Noontunes Summer Concert Series: Sarah Bach, soprano and Brittany Haskell, organ

Please join us at the Church of the Messiah in Woods Hole on Wednesday, July 29th at 12:15pm, for the final concert of our 2015 Noontunes Summer Concert Series. This concert will feature Sarah Bach, soprano, and Brittany Haskell playing organ and piano. The program will last about 45 minutes, and we will be offering box lunches following the program for anyone who is interested. Please feel free to visit our website www.churchofthemessiahwoodshole.org or call (508) 548-2145 for more information.

Soprano Sarah Bach is possessed with a voice of “sparkling tone”, “very fine legato” and “excellent coloratura technique” and is said to “communicate beautifully and convincingly”. She has sung internationally throughout the UK, Canada and USA including Southwest corridor and the New England area. Her most recent performances include recitals at Northern Arizona University, Smith College, Boston University and New England Conservatory. A champion of new song, her repertoire ranges from oratorio and opera to art song and chamber music. Miss Bach holds a Master of Music degree in Voice from The Longy School of Music. She holds a Bachelor of Music degree in Voice Performance from the University of Massachusetts. She also received vocal and music education training from The Hartt School of Music and The Crane School of Music. Miss Bach is a student of acclaimed mezzo-soprano D’Anna Fortunato and her principal teachers have included Karyl Ryczek, Celina Moore and Ruthann Ryan Hellfach. She has participated in master classes with Rosemarie Landry, Carol Webber, Graham Johnson, Martin Katz, Sondra Kelly, and composers John Musto and Lori Laitman.

Brittany Haskell is the Music Director at the Church of the Messiah in Woods Hole, where she has been since 2008. She also has a large studio of private piano and organ students in the Falmouth/Bourne area. She was the Accompanist and Assistant Director for the Mastersingers By the Sea from 2013-2015 and the Artistic Director for the Greater Falmouth Mostly-All-Male Men’s Chorus from 2009 to 2013. Prior to moving to the Cape, Ms. Haskell was the Music Director at Grace Church in Nutley, NJ.

She earned a Master’s degree in organ performance from Westminster Choir College in Princeton, NJ, where she studied organ with Alan Morrison and was the Graduate Assistant to the Organ Department. She was also the graduating organ student selected to play a solo piece at their commencement ceremony in 2008. She received her Bachelor’s degrees in both Organ Performance and Music Education from the University of Southern Maine, studying organ with Ray Cornils. Prior to her organ studies, she studied piano with Robert Noyes, of Durham, ME.

Ms. Haskell has performed organ recitals at various locations in the North East. In June 2012, she was invited to play the Kotzschmar Memorial Organ in Merrill Auditorium, Portland, ME, for a past-scholarship recipient concert. Other venues she’s performed at include: Basilica of Saints Peter and Paul, Lewiston, ME; South Freeport Church, South Freeport, ME; First Congregational Church, West Newbury, Vermont; First Parish Church, Brunswick, ME; and West Parish Meetinghouse in West Barnstable, MA. She has also appeared in Princeton University Chapel’s noon-time concert series. In 2007, she performed in a noontime concert at the Jack Singer Concert Hall in Calgary, AB, as one of the organists selected from Mount Royal College’s International Summer School 2007. Ms. Haskell has won various awards including the Joan Lippincott Competition for Excellence in Organ Performance (2007) at WCC, the Friends of the Kotzschmar Organ Memorial Scholarship (2005 & 2006), and the organ award in The Maine Federation of Music Club’s Anne Gannett Scholarship Competition (2003).