Joanne Wheeler, Flutist, and Eileen Christiansen, Mezzo Soprano, Perform For Beethoven Society

The Beethoven Society’s first meeting of the 89th season will be held on Sunday, September 20, 2015 at 3:00pm at the Melrose Highland Congregational Church, 355 Franklin Street, Melrose, MA. This first meeting will feature two wonderful artists: Joanne Wheeler, flutist, and Eileen Christiansen, mezzo-soprano. The meeting is open to the public and free of charge. Refreshments will be served after the program. Free will offering at the door benefits our Music Award Fund for High School students. This concert is made possible in part by funding from the Melrose Cultural Council and the Melrose Messina Fund for the Arts.

Joanne Wheeler, a Boston area flutist and music educator, will be performing solo flute music of Debussy, Telemann, C.P.E. Bach/J.S. Bach and Ian Clarke. Joanne is a founding member of the flute quintet In Radiance, which last year performed in a Beethoven Society program. Mezzo-soprano Eileen Christiansen, whose voice is described as “richly resonant”, will perform the Kindertotenlieder of Gustav Mahler, accompanied by Dan Wyneken, a voice teacher at the N.E. Conservatory. Eileen is a Boston-based singer of oratorio, opera, and art song. She has performed as a soloist with the Masterworks Chorale, the Wellesley Choral Society, Polymnia Choral Society, The Boston Cecilia, the Belmont Open Sings, and the Salisbury Singers. In March 2015, she sang the role of Dido in Purcell’s “Dido and Aeneas” with the Polymnia Choral Society.