Princeton Festival Kicks Off Saturday With Award-Winning a Capella Groups

The 11th annual Princeton Festival kicks on June 6 and 7 with jazz, a cappella vocal jazz and a jazz piano quintet.

The first week of the three-week festival includes free lectures, musical previews, and a hands-on Indian dance demonstration and workshop.

The 2015 festival kicks off on Saturday, June 6, at 8 p.m. in Taplin Auditorium in Fine Hall on the campus of Princeton University with two award-winning a cappella vocal jazz groups.

The Tribunes, a group of five guys who have performed doo wop, R & B, and rock ‘n’ roll with some of the greats of the 1950s and 1960s, will perform some of the of the great songs from those two decades.

The West Side 5 is known for a unique sound that is characterized by original arrangements, complex harmonies, and outstanding musicianship.

New York-based pianist and composer Falkner Evans brings his jazz piano quintet to Clark Music Center at The Lawrenceville School on Sunday, June 7, 4 p.m.

“I want the music to be enjoyable on the first listen, but to open up to show its depths,” Evans says of his “attractive, listenable music full of subtle complexities.”

He will be joined by Marc Mommaas, saxophone, Kirk Knuffke, trumpet, Belden Bullock, bass, and Matt Wilson, drums.

Leading up to the beginning of the festival, there will be three free lectures.

On Tuesday, June 2, Catherine Sprague, historian, pianist and Mozart expert will discuss “Mozart 1784-1786,” a vibrant period in Vienna that was the most productive of the composer’s life.

The lecture takes place in the Princeton Public Library, 7 p.m.

On Thursday, June 4, Marianne Grey, Princeton University Art Museum docent, will present “Figaro, a New Opera Hero,” with illustrations of the political and social change that underlay Mozart’s opera.

The lecture takes place at 7 p.m. in the Lawrence Library, and is repeated on June 25 at 7:30pm in the Princeton Public Library.

“A Marriage of Music and Mayhem: Mozart’s Le Nozze di Figaro” will be the subject of a lecture by Timothy Urban, Professor of Music at Rider University on Saturday, June 6, in West Windsor Library. A second lecture takes place on June 19 at 7:30 p.m. at Princeton Public Library.

Opera artists, production staff and others from Mozart’s Marriage of Figaro will share their personal experiences with audiences during an interactive forum on Wednesday, May 27, 7 p.m.

The Princeton Festival Guild’s The Artists Round Table, takes place in Sheide Hall (next to Miller Chapel) of the Princeton Theological Seminary.

Those involved in the show will share the pleasures and perils faced both on stage and off as they bring the opera to life for its opening performance.

The opera opens on June 13 for three performances, and Spelling Bee on June 12 for ten performances.

A free interactive workshop and demonstration of the classical Indian dance form of Kathak and tabla drum at the Clark Music Center at The Lawrenceville School at 4 p.m. on Saturday, June 6, will presage Pradhanica’s June 27 performance.

For more information and a link to ticket sales (handled by McCarter Theatre), visit www.princetonfestival.org. To purchase tickets by phone, call McCarter Theatre at 609-258-2787.

The attached image of Pradhanica dancer Jin Won was provided by the Princeton Festival