Vladislav Kovalsky discusses the 50th anniversary commemorations of the Monmouth Conservatory of Music on a recent news program. (Click to enlarge)
After a long run, it remains one of Red Bank’s best-kept-secret arts treasures: the public-welcome series of free classical music concerts that occur on a regular basis at the Monmouth Conservatory of Music on White Street.
Mixing guest performances by internationally touring artists with the showcased talents of the school’s faculty and students, the events are merely the most visible and audible manifestations of an entity that has trained generations of young musicians for 50 years.
This Saturday afternoon, the staff and students of MCM travel from their home in the heart of the downtown business district to the Count Basie Theatre, where executive director Vladislav Kovalsky and company will cap a yearlong Golden Anniversary observance with a pair of world-premiere works by New Jersey composers. They’ll also salute the man who first got the notion of establishing a serious music school in the borough that birthed the bandleader-legend Bill Basie.
And they’ll be joined by some special young guests, too.
The name of Felix Molzer, while perhaps not a household word in millennial Red Bank, is a significant one in the cultural history of a little town that’s cast a giant profile on the area’s music scene. The European-born educator, composer and arranger – a former conductor of the Vienna Boys Choir in his native Austria – established what became the Monmouth Conservatory upon relocating to the Red Bank green in 1964.
Before retiring as the MCM’s director in 1992, Molzer (who passed away in 2005 at age 83) also served as director of another source of local pride among serious music buffs: the venerable Monmouth Civic Chorus.
During Saturday’s 2 pm concert at the Count, Molzer’s successor – the Russian-born, internationally renowned pianist Kovalsky – will lead his faculty and student musicians in a program of solo and ensemble pieces highlighted by the twin world premieres. They include Duo Concertante for marimba, piano and string orchestra by contemporary NJ composer and harpsichordist Timothy Broege, as well as Divertimento, a piece specially commissioned by the MCM from the late Gilman Collier.
As for those “special young guests,” take it here for details.
Reserve tickets ($25 general admission) here, and email [email protected] for more about the event and the ongoing programs at the Conservatory.
