Young Artists Showcase
Saturday, January 21, 2023 at 7:30 pm

A showcase of young college students studying at NYC’s top conservatories. Featured artists include Evan Katsefes (tenor), Jennifer Robinson (soprano), and Nick Fanara (piano). Works of Liszt, Beethoven, Mozart and others TBA. Hosted by MRP Artistic Director Barbara Podgurski.

Artists:
Nick Fanara, piano
Evan Katsefes, tenor
Jennifer Robinson, soprano
Barbara Podgurski, collaborative pianist

Program:
Ludwig van Beethoven (1770-1827) Adelaide 
Franz Schubert (1797-1828) Nacht Und Traume 
Vincenzo Bellini (1801-1835) Ecco mi in Lieta Vesta…Oh Quante Volte I Capuleti I Montecchi 
Gioachino Rossini (1792-1868) Cessa Di Piu Resister (from Il Barbiere di Siviglia)    
Johannes Brahms (1833-1897) Meine Liebe Ist grün
Franz Liszt (1811-1886) O Quand Je Dors
Reynaldo Hahn (1874-1947) L’heure Exquise
Henri Duparc (1848-1933) Chanson Triste 
Giacomo Puccini (1828-1924) Quando M’en Vo (from La Bohème)
Paolo Tosti (1846-1916) L’Alba Separa Dalla Luce Lombra 
Giuseppe Verdi (1813-1901) Addio Addio (duet from Rigoletto)   

INTERMISSION

Ludwig van Beethoven (1770-1827) Sonata in C Major, op. 53 “Waldstein”
Allegro con brio
Introduzione: Adagio molto
Rondo: Allegretto moderato—Prestissimo


Nicholas Fanara is a current student of the Mannes School of Music. He graduated from Fiorello H. LaGuardia High School for Music & Art and Performing Arts, where he was a winner in the school’s 2019 Concerto Competition. He also received the Marianne & Michael Shapiro Music Fund Award for Music, given to a student who excels in classical piano during their time in high school.

A member of the LaGuardia Chamber Music class for two years, Nick’s quartet was invited to perform in the Inaugural Young Musicians Concert, New York City Regional, by the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center in February of 2019. His trio of senior year was also invited to perform again – this time also in Alice Tully – in March of 2020.

He has been a member of the New York Youth Symphony Chamber Music Program for two years, and performed in their Spain Tour during the summer of 2019. In May of 2018, he was invited to perform in the Tomorrow’s Artists Today concert, as part of the Musica Reginae Productions season concerts. And, he was awarded Best Romantic Piece Winner at the Second Annual Youth Competition from the Piano School of New York City.

A versatile performer, Nick has studied at the New York University Summer Piano Intensives, the Luzerne Music Center in Lake Luzerne, NY, and the Vivace Music Festival

Nicholas is studying piano with Dr. Thomas Sauer.

Tenor Evan Katsefes has performed in opera, recital and concert throughout the United States. Mr. Katsefes studies at The Manhattan School of Music in pursuit of a Bachelors Degree in Vocal Performance in the studio of Marlena Malas.

Evan Katsefes currently devotes much of his professional time in the field of Sacred Music as an in-demand musician serving in both Roman Catholic and Lutheran Churches. For five years, Evan was the youngest member of the Saint Patrick’s Cathedral Choir under the direction of Dr. Jennifer Pascual. As a member of this choir, Mr. Katsefes sang at liturgies and events which included two Papal Visits to the United States and his solo debut on the Millennium Stage of the Kennedy Centre in Washington D.C..

Evan also has been featured as soloist at St. Patrick’s Cathedral at the annual A City Sings At Christmas Concert, the Irish Heritage Concert and the Saint Patrick’s Day Mass in 2015. Evan also has served as a Cantor for the Diocese of Brooklyn, which included the recent installation of the eighth Bishop of Brooklyn in November 2021. Mr. Katsefes has been on the rosters of numerous young artist programs, both in-person and virtually at the Curtis Institute of Music, the Chautauqua Institution, Classical Singing and New York in June, and the Queens Summer Vocal Institute. As a student of these programs, Evan has worked with the likes of Susan Graham, Christine Georke, Ben Moore, Margo Garrett, Corradina Capporello, and others. Mr. Katsefes has been very active throughout his career in the arts working closely with many non-profit organizations, such as the Oratorio Society of Queens, where he has been featured as a student choral scholar and served as the Assistant to the Administrative Director. Evan’s affiliation with the Brooklyn Philharmonia Chorus began in 2015, when he joined the board as a member at large and subsequently wrote grants for the chorus, under the guidance of the Brooklyn Council of the Arts.

Recent Concert credits include tenor soloist in Bach’s St. John Passion with The Opera Next Door. In the Summer of 2022, in addition to performing a solo recital following his solo debut as a featured artist with the Oratorio Society of Queens, Evan made his debut at Chautauqua Opera, covering the role of Andrew Johnson in Virgil Thompson’s The Mother of Us All and participated in a workshop reading of The House on Mango Street while simultaneously attending the Chautauqua Opera Conservatory, a Summer-long Young Artist Program in Western New York. In the Conservatory, Evan also sang the role of the Pasek in Janáček’s The Cunning Little Vixen, performed in the institution’s five thousand seat amphitheater.

Evan’s time spent outside of his life in music is filled with adventurous travel, cooking, and supporting the arts in and around New York City, which he calls home. 


Twenty-year old soprano Jennifer Robinson, a native of Florida, is currently studying voice at the prestigious Manhattan School of Music. Living in New York City since the fall of 2021, she has blossomed as a young professional. Working with renowned conductors such as Kent Tritle on Mozart’s Requiem and Fauré’s Requiem, Thomas Muraco performing select scenes as Gilda from Verdi’s Rigoletto, and George Manahan on the ethereal The Planets by Holst, Jennifer has taken every opportunity possible to learn and grow as a young artist. As of April, Jennifer excitedly signed her first professional contract with Ars Musica Chorale, based in Ridgewood, New Jersey, as their concert seasons’ soprano soloist. She is thrilled to be singing Mozart’s Requiem again and expanding her repertoire with a Brahm’s literature concert, as well as the wonderful Messiah by G.F Handel. Alongside this, she is thrilled to be joining incredible pianist and friend Barbara Podgurski for an evening of song alongside Tenor Evan Katsefas this January as a part of the Música Reginae season in Queens, New York. As she tackles the upcoming conservatory semester, she can’t wait to expand her repertoire and further her musicianship and abilities as an artist through these opportunities. 


A native of New York, pianist and teaching artist Barbara Podgurski holds a DMA in piano performance from The Graduate Center (CUNY) as well as a BM in piano performance and an MM in both piano performance and music theory from the Mannes College of Music. Dr. Podgurski has performed as soloist and chamber musician throughout the United States, Canada, Mexico, Caribbean and Europe and has performed at many of the world’s finest venues including a number of performances at Carnegie Hall. She has been featured in numerous television and radio broadcasts, including appearances on WQXR’s Young Artists Showcase, WNYC’s “Soundcheck”, NPR, WPLN Nashville’s “Live from Studio C”, WQED and numerous others. Ms. Podgurski was recently featured on a television documentary for NHK in Japan with her touring partner violinist Elizabeth Pitcairn and the famed “Red” Mendelssohn Stradivarius. Ms. Podgurski was a special guest in March 2015 performing for the National Association of Broadcasters at the 2015 Golden Mike Awards with Grammy-nominated violinist Jenny Oaks Baker. Past collaborations with renowned artists including violinists Philippe Graffin and the late Lorand Fenyves, flutist Harold Jones, clarinetist Charles Neidich, pianists Diane Walsh and Seymour Lipkin, and cellists Manfred Stilz, Marcy Rosen and the late Paul Tobias. 

Dr. Podgurski has premiered numerous new works including a commission of a concerto by Pulitzer-Prize winning composer George Walker which she premiered with the Queens Symphony Orchestra. She is a dedicated proponent of new music, focusing on premiering works of NYC based composers and programming such works each season. Barbara has been working for a number of years with the Department of Cultural Affairs as a contact for organizing and contracting musicians for the 9-11 Commemoration Memorial (live televised broadcast from Ground Zero in NYC) and in 2015 was invited with her colleagues to perform at a private ceremony for Pope Francis and members of the United Nations in an interfaith prayer service during the Papal visit to NYC. 

Dr. Podgurski is currently the Executive and Artistic Director of Musica Reginae Productions in Queens, NY. She is also a member of the Pitcairn-Podgurski-Drachman Piano Trio which just completed its first US tour. A former faculty member at The Mannes College of Music (The New School), Hunter College (CUNY) and Mercy College (NY), she is currently on the faculty of the RiverArts Music Program in Hudson Valley and is a consultant for the Board of Education for both New York City and New York State. By invitation in 2014, Dr. Podgurski became a Steinway Teaching Artist. 

Recent performances include concerts at Carnegie Hall (NY), at the Luzerne Summer Music Festival (NY) and at The Metropolitan Museum of Art in NYC, Trinity Church (NYC), concerts in Palm Beach (FL) and St. Croix (USVI), as well as performing Mozart Piano Concerto in c minor K.491 as soloist with the Astoria Symphony Orchestra in NYC. Barbara is currently a contributing writer to Cambridge’s Nineteenth Century Music Review, an Adjunct Assistant Professor at BMCC (CUNY) and is a staff pianist in the Strings Department at NYU, Barbara performed with rock band Evanescence on their 2017-18 Synthesis Tour and recently performed with legendary vocal group Il Divo their 2019 and 2022 US tours. Barbara is an Arts Commissioner Advisor for the Queens Council on the Arts. In November 2020 Barbara accepted the position of organist/music director at Trinity St. Andrews Evangelical Lutheran Church in Maspeth, Queens. Her most recent performance was at Carnegie Hall in May 2022 celebrating the release of the album Song of the Redwood Tree..