Guest Artists at Season Finale Concert

The SUSTAINABILITY concert, to be held at 7:30PM on April 25th at Callaway Auditorium, celebrates the fourth guiding principle of the LaGrange Symphony Orchestra. The four principles are ARTISTRY – 9/20/22, COMMUNITY – 11/1/22, EDUCATION – 3/21/23, and SUSTAINABILITY – 4/25/23.

Within this robust concert, two guest artists will be featured. Sicong Chen will perform Korngold’s Violin Concerto in D Major and Don Papenbrock will perform Camille Saint-Saëns Symphony No. 3 (The Organ Symphony). This LSO concert, conducted by Maestro Richard Prior, will be the orchestra’s season finale, and will end a fantastic concert series in a big way. Plan to attend!   TICKETS HERE

THE PROGRAM:

Boulanger: D’un matin de printemps

Erich Wolfgang Korngold: Violin Concerto in D Major, Op 35
with guest artist 2023 LSO Young Artists Competition winner, Sicong Chen, violin

Saint-Saëns: Symphony No. 3 Organ Symphony
with guest artist, Don Papenbrock, organ

More about Sicong Chen and Don Papenbrock

Sicong Chen

Of the two guest artists, Sicong Chen will appear first on the program. He is the winner of the 2023 Young Artists Competition that was held in February of this year. Sicong impressed the judges with Erich Wolfgang Korngold’s violin concerto in D, op. 35 – I. Moderato nobile. Mr Chen will perform this winning piece for the audience, this time with full orchestra.

Born in Beijing, China, Sicong Chen began studying violin at the age of 12 with one of China’s most distinguished violin pedagogues, Xiongda Jiang. He received his bachelor and master of Music at Arizona State University, serving there as a New American Scholar and Graduate Teaching Assistant under Professor Danwen Jiang.

Chen made his solo debut in 2012, performing alongside the Beijing Youth Symphony Orchestra at the Forbidden City Concert Hall. Since then, Chen has appeared as a soloist and ensemble musician in venues all across the globe. Recent seasons highlight his performances at the Beijing Concert Hall, the Millenium Monument Concert Hall, the Zhongshan Concert Hall, the China National Library Concert Hall, and Weill Recital Hall at Carnegie Hall. Chen also made his recording debut in 2015, featuring works by his first teacher Xiongda Jiang, alongside the Beijing Youth Symphony Orchestra.

Chen has received top awards in the Sicong Ma National Violin Competition, Hong Kong International Violin Competition, Schoenfeld International String Competition, Hong Kong International Chamber Music Competition, China Hummingbird Chamber Music Competition, and Schwob School of Music Concerto Competition.

Having served as concertmaster throughout his studies at the Beijing Youth Symphony Orchestra, Arizona State University Symphony Orchestra and the Schwob Philharmonic, Chen is an experienced ensemble leader and highly enjoys collaborating with his peers, educators and acclaimed artists through chamber music and orchestral playing. He has participated in music festivals such as Bowdoin, Montecito, Red Rocks, Taconic, Centrum, and Interharmony international festivals. During these festivals, where he studied with and performed alongside artists such as Sergiu Schwartz, Boris Kuchnir, Nicholaj Znaider, Andrès Cardenes, Shmuel Ashkenasi, Cho-Liang Lin, and Vadim Repin. He has been featured by Germany’s Sulzbach-Rosenberg Stadt newspaper numerous times and noted as an extraordinary classical ensemble musician. In 2018, he was invited as a guest artist for the International Clarinet Festival in Ostende, Belgium, and in 2021, he was invited to give a presentation and perform as a featured soloist with Orchestra Northern Arizona.

Since 2021, Sicong Chen is studying in the violin studio of Sergiu Schwartz, the William B. and Sue Marie Turner Distinguished Faculty Chair in Violin, serving as a Graduate Assistant at the Schwob School of Music at Columbus State University. As of 2021, he also acts as an Ambassador for the Samuel Vargas International Music Foundation, teaching and mentoring young aspiring talents.

Don Papenbrock

Performing Charles-Camille Saint-Saëns’ Symphony No. 3 (also known as the Organ Symphony) with the LSO, will be Don Papenbrock.

Mr. Papenbrock is a resident of Georgia, but originally hails from Jacksonville, Florida. Don is a graduate of Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, GA in Industrial Engineering. He is also a graduate from Jacksonville University, Jacksonville, FL in Business, and in Music under the study of Professor William Saunders.

Don Papenbrock has thirty-four years’ worth of professional credits over many venues, including professional music theater, community productions, solo concerts, and church positions as music director and organist. Don is currently employed as data analysis manager by Cox Communications as well as being principal organist at The First United Methodist Church of LaGrange.

Performing with the LaGrange Symphony Orchestra on April 25, 2023, Mr. Papenbrock will be playing state-of-the-art electronic equipment, which is his own personal build. Don has combined his extraordinary technological and engineering expertise with his music abilities to bring you something truly remarkable in Callaway Auditorium. This instrument is capable of reproducing sounds from various famous organs most impressively! Recently, this Hauptwerk equipment enticed audiences with the Mascioni organ of Chiesa di San Giovanni Evangelista in Alessandria, Italy and the organ from St. Laurenskerk basillica, in Rotterdam, Netherlands.

The music within Symphony No. 3 was recognized by the composer as one of his best works.
Camille Saint-Saëns said, “I gave everything to it I was able to give. What I have accomplished here, I will never achieve again.”

Read more about Charles-Camille Saint-Saëns HERE

This concert performance of Symphony No. 3 will be inspirational. You will hear, feel, and remember this season finale concert for a long time.

GET TICKETS for the LSO 22/23 season finale concert “SUSTAINABILITY” HERE

Season Finale and Announcement