madrid, taught modern and Spanish dance at the Academy Relatores, and had her own choreography performed in Madrid. For the past four years she has given workshops in New York and Massachusetts. She has performed at the Rhinebeck Performing Arts Center, the "Salsa by the Sea" festival in Hyannis, Massachusetts, and at the Kaatsbaan Center for Dance's "Starburst of Dance" benefit at the Bardavon Opera House in Poughkeepsie. She teaches at the Performing Arts Center in Rhinebeck and at the Center for Healing Arts in Stone Ridge.

Luis Garcia-Renart, cellist, was born in Barcelona, Spain, and studied at the Music School of the National University and the National Conservatory of Music in Mexico. From 1951 until 1956, his studies were supervised by Pablo Casals. He attended the conservatories of Bern and Basel, Switzerland, and Trossingen, Germany, where he was a pupil of Sandor Veress and Sandor Vegh. Garcia-Renart studied directly under Casals in France and in Puerto Rico from 1956 to 1960, when he won a scholarship to study at the Conservatory of Moscow with Rostropovich and Khachaturian. He has appeared in solo performances in Europe, the former Soviet Union, Israel, and in North and South America. Prizes awarded Garcia-Renart include the Casals International Contests in Paris in 1956, in Xalpa in 1959, and in Israel in 1961. He is also the recipient of the Harriet Cohen Cello Prize in London in 1959. Garcia-Renart is professor of music at Bard College. He is also on the faculty at Vassar College, Poughkeepsie; the Piatigorsky seminars at the University of Southern California; and the Yale Summer School of Music and Art. He is music director of the Cappella Festival Chamber Choir and Orchestra and the Woodstock Chamber Orchestra. He performs frequently as a soloist in recitals and chamber music both here and abroad.

This event was last updated on 03-02-2001

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