EUGENE–Choral works, original compositions, string quartet repertoire and Kenyan folk music are featured in four concerts scheduled this week at the University of Oregon School of Music, 961 E. 18th Ave.

For more information, call the UO School of Music weekdays at (541) 346-5678. To confirm concert times and ticket information, call GuardLine from a Touch-Tone phone at 485-2000, ext. 2533, for a taped message of the week’s events.

Four university choral ensembles will share a concert beginning at 4 p.m. in Beall Concert Hall, 961 E. 18th Ave. Tickets, available at the door, are $5 general admission and $3 for students and senior citizens.

The UO Chamber Choir, directed by Professor James Miller, the University Singers, directed by Associate Professor Richard Clark, the UO Women’s Chorus, directed by graduate teaching fellow Misook Yun, and the UO Men’s Chorus, directed by graduate teaching fellow Angelo Dias, each will perform on the program.

Selections include "Amazing Grace" and "My Love is Like a Rose," as well as songs by Brahms, Elgar, Mendelssohn, Festa and Martini.

The Oregon Composers Forum will present premieres of new music by UO graduate composers at 8 p.m. in Beall Concert Hall. Admission is free.

Among the pieces on the program are new works for solo piano, flute trio, violin and piano, piano trio and a soprano-tenor-organ trio.

The Chicago String Quartet will be the featured ensemble in a Chamber Music Series concert at 8 p.m. in Beall Concert Hall. Reserved-seat tickets range from $8 to $22, available in advance from the Hult Center at (541) 682-5000. Student rush tickets will be sold at the door for $5 and $9.

The featured selections on the program are Mozart’s "Quartet in D Major," Beethoven’s "Quartet in F Minor" and Ravel’s "Quartet in F Major."

Fritz Gearhart, the music school’s new violin professor, will give a free talk at 7:15 p.m. in Room 198 of the Music Building, 961 E. 18th Ave. He will offer insights and recorded examples of the concert repertoire.

Founded in 1995 as quartet-in-residence at DePaul University, the Chicago String Quartet is an offshoot of one of Chicago’s most distinguished chamber ensembles, the Chicago Chamber Musicians (CCM). All of the quartet’s players remain members of the CCM, including first violinist Joseph Genualdi, who served on the UO music faculty in the early 1990s. Others in the quartet are violinist Stefan Hersh, violist Rami Solomonow and cellist Christopher Costanza.

The Chicago String Quartet is dedicated to presenting eclectic programs that encompass the entire range of works written for string quartet. The initial three programs in their subscription series at DePaul University featured quartets by Mozart, Schumann, Brahms, Ravel, Bartok, Berg, Barber and Pulitzer Prize-winning composer George Perle. The concerts drew unanimous praise from the Chicago press. Wynne Delacoma of the Chicago Sun-Times found that "the single-minded intensity and unity of purpose they brought to the music was unusual for a quartet that hasn’t yet celebrated its first birthday." The quartet also has performed in New York, Arizona and throughout the Midwest.

Timothy Njoora, a graduate music student from Kenya, will lead a special children’s concert featuring music of his homeland. The one-hour program begins at 10:30 a.m. in Beall Concert Hall. Tickets, available at the door, are $3 for adults, $2 for children and students, or $5 for a family ticket.

The program will center around folk music of Kenya, both traditional and popular. Njoora will teach youngsters some Swahili words, teach them a popular Kenyan folksong and a traditional Kenyan lullaby.

Njoora is a Fulbright scholar and a doctoral degree student in music education and ethnomusicology at the University of Oregon. He has taught composition, aesthetics and music education courses at Kenyatta University in Nairobi for 14 years, and served as chair of the music department the past four years. He has written music for choir, orchestra and piano.

The Children’s Concert Series, subtitled "Lively Music for Young Listeners," is designed to present children ages 5—12 with a variety of interesting listening experiences, and to expose them to a broad musical spectrum that they might not otherwise encounter.

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