St. Mark’s to host Summer Serenata
By Angie Landsverk
A violinist who has performed throughout the world will be featured in the next Summer Serenata at St. Mark’s.
Bernard Zinck will be the soloist in the Saturday, July 29 concert, at St. Mark’s Episcopal Church.
The concert will begin at 2 p.m., in the church’s Garden of Blessings.
It is free and open to the public, with donations encouraged.
Hors d’oeuvres and wine will be available, with the proceeds benefiting the church.
There will be tents in the garden for those who want to sit in the shade.
The church is located at 415 S. Main St., in Waupaca.
The July 29 concert will be the third of four in a summer concert series being presented by the Vivace Chamber Players.
The upcoming concert will include 11 musicians on strings and keyboard.
The group will perform two pieces: Edward Elgar’s Serenade for Strings and Johann Sebastian Bach’s Concerto for Violin in E major.
The Bach piece will feature Zinck as the soloist.
Emily Sipiorski, a violinist and co-founder of the chamber group, has a connection to Zinck.
He was one of her professors when she was a graduate student at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee.
In fact, when Sipiorski auditioned there for graduate school, her audition was before him.
“On a whim, I contacted my old professor at UW-M and asked if he would be interested in playing. I didn’t think he would. He said, ‘Yes,’” she said.
She remembered her former professor’s dedication to education and outreach.
He agreed to be a part of the Bach concerto she had in mind.
Playing a Bach piece was Sipiorski’s idea, as it will lead up to this fall’s Bach festival in the community.
“It all fell together,” she said of the July 29 concert.
Sipiorski describes Serenade for Strings as a “beautiful piece that was also on my wish list.”
She said it will complement the Bach piece well.
Zinck is an associate professor of violin at UW-Milwaukee and also the director of its Sorkin Chamber Music Institute.
Born in Tours, France, he is a graduate of the Paris Conservatory, the Julliard School (Fulbright Scholar) and Temple University.
Zinck has performed throughout the United States, Europe, Asia and South America.
He has also served on the faculty of the Cologne Hochschule for Musik and taught master classes throughout the world.
The Giovanni Battista Rogeri violin he performs on is dated 1690.
This is the first year the Vivace Chamber Players is presenting Summer Serenata at St. Mark’s.
Sipiorski explained how the group came together and ended up planning the summer concert series.
The Vivace Chamber Players formed in the spring of 2013 after the Waupaca Area Orchestra’s first concert in 2012.
Sipiorski said it started because of the need for a small chamber group in the area.
Orchestra members from the Waupaca area had a desire to play chamber music, she said.
“It progressed from playing at weddings and parties to putting together recitals,” Sipiorski said.
Collaborations with St. Mark’s began after its Garden of Blessings opened last summer.
Rev. Nigel Bousfield contacted Sipiorski and asked if members of the group would be interested in playing there.
The group did.
Then he approached her with the idea of doing something this year as well.
“I had been thinking about a summer concert series,” she said. “It just really was a great marriage for our group and St. Mark’s.”
The first concert took place in the garden in June.
There was also one there on July 15. After July 29, the final concert of the series will be on Saturday, Aug. 12.
It will also begin at 2 p.m., with that program set to showcase musicians from the community.
Sipiorski said there is a lot of talent in the Waupaca area, and much of it is hidden.
She hopes to continue making connections with area musicians.
“We are planning to continue the summer concert series, and maybe not just in the summer,” Sipiorski said.